What the
VUCA Environment means to a CEO
by Brigadier General George Forsythe, Karen Kuhla
and Daniel Rice
This
article illustrates what VUCA looks like from the CEO’s perspective across a
variety of industries, highlighting specific disruptors —technology, competitors
and market forces— that are impacting their companies. We found these
environmental forces to be similar to what the Army experienced after the Cold
War. Emerging global threats from new competitor nations, as well as non-state
actors (terrorist groups) and dynamic market forces (e.g., changing
geopolitical alliances and shifting national budget priorities), led the Army
leadership to think differently about national security. Advances in digital
technology played an important role in allowing the Army to respond to these
new threats.
Remember
the days of stopping by the local 7-Eleven on the way to work for a cup of
coffee, a donut and a tank of gas? That is still the primary focus of the
largest franchise business in the world with 63,000 convenience stores, but the
business is changing dramatically, according to 7-Eleven CEO, Joe DePinto. Joe
was named the Convenience Store Petroleum (CSP) Retailer of the Year among
consumer and petroleum retailers and has led 7-Eleven for 12 years. “Disruption
is as great as we have ever seen it. We are seeing all aspects of VUCA.” He
described the disruption brought on by e-commerce competitors and the desire to
transform the company before competitors change the industry:
“We are an
immediate consumption business,” he says. “We sell products that are
immediately consumable, and the e-commerce businesses are starting to encroach
on our space. They are in fact beginning to redefine convenience as we have
traditionally known it. The company that epitomizes this is Amazon. Once an
e-commerce book company, they now disrupt businesses across many channels. For
instance, Amazon’s Prime business will deliver anything you want within 2
hours. In time, it will be much faster. That’s why we have been so aggressive
in ramping up our digital initiatives at 7-Eleven. We’re working to move our
company toward being more of a technology company that works in coordination
with our traditional convenience stores. Customers can now order products from
7-Eleven that are picked up by Post Mates or some of our other partners, and
then delivered to the customer within 30 minutes.
“Additionally,
to offer increased convenience, we’re getting into the ‘click-and-pick’
business where customers will be able to order online or through our app, come
to our stores, and the product will be available for them immediately to pick
up, having already been paid for. We are also focused on utilizing our stores
as distribution points for other businesses. Customers can have their boxes
shipped to a local 7-Eleven, and can pick them up at their convenience.
Finally, we are working on digital payment options that are multiple and
varied. Today’s customer wants different payment options. We need to provide
them solutions to pay the way they want. So, we have all of this going on. It’s
really being driven by the customer and new e-commerce entrants. It’s forcing
businesses like 7-Eleven to change the way we have done things in the past.”
Bob
Weidner, President and CEO of the Metals Services Center Institute (MSCI), the
trade group representing the industrial metals supply chain in North America,
shared a story of how adaptive manufacturing and 3-D printing might disrupt the
traditional industrial metals manufacturing process in the industry. This
disruption illustrates dramatic changes in the way industrial metals
manufacturing firms think about business going forward.
A
relatively new CEO to this particular service center was attending one of his
first MSCI conferences. And on that program, we actually had a speaker talking
about additive manufacturing and 3-D printing. Again, that would not
necessarily be the content at a typical trade association’s programming, but
you know, I believe we have delegates in a ballroom for a finite period of
time. Bringing new ideas is part of our value add – because we can see the
world, by definition, through a very broad lens. We are looking at the world
through a producer’s lens. Through a service center’s lens. We are looking at
it through a lens of carbon steel, stainless steel and aluminum. And, again,
our value is to identify on the horizon things that are going to be
fundamentally changing their businesses.
The CEO
went back to his company, pulled together his senior leaders and asked the
question, “What do you guys know about 3-D printing and additive
manufacturing?…I just came from an MSCI conference where I heard enough in the
hour-long presentation that basically told me I don’t know what I don’t know,
so I want you all to put together a little team and come back in 6 to 9 months
(whatever the time frame was.) Come back with a plan for what our company
should be doing in this space.” Flash forward – that company recently bought a
3-D printing company.
Bob Leduc,
President of Pratt & Whitney, with 2016 sales of $15 billion and 38,000
employees, described how the rapid pace of technological advances in the jet
engine industry is requiring his company to become nimble in the face of a
historic growth rate in commercial aviation, advancements in technology, and
increasingly stiff competition.
“There is
no question that we are in a VUCA environment right now,” he says. “When you
think about our business, we’ve got a very complicated landscape. We have
established competitors, but also emerging competitors, particularly in China
and Russia. We have technology that is constantly advancing, and we have
commercial and military customers redefining what their business models are and
[what] they value now vs. what they previously did. So basically, the whole
landscape is moving on us in many different directions and, because of that, we
needed to foster a culture that would allow the organization to move quickly.
