Market research & new things

 “You can do market research to check your ideas, but my belief is that market research is not particularly effective when it comes to truly new things. Market research is useful but only for checking things that already exist. Consumers can only give you meaningful feedback on what they already know. For truly innovative things, you are better off testing them on the market. So, to make sure that my ideas were fine, we tried a few of them in a limited way to make sure they worked. ”

Trecho retirado de “Organizing for the New Normal” de Constantinos Markides.

"It is amazing how many organizations fall into the trap of not making the required choices on strategy"

"Decisions about strategy are the prerogative of top management and cannot be delegated to employees. For example, deciding what customers to target or what products to sell are strategic decisions and must be made by top management. Similarly, changes to strategy are also the domain of top management. You cannot have employees changing the product offering or the customers being targeted without the direct input of their leaders.

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Employees can have autonomy to act on operational issues that improve what we are already doing, but not on the strategic choices that the organization has made that define its strategic direction.

Obviously, for employees to tell the difference between operational and strategic issues, they must first know what strategic choices the organization has made. This implies that the most important parameter that will guide employees’ behaviors—and the parameter that will allow us to give autonomy without fear of losing control—is our clearly communicated strategy. 

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a 2013 academic study reported that even in high-performing companies with clearly articulated strategies, only 29 percent of employees knew what their company’s strategy was. This is not an isolated finding—survey after survey reports that employees seem to be in the dark when it comes to their organization’s strategy, despite claims by senior management that their strategy is clear, well communicated, and understood by their employees.

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Reason #1: Failure to Make the Difficult Choices That Strategy Requires

Strategy is all about making difficult choices—what the organization will do, and more importantly, what it will not do. The question that immediately arises is: “choices about what?” There is no agreed answer to this question, but at the very least there are three choices about strategy that need to be made—the who, the what, and the how. Specifically:

• Who should we target as customers and who should we not?
• What shall we offer these customers and what shall we not?
• How should we achieve all this—what value chain activities should we undertake and what activities should we not?”

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The biggest strategic mistake that organizations make is not that they miss one or two choices in their decision making; it is that they do not make choices at all.

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It is amazing how many organizations fall into the trap of not making the required choices on strategy. One reason for this is the fact that these are not easy choices to make—ex ante, there are many possible answers to each one of the three questions.

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There may be additional reasons, but the end result is that organizations consistently and predictably fail to make the necessary choices that strategy requires. Faced with uncertainty, they invest some of their resources going after customer X and some going after customer Y—just to be on the safe side. In the process, they do a disservice to both X and Y (by underinvesting in both), but at least they ensure that they do not make a mistake by choosing one that may turn out to be wrong five or ten years down the road. Similarly, faced with the prospect of upsetting some of their colleagues, they allocate their limited resources to projects and regions that do not fit with the organization’s goals or direction. In the process, they underinvest in the things that deserve their attention, but at least they do not upset their colleagues!

Failure to make choices leads to the first key reason why we have lack of clarity in strategy: Instead of being a clear statement of the (difficult) choices that the organization has made, strategy becomes nothing more than a vague and generic statement that lists all the wonderful things that the firm aims to achieve. It says all the right things so that nobody can really disagree with it, but fails to state the one thing that will offer guidance to employees— the choices the organization has made—exactly because no choices have been made. When you read the annual report of any company, what you get is good-sounding motherhood statements masquerading as strategy statements, a point also made by other academics. These offer no guidance or direction to employees. No wonder these people complain that they have no idea what their organization’s strategy is. They do not know it because the organization does not really have a strategy!"

Trechos retirados de “Organizing for the New Normal” de Constantinos Markides.  

"Advertise the good behaviors, not the bad ones"

Ao ler.

"Small and seemingly trivial changes in the immediate environment or in the way we behave can have a big influence on what people do or how they behave."

Dei uma interpretação diferente daquela que a maioria das pessoas tem. Quem lê esta frase, olha para o futuro e pensa que a melhoria da situação actual pode depender de pequenas mudanças. Pensei, pequenas mudanças no passado podem ter criado a situação dolorosa actual.

