Doing so can help you protect and build company value
“People only see what they are prepared to see.” Ralph Waldo Emerson is credited with this quote that remains relevant to this day. It’s relevant as it relates to emerging technologies that are slowly or quickly going to change your industry.
Our job as owners and CEO’s is to ensure we take steps to protect and build the net worth of our business. Doing this in today’s environment is as challenging as ever because of the onslaught of emerging and evolving technologies that are changing how we operate and what our customers desire. We must ensure that we are monitoring these technologies and that we are willing to change our paradigms if necessary. Think about businesses like Borders, Toys R Us, Marriott, Yellow Cab and many others that have been disrupted by changing technologies. These companies had plenty of smart people, subject matter experts in their industries and access to talent and to money and yet each of them saw their value negatively impacted by competitors that took advantage of new technologies and changing customers behaviors. Their paradigms were wrong and held them back from seeing what was happening in their industry. Ask yourself, is it possible that my paradigms are going to hold me and my business back from seeing what’s happening with emerging technologies and the impact they are having on our customers? If your answer is even slightly yes, then it’s time to rethink your paradigms.
If you believe the paradigms embraced by you and your team are possibly getting stale and could be soon outdated, ask yourself these questions:
- Is our dialog with our customers and vendors fresh or has it become stale? Are we asking our customers and suppliers new questions to get their perspective on what technologies they see coming at our industry?
- Where are our customers and suppliers investing in new technologies that we should be aware of?
- Are we participating in new industry events and connecting with new industry information sources or are we only connected with older ones that may be getting stale and less cutting edge?
- Are we meeting with new people or are we just staying within our same network and not hearing or learning anything new?
- Have we refreshed our advisors to get new insights?
The list could keep going here but you get the gist. Make sure your personal and professional paradigms aren’t going to put your business valuation at risk. Be willing to challenge and change your paradigms if need be. The world, and specifically technologies, are evolving rapidly and you want your paradigms to add value, not detract from the net worth of your business.
