Re-entry: Play to Win (AMP Work Blog No. 6)

As I head into the conclusion of the AMP, I find myself contemplating what they call "re-entry": how to apply the learnings from the past 2 months to help the company succeed. 

It would be a very bad idea to come back and start pompously spouting - "In Harvard, this is what we would have done..."!  But on the other hand, just going back to life-as-it-was would be a waste!

One thing that has been swimming in my consciousness is the idea of winning.

Are we playing to win?  Or are we content to keep up with the pack?

Clearly, it's not possible to win in every sphere.  Most people will agree that it's generally unlikely that a steel mill can simultaneously succeed as an advertising agency.  Putting it more narrowly, it remains true that a luxury handbag maker is unlikely to be able to simultaneously succeed as a budget brand. 

So the idea is not to play everywhere and try to be all things to all men, but to win convincingly in our chosen theater of war.

Where are we playing to win?  In the places we play, do we have the determination to be absolute worldbeaters?  And where should we deliberately not play, because if we have no chance to win, why are we there?  Do we have the courage to focus and boldly reset?

After having chosen where we want to play, how can we stoke a burning desire to win?  Perhaps necessity can be a powerful impetus!

In 1914, the adventurer Ernest Shackleton led an expedition to cross the Antarctica land mass.  But his ship, the Endurance, got caught in an ice floe.  Shackleton and his crew spent the next 497 days stranded on the ice (which means they had to survive the Antarctic winter!).  The Endurance was eventually crushed by the ice floe movement, leaving the crew with just a few lifeboats, in the middle of the Antarctic sea, but they somehow managed to sail to Elephant Island.

It didn't end there.  Elephant Island was uninhabited.  So Shackleton and a few of his crew set off for the whaling station on the island of South Georgia - an 800 mile voyage - in a lifeboat.  The rest of the crew remained on Elephant Island to await rescue. 

Weeks later, after fighting storms and the sea, they miraculously landed on South Georgia.  And found they had to traverse a mountain range to get to the other side of the island, where the whaling station was. 

Incredibly, with no equipment, Shackleton and his crew crossed the mountains, eventually found a ship and went back to rescue his men on Elephant Island.  Every crew member survived.

To put perspective on Shackleton's incredible journey, the next successful crossing of the mountains in South Georgia was 40 years later, in 1955, and the  British explorer Duncan Carse commented of Shackleton's earlier achievement "I do not know how they did it, except that they had to."

Are we clear-eyed enough about the necessity of winning?  In 2002, Blockbuster, the mail-order DVD business, registered record profits on the back of five consecutive years of growth.  But that very same year, Blockbuster refused to admit that the emerging upstart Netflix, with 700,000 subscribers, was a competitive threat.  By 2010, Blockbuster had entered Chapter 11.

In 2007, Forbes ran a cover story headlined "Can anyone catch Nokia the cell phone king".  By 2011, Nokia belatedly conceded that their business was on a "burning platform", 4 years after the iPhone's introduction (in 2007!) and 2 years after Android's introduction - but it was too late.  They too did not survive.

A slow glide into obscurity (even from a position of strength) is just as deadly, and far more insidious than a high-profile calamity.  So to repeat - are we clear-eyed enough about the necessity of winning?

What is our response?  That our rivals have competitive advantages?  The interesting thing is, Blockbuster and Nokia had huge competitive advantages in their day too.  But rivals caught up.  Research statistics suggest that the half-life of a competitive advantage is, on average, just 3 years i.e. competitive advantages deteriorate by half in 3 years, and by half again each successive 3-year period. 

Some companies manage to beat the odds and preserve their competitive advantage for much longer.  So in those areas where our company is blessed with great competitive advantages - we need to fight complacency and stay ahead!

In many other areas, our company is striving against rivals with competitive advantages.  But those advantages don't last forever.  We can play hard, play smart, catch up and win!  And not in 5, 10 or 15 years.  3 years, if we're average.  And we're not settling for average, are we...?

Let's focus on where we play, and where we don't.  Then let's be determined to win convincingly where we play.  Where we're ahead, fight to stay ahead.  Where we're behind, believe and act to close the gap, fast! 

Finally, it's no use running fast if you reach the destination first and no one else from your team is with you.  Shackleton's story only means something because he brought his whole crew home. 

We need to help each other succeed.  Believe the best of ourselves and our colleagues.  Don't contest with each other for the spotlight - our rivals are outside, not inside.  Train alongside our colleagues and supervisors and staff to be fit and fast.  Lead and run in the same direction.  Course correct when we stray.  Pick each other up when we fall.  Spur each other on!

Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves.  A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.  Ecclesiastes 4:12