Uma exemplo interessante sobre essas pequenas acções:

"Leaders can use this fact to influence their employees. How? By “advertising” the behaviors they want to encourage in their organization. For example, advertise that the majority of your employees are team players rather than complain about those that do not collaborate as much as you want. Similarly, advertise that the majority of your people come to work on time rather than complain about those that arrive to work late. Simply “advertising” the right behavior will encourage everybody to conform to that.

It sounds simple, but the truth of the matter is that we do the exact opposite in organizations: We complain about the lack of cooperation, or people arriving late to work, or not experimenting enough. By doing this, we are advertising the “bad” behaviors and in the process encouraging even good employees to conform to them.

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Advertise the good behaviors, not the bad ones."

Trechos retirados de “Organizing for the New Normal” de Constantinos Markides.

O poder das estórias

"Make the Need for Change Personal

First, give them all the negative facts about disruption and warn them that if we don’t change, bad things will happen to us. This is the threat framing that is necessary to demonstrate that we are not hiding from reality. But as already pointed out, you should not stop there. Complement this threat framing with a positive reason why we need to change. The key is to make sure this positive reason is personal to every single employee.

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A statement, however nice or inspiring, will not by itself elicit emotion from people. We therefore need to go beyond simply communicating to people to doing certain other things to support what we say. Here are a few tactics illustrating what we could be doing:

Walk the talk: It should be obvious that we need to support what we are saying with actions. Nothing could be more persuasive to people than seeing their senior leaders behave in ways that support what they are proclaiming, especially when the actions are not cost-free. 

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Visualization: Things that people see are more likely to evoke emotions than things they hear or read. You should therefore help them visualize what you are trying to sell to them. This suggests that instead of simply telling them, “We need to become customer-centric because that will make our customers happy,” it is better to show them a video of happy customers complimenting the company on its customer responsiveness. Similarly, instead of telling them, “We need to become more innovative because that would save people’s lives,” it is better to bring patients into the organization to tell the employees how your company’s products have saved their lives.

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Story-telling: Stories and how you tell them are more likely to evoke emotions than a presentation. You should therefore support what you are selling to people with stories."

Uma ilustração do poder das estórias nesta figura:

Quando se apresentam os factos associados a uma medicação e uma estória positiva ou negativa associada, vemos a taxa de aceitação dessa medicação. O caso B é particularmente impressivo!

Outra ilustração:

Trechos retirados de “Organizing for the New Normal” de Constantinos Markides. 

Minerar mercados

Em 2015 chamei aos disruptores de mineradores:

"o seu negócio não é low-cost? Então, agradeça aos membros low-cost o trabalho de "mineração" que fazem, eles criam os seus potenciais futuros clientes. Eles "ensinam-lhes" o bê-à-bá da actividade. Depois, alguns ficarão sempre por aí, mas outros ganharão uma paixão e sentirão uma necessidade genuína de subir para outros desafios. É aí que entra a sua empresa, dedicada a servir um grupo que quer mais do que o básico. Para isso, precisa de ter uma estratégia clara e estar alinhado com ela."

Recordo este postal de 2020, "O low-cost como um aliado". 

Agora, em “Organizing for the New Normal” de Constantinos Markides encontro:

"when we look at one specific disruption that is affecting numerous companies: the arrival of a new and disruptive business model in an established market. If there is one thing we know about disruptive business models it is that they grow by attracting two different types of customers: the customers that are currently served by the established companies, and entirely new customers that enter the market for the first time.

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When it arrives, the new business model attracts customers that are different from the customers of the core business. 

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These “different” customers are what sustain the new business model in the short term, but the innovators who introduced the business model keep improving it year after year until it reaches a point that it becomes “good enough” for the customers of the core business. That’s when these core customers begin to switch to the new model and that is when the cannibalization of the core business begins."

