Escaping Disruption

We're surrounded and buffeted by all types of disruption. Until recently, customers bullied suppliers, employers bullied employees, and companies made few exceptions to the rules long established. But then the world changed. And the reactions of human beings -- people -- to those changes, and especially to what those changes made possible, has disrupted every business.

While that has happened, the pace of technological change has quickened as the pace of discovery in both tech and application has accelerated.

For manufacturers, who tend to be a laggard group when it comes to adopting change, these are confusing and challenging times. It is common to believe the evolving technologies can be ignored for several more years as we try to wrap our arms about the changes people now expect.

Ah, but it is not so. There is no escaping disruption. There is only preparing for it, or creating it.

The heads-down tactical mindset of most manufacturers is limiting their abilities to envision a vastly different future. And we can not create a future we cannot envision. So, like the ostrich.....

No business can avoid disruption. No business can operate as it did before and survive the future. Imagine a manufacturer with no heat or electricity, with no computers, one that demands women work only in clerical roles and that men wear ties and fedoras to work. That hires only white Christians.

Disruption comes in many forms and at many speeds. It is not becoming slower or more narrow. While you may hope this digital transformation stuff will bypass your industry, it will only do so as it leaves you in its dust. You'll be replaced by something better and faster and more environmentally friendly.

You cannot escape disruption. Learn how to create it and thrive in it. Or learn about bankruptcy laws in your country.