From Vision to Breakthrough Growth - from Innosight CEO Summit

This is short summary from LEADING TRANSFORMATION – 2019 CEO Summit Report by Innosight.

THE GROWTH IMPERATIVE

1. Innosight has long argued that growth doesn’t just happen; it’s a choice.
2. Incremental improvement of the status quo is no longer enough to achieve breakthrough growth. 
3. Business model — or even ecosystem — innovation is the biggest driver of long-term value. 

How leaders enable that — moving from vision and ideation to incubation and operationalization of disruptive change — was the focus of Innosight’s 2019 CEO Summit in Boston.

The ability to enable sustainable breakthrough innovation while still executing in the core business is a tall order. At its heart, it’s a systems issue. It requires the integration of leadership, strategy and innovation. “[You have to have] the right way of thinking to unlock a vision and then move that into a strategy for breakthrough growth,” Johnson said.. 

Growth is particularly hard for large companies for three reasons,

1. Math,
2. Market share and 
3. Maturity

The bigger you get, the more difficult the math is, the harder it is to achieve the next incremental bit of market share, and the trickier it is to identify new opportunities. Yet that is what longevity demands in a disruptive market. The greatest predictor of long-term value creation is not margin expansion, but revenue growth. That’s why disrupters now dominate Top 10 S&P 500 by market cap. “No one beats disruption just by trying to do what they currently do better,” Viguerie said. 

That doesn’t mean that large incumbent firms have to throw away years of acquired knowledge, experience and competitive advantage. Rather, they can harness that for exponential returns in what Viguerie described as dual transformation. “We're talking about leveraging a core capability — something that you're good at, something that you bring to the table — and using that as a basis of creating something new.”

Viguerie offered the audience five actions required for breakthrough growth:

1. Decide whether to grow or go. Growth is first and fundamentally a strategy decision. “Making that choice is decision number one,” Viguerie said.

2. Make “where-to-play” choices. The decisions about which parts of the economy you choose to participate in will enable — or limit — growth. 

3. Determine whether to build a transformative growth platform or focus on the core. “The biggest choice in many companies facing growth is whether they're going to bet on their core or create something new — and what the likely mix is between the two. In all cases, leaders seeking growth must make some curvebending moves.

4. Anchor innovation in customer jobs to be done. What jobs are the customers hiring your product or service to do? Anchoring innovation efforts in that can reveal powerful ideas for business model innovation.

5. Apply granularity. Value is created at the granular level in business. Looking at that level of detail, rather than averages, will sharpen insights and decisions about markets, opportunities and the growth portfolio.

SYNTHESIS AND TAKEAWAYS 

Growth is a choice. Innovation leaders drive long-term value by choosing to move from vision and ideation to incubation and operationalization of disruptive change.

1. The greatest predictor of long-term value creation is revenue growth. Incremental improvement of the status quo is no longer enough in today’s business environment. Disrupters dominate.

2. Dual transformation is possible.

3. The customer jobs-to-be-done framework supports innovation efforts in a number of ways.

4. Winners make big bets. One of the biggest mistakes companies make is underinvesting in the future. Successful innovators understand that the bigger risk is not making the big moves and devote a percentage of investment to transformative innovation.

5. Organizations take different approaches to incubating innovation. 

6. Converting the future vision into an actionable road map is critical. Most leaders approach strategy with presentforward perspective — adapting today’s paradigms for the future. Transformative growth demands a future-back approach: connecting the dots from an idea to inform tangible initiatives for today

Courtesy & Inspiration!

Innosight - Access entire PDF report - https://www.innosight.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Innosight-CEO-Summit-Report-2019.pdf 

Dual Transformation - Quick Guide - https://www.innosight.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Final_Dual-Transformation_Mini-Book.pdf

2018 - report at https://www.innosight.com/insight/leading-transformation-ceo-summit-report-2018/ 

Breaking Downthe Barriers to Innovation - https://www.innosight.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Innosight_HBR_Breaking-Down-the-Barriers-to-Innovation.pdf