 

Para reflexão

Antes de voltar para a 2º mão da pintura que ando a fazer, aqui vai um vídeo curto mas directo à ferida que assola tantas PME... sobretudo as PME porque têm menos recursos.


Séries como "Tecto de vidro" abordam as consequências deste erro.
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E num mundo que se embrenha no Estranhistão, num mundo de tribos, num mundo que busca autenticidade, que está em processo de polarização, ser específico é ainda mais importante.

"the biggest mistake that companies make is they fail to make choices"

"the biggest mistake that companies make is they fail to make choices"
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3 escolhas fundamentais:

• para quem trabalhar e para quem não trabalhar? (recordar a Lei de Gresham)
• que produtos e serviços oferecer e que produtos e serviços não oferecer?
• que ecossistema da procura desenvolver, como levar a oferta até aos clientes?

Claro que a primeira opção leva a equacionar:

• a segmentação dos clientes e a geografia da presença

A segunda opção leva a desenvolver:

• uma proposta de valor

A terceira opção leva a construir:

• um mosaico de actividades que se reforçam

Não se escolhem primeiro as pessoas sem saber qual é a estratégia.

Há dias escrevi "Não há boas-práticas!!!"
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E expliquei porquê. Não há boas-práticas em abstracto, tudo depende de quem são os clientes-alvo de qual é a proposta de valor.
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Já Porter no seu "What is Strategy?" alerta para a necessidade de fazer trade-offs para criar um mosaico, expressão usada por Markides, um tecido que torne mais sustentável a estratégia escolhida.
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Steve Blank mostra várias vezes como é perigoso pôr gestores habituados a lidar com empresas estabelecidas, a comandarem startups ainda na fase do Customer Discovery e Customer Development.
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Gary Klein chama a atenção para a importância da experiência prévia para ajudar as pessoas na tomada das decisões.
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Assim, faz sentido pôr em causa "Primeiro quem... depois o quê"... não faz sentido escolher as pessoas sem primeiro equacionar qual é a estratégia, quem são os clientes-alvo, qual é a proposta de valor.
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Nunca descansar, nunca assentar, nunca confiar que o futuro será uma extrapolação linear do presente

"Therefore, a company must never settle for what it has. While fighting it out in its current position, it must continuously search for new positions and new opportunities (Moi ici: a exploration e exploitation de March).
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Simple as this may sound, it contrasts sharply with the way most firms compete in their industries: most of them take the established rules of the game as given and spend all their time trying to become better than each other in their existing positions - usually through cost or differentiation strategies. Little or no emphasis is placed at becoming different from competitors. This is reflected in the fact that most firms which strategically innovate by breaking the rules of the game are small niche players or new market entrants. It is rare to find a strategic innovator who is also an established industry big player - a fact which hints at the difficulties of risking the sure thing for something uncertain."
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Para terminar a leitura do artigo  da revista Business Strategy Review, publicado em 1999, da autoria de Constantinos Markides, intitulado "Six Principles of Breakthrough Strategy".
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Nichos, nichos, nichos, nichos, nichos, nichos.
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Chegar e deitar abaixo o pau do circo para, no meio da confusão instalada, enquanto os incumbentes tentam perceber o que se passou, avançar com algo novo, com algo diferente.

Um emaranhado auto-catalítico que conspira para emergir uma sinergia competitiva bem sucedida

Parte I, parte II.

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Na parte I abordam-se as questões a considerar para formular, ou reformular, uma estratégia.

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Na parte II chama-se a atenção para o aviso: façam escolhas claras!!!

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Depois, lembra que as escolhas têm de se reforçar num emaranhado auto-catalítico que gera uma rede de sinergias, e o poder realmente surge da conspiração que emerge dessas sinergias:

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"Choosing what to do and what not to do is certainly an important part of strategy. However, strategy is much more than this. Strategy is also about combining these choices into a system that creates the requisite fit between the needs of the environment and what the company does. Combining the firm's choices into a well-balanced system matters more than the individual choices.

