JUNE 2014 / NO. 2
TAGS: COMPETITORS, WHY?, BANKS, INSURANCE COMPANIES, HEALTHCARE COMPANIES, TELECOM COMPANIES

Strategy is outthinking your competition

“Strategy explains how your organization, when faced with competition, will achieve superior performance. Competing to be unique thrives on innovation. Instead of competing to be the best, organizations can and should compete to be unique”, Michael Porter
Strategy is about shaping the future. There is, however, no guarantee that the future will turn out the way you want. You can use strategy to figure out how to achieve your purpose and ambitions. You move between where you want to go (ends) and what you need to do to get there (means). A great strategy is the quickest route from means to ends to shape your future.
Strategy is also about outthinking your competition, about opening your mind to possibilities and seeing the bigger picture.
Strategy is about making choices differently from your competitors.
Do you know them? See the following ten key questions which will help you find out:
  1. Who are your competitors?
  2. What is your competition doing and what are their future goals?
  3. Which of your competitors motivate you and why?
  4. Who is doing the best work in your sector of industry and why?
  5. Who is doing the best and most exciting work in any industry and why?
  6. What would you do to improve your competitors’ products and why?
  7. What could the competition do to wipe you out and why?
  8. How would you respond to the best/worst your competition could do and why?
  9. What are the best companies in the world doing and why they are successful?
  10. What are other companies doing better than you and why?
Are you able to answer these ten questions? Most of us don’t readily invest in things that haven’t yet proved themselves. Management is always busy with the day-to-day operations of the organization, and so a sense of urgency may be lacking to get the answers for these ten key questions. This is the case for many organizations that blindly follow the actions of their competitors. Examples are banks, insurance and healthcare companies, telecom companies, most FMCGs and others. How are companies able to compete successfully if they don’t watch their competitors continuously, 24/7?
“Do you think you can do today’s job with yesterday’s methods and still be in business tomorrow”
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