Mike
Fucci, Chairman of Deloitte, with 84,000 employees and $18 billion in revenue,
spoke about how the changing nature of work and advanced technology is altering
customer expectations in the professional services market.
“I’d say
the same things that are affecting our clients are affecting us, which is
artificial intelligence, robotics and cognitive technology. Our clients are
struggling with the question of how they incorporate these innovative
technologies into their day-to-day operation. Therefore, if we’re going to
consult with them, we need to be ahead of the curve and help them decide how
they use this technology. The days when you got by using just the experience
you had are gone. We have to anticipate things that aren’t even fully baked
yet, but it’s mostly around technology. I call it the—‘everything is a what-if
scenario.’
“[I]t’s
almost a 180-degree difference [from when I joined the firm] as to what people
need to be learning and how they learn. We don’t work in offices anymore. We
have people in London, on the phone with people in New York…people in South
Carolina. The way we work is so different that training and learning (are
different). It’s more like an extension of college, as opposed to a way to
actually help you build skills that help clients solve problems. When people
enter different levels of their career, like we do a lot of work with new
senior managers and new partners, it’s helping them learn how to operate
differently in those roles, and it’s not just that what got you to where you
were doesn’t work at the next level. It used to be that that technical
experience was kind of all you needed—you had a deep knowledge in something and
you brought that knowledge to clients. We have to stay in front of disruption
with our clients, and as the chairman, one of the things that actually concerns
me a lot is how do we govern over disruption. It’s hard enough to manage over
disruption. How do we govern over disruption? So, how do I build really nimble
leaders to be able to address a little bit of the unknown? That’s why the VUCA
analogy resonates with me, because it’s really more about building leadership
than it is about building technical skills.
These
examples illustrate how executives understand their dynamic business
environments. They all talk about the accelerating rate of change caused by
advances in technology, which have brought new competitors into their market
and forced a rethinking about the nature of work in their companies. In the
next three articles, we will share the ways these leaders are transforming
their organizations to respond to these disruptions.
Fuente: Chief Executive
Haciendo click en cada uno de los links siguientes, Contenidos de nuestros
TALLERES DE CAPACITACIÓN IN COMPANY, "A MEDIDA"
de las necesidades de su Organización:
- Curso Taller ¿Cómo incorporar y aplicar Modelos de PENSAMIENTO ESTRATÉGICO en la Organización? 2018:
- http://medinacasabella.blogspot.com.ar/2016/04/PENSAMIENTO-ESTRATEGICO-2017.html
- Curso Taller de PLANEAMIENTO ESTRATÉGICO - Recetas Eficientes para Escenarios Turbulentos 2018:
- http://medinacasabella.blogspot.com.ar/2016/04/PLANEAMIENTO-ESTRATEGICO-2017.html
- Curso Taller ¿Cómo Gerenciar Eficientemente a partir del MANAGEMENT ESTRATÉGICO? 2018:
- http://medinacasabella.blogspot.com.ar/2016/04/MANAGEMENT-ESTRATEGICO-2017.html
- Curso Taller ¿Cómo GERENCIAR PROCESOS DE CAMBIO y no sufrir en el intento? 2018:
- http://medinacasabella.blogspot.com.ar/2016/04/GESTION-DEL-CAMBIO-2017.html
- Curso Taller de LIDERAZGO TRANSFORMACIONAL para la Toma de Decisiones 2018:
- http://medinacasabella.blogspot.com.ar/2016/04/LIDERAZGO-TRANSFORMACIONAL-2017.html
Consultas al email: mamc.latam@gmail.com
.·. Dr. Miguel Ángel MEDINA CASABELLA, MSM, MBA, MHSA .·.
Especialista Multicultural Global en Management Estratégico, Conducta Organizacional, Gestión del Cambio e Inversiones, graduado en University of California at Berkeley y The Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania)
Consultor en Dirección General de Cultura y Educación de la Provincia de Buenos Aires
Miembro del Comité EEUU del Consejo Argentino para las Relaciones Internacionales
Representante de The George Washington University para LatAm desde 1996
Ex Director Académico y Profesor de Gestión del Cambio del HSML Program para LatAm en
The George Washington University (Washington DC)
The George Washington University (Washington DC)
CEO, MANAGEMENT SOLUTIONS GROUP LatAm
Skype: medinacasabella
Twitter: https://twitter.com/medinacasabella
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