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In designing the company's system of activities, managers must bear four points in mind:

• first, the individual activities we choose to do must be the ones that are demanded by the market...
• second, the activities we decide to perform must fit with each other...
• third, activities must not only fit but must also be in-balance with each other...
• finally, in designing these activities, not only should we pay particular attention to the interrelationships in this system but we should also be aware that the "structure" of the system will drive behaviour in it. What our people do in the firm is conditioned by this underlying structure. Therefore, if we want to change behaviour, we will have to change the structure of the system."

Este encaixe, esta combinação é mágica. O stuck-in-the-middle é a consequência de não se assumirem estas sinergias.

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Continua.

Estranho...

Na página 3 do Caderno de Economia do semanário Expresso de 28 de Agosto de 2010 pode ler-se, num artigo sobre a aterragem violenta do sector da Construção em Portugal:

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"A retoma será assegurada pelo investimento privado.

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Com reformas estruturais no país, a construção terá condições para se tornar o sector líder das exportações."

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Palavras de Vera Pires Coelho, Presidente da Edifer.

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Engraçado... ou estranho. As empresas com que tenho trabalhado e que são um sucesso a exportar, caracterizam-se por um pormaior, fazem um by-pass ao país, fazem um by-pass ao Estado. Têm sucesso apesar do Estado normando que as oprime, não precisam de apoios do Estado.

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Se elas estivessem à espera, ou precisassem da ajuda do Estado, teriam de se concentrar em conquistar o apoio do Estado, e desviariam a sua atenção do mais importante: responder às questões de Markides.

Fazer escolhas claras!!!

Parte I.

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Volto ao artigo da revista Business Strategy Review, publicado em 1999, da autoria de Constantinos Markides, intitulado "Six Principles of Breakthrough Strategy" para enfatizar uma característica das boas estratégias: a clareza:

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"Strategy Involves Making Clear Choices

Having developed a long list of strategic options, the firm has to decide what to actually do. This means that every idea needs to be evaluated and choices made on what to pursue and what not to pursue.

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Choosing is difficult. At the time of choosing nobody knows for sure whether a particular idea will work nor does anybody know if the choices made are really the most appropriate ones. One could reduce the uncertainty at this stage either by evaluating each idea in a rigorous way or by experimenting with the idea in a limited way to see if it works or not. However, it is crucial to understand that uncertainty can be reduced but not eliminated. No matter how much experimentation we carry out and no matter how much thinking goes into it, the time will come when the firm must decide one way or another. Choices have to be made and these choices may turn out to be wrong. Lack of certainty is no excuse for indecision.

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Not only must the firm choose what to do but it must also make clear what it will not do. The worst strategic mistake possible is to choose something but also "keep our options open" by doing other things as well." (Moi ici: receita para acabar atolado no pântano da indefinição do meio-termo)

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"Organizations which say one thing and then do another are those that have failed to make clear choices on what they will do and what they will not do with their strategy."

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Escolher, cortar, deixar de fora, focar, concentrar... tão difícil!

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Por isso é que as crises extremas, as burning-platforms, precipitam as situações e obrigam a tomar decisões com um sentido de urgência.

Saltar do disco do HOW, HOW, HOW, HOW.

A revista Business Strategy Review publicou em 1999 um artigo Constantinos Markides intitulado "Six Principles of Breakthrough Strategy".

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O artigo é muito interessante. Destaco, numa primeira parte:

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"In every industry, there are several viable positions that companies can occupy. The essence of strategy is, therefore, to choose the one position that our company will claim as its own. A strategic position is simply the" sum of the answers that a company gives to the questions:

• WHO should I target as customers?
• WHAT products or services should I offer them?
• HOW should I do this in an efficient way?

Strategy is about making tough choices on these three dimensions: the customers we will focus on and those we will consciously not target; the products we will offer and the ones we will not offer; the activities we will perform and the ones we will not perform." (Moi ici: escolher o que fazer e o que não fazer. Matar filhos, produtos ou serviços tornados obsoletos, é quase blasfémia. Como desenhou Seth Godin, o attachement cega).

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"Strategy is all about choosing and a company will be successful only if it chooses a distinctive (ie different from competitors') strategic position. Sure, it may be impossible to come up with answers which are 100% different from the answers of our competitors but the ambition should be to create as much differentiation as possible whilst satisfyng your chosen customers' needs.

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The "WHO-WHAT-HOW" decisions set the parameters within which the company will operate. At the same time, they also define the terrain for which the company will not fight: the customers it will not pursue, the investments it will not make, the competitors it will not respond to. As a result, these decisions are painful to make and are often preceded by internal arguments, disagreements and politicking. But unless a decision is taken, the company will find itself spreading its resources too widely with no clear focus or direction." (Moi ici: De acordo com tudo isto, só acrescentaria outra questão, anterior às outras: Qual é o nosso negócio? Ou, seja, ter em conta a primeira lei que Tony Hsieh aprendeu com o poker "Table selection is the most important decision you can make. It’s okay to switch tables if you discover it’s too hard to win at your table. If there are too many competitors (some irrational or inexperienced), even if you’re the best it’s a lot harder to win.")

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"Most managers have a strong bias towards the "HOW" question (Moi ici: Atenção a este ponto muito importante). Either because they do not think the "WHO" and the "WHAT" choices are real strategic choices or because they think that, once decided, these choices should never be revisited, most managers spend little time on the "WHO" or "WHAT" questions (Moi ici: como refere David Birnbaum "We in the garment industry — both the factory suppliers and the importer/retailer buyers — none of us like strategies. We are very good at tactics. We are masters at dealing with crisis. But long-term strategies are simply not our thing.").

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BUT EXPERIENCE SHOWS THAT MOST BREAKTHROUGHS IN STRATEGY OCCUR NOT SO MUCH WHEN THE "HOW" IS QUESTIONED BUT WHEN THE "WHO-WHAT" CHOICES ARE CHALLENGED.

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Usually, strategic innovation takes place when companies question and chalenge the answers they gave, often a long time ago in their history, to the "WHO-WHAT" questions."

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Saltar do disco do HOW, HOW, HOW, HOW... para o pôr o jogo em causa e virar a mesa é tão difícil.

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Cada vez percebo melhor este título e a ideia subjacente ao livro "Hero with a Thousand Faces" de Joseph Campbell... calçado, têxtil, mobiliário, maquinaria, medicamentos,... à primeira vista parecem histórias diferentes, heróis diferentes, mas depois de alguma análise, começamos a perceber que há um arquétipo por trás disto tudo. Steven Blank tem razão!!!

De volta ao fundamental

Estes tempos são bons para parar um pouco e reflectir sobre o que é fundamental, para não perder de vista o que realmente conta.
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O artigo "What is strategy and how do you know if you have one?" de Costas Markides, publicado no Verão de 2004, pela Business Strategy Review, é uma boa fonte para reflexão.
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Alguns trechos:
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"A company has to decide on three main issues: who will be its targeted customers and who it will not target; what products or services it will offer its chosen customers and what it will not offer them; and how it will go about achieving all this - what activities it will perform and what activities it will not perform.
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"It is absolutely essential that an organization make clear and explicit choices on these three dimensions because the choices made become the parameters within which people are allowed to operate with autonomy. Without these clear parameters, the end result can be chaos. Seen in another way, it would be foolish and dangerous to allow people to take initiatives without some clear parameters guiding their actions."
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"Not only must a company make clear choices on these parameters, it must also attempt to make choices that are different from the choices its competitors have made. A company will be successful if it chooses a distinctive (that is, different from competitors) strategic position."
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"Choices have to be made and these choices may turn out to be wrong. However, lack of certainty is no excuse for indecision."
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Agora, mais do que nunca é o momento de mirar os clientes-alvo (fazer escolhas), de desenhar uma proposta de valor, de fazer o perfil dos clientes, produtos e processos (fazer escolhas e enunciá-las claramente, para perceber as consequências), e de escolher o que fazer e o que não fazer.