Considering a pivot? Here are a few thoughts that might help.

As days turned to weeks and now weeks turn to months, many of us are realizing that life, work and business will never be the same as it was in February 2020. I am not saying this to be dramatic or to evoke sadness for what we have lost. I intend to actually offer some hope and helpful perspective.

I have been spending time this past year being nostalgic (and writing about that in my personal blog). Through this process it has become so clear to me that our lives are changing on a daily basis. Similar to the way the earth spins on its axis though, we do not feel the movement. But we all accept that we are moving.

Just think for a moment what life, work and business were like in the 70's, 80's and 90's. How different those times were from now - even pre-pandemic. So different.

When I was ten years old (in 1979), I would come home from school, drop off my Adidas book bag, grab my bicycle and be gone until dinner time. My friends and I would ride around the neighborhood, get slurpees from the brand new 7-Eleven, go to the woods and play spy games and even hang out at the public library and sign out books.

At least once a week we got home after dark and felt the consequences. All of this activity was unorganized and unsupervised. The plans were always spontaneous. No one told us what to do.

If you are a parent to a child born post 2000, you know how different life has been for our kids.

I was 23 when I got my first office job. I didn't have a computer or mobile phone. I had a green text mainframe terminal plugged into an inventory system. There was no internet in the office. We didn't have voicemail and we didn't use conference calls.

I updated sales graphs for my team on a coreplast board and a marker. My communication with colleagues was done through memorandums which I wrote by hand and submitted to an Assistant to type (on a computer) and distribute. My messages were on little pink slips of paper which I had to pick up at reception..

Compare that to working life today.

Thousand of changes and shifts are underway everyday in our lives, in businesses and in entire industries. And that has been the case for the entire human history.

I acknowledge that the pace of change has increased. Industries seem to be transformed in months not years. Many of today's businesses are testing multiple product and service variations every single day.

Some companies that started-up five years ago are often in completely different businesses today. This is what we call a pivot. The word is being used a lot right now as a call to action to prepare for the post pandemic world.

If you are in an industry that relies on physical visits and large gatherings, you are being told to pivot to markets and applications that are digital, enable remote working or support virtual experiences.

But the concept of the business pivot in the face of change is not new. Here are three examples I have come across.

1. In post depression 1930's a company sold a product designed to clean the coal residue off interior walls that resulted from the coal burning stoves that were prevalent at that time. When the world switched to different forms of heating like oil and gas, the wall cleaning product was doomed to obsolescence. The company would go bankrupt and thousands of employees would lose their job. Unless they could pivot.

The owners then discovered that a kindergarten teacher had been buying the product for use in her classroom arts program. That prompted a pivot that led to...you guessed it. Play-Doh sells 100 million cans annually.

2. A 75 year-old company (started in 1889) that manufactured playing cards reached a point of market saturation. Every family that wanted playing cards already had several decks and since they had evolved to be made from plastic, they were more durable than their cardboard predecessors.

Rather than close up shop, in 1965 the company looked at what they had learned from their customers and pivoted to toys and games. That company is Nintendo which now generates revenues of $5B annually.

3. Over 20 years ago a young man started a home based company selling snowboards on-line. He was a computer engineer so he created his own software for the on-line transactions. He discovered he wasn't very competitive in the snowboard business and packed it in. That is when he and a couple of friends took his transaction software and started a company that provided an e-commerce platform to empower entrepreneurs of all kinds to grow their small business. Shopify now has over 1,000,000 businesses in 175 countries operating on this platform generating revenues of $41 billion in 2018.

And thanks to this pivot, thousands (if not more) businesses in the past several weeks have been leveraging that platform to transition their business to online. Shopify's share price is up 67% today compared to Jan 2. It is now the second largest company in Canada in terms of market capitalization at just over $100B (taking the spot from RBC). Shopify has now launched a program to provide cash injections to the merchants on their platform to help them stay in business through this time.

More recently I have come across a dozen examples of companies that are pivoting to not only survive this time but to thrive. Within two hours a trendy Italian restaurant converted to a grocery store. Within a week a decades old family retailer serving its local community transitioned to an online retailer servicing an entire province. A distillery converted operations to manufacture hand sanitizer. A courier company transitioned from overnight delivery of non-perishable items to delivering thousands of meals within the same day to essential workers in the financial sector.

The key with business pivots is to start with a deep understanding of the customer need and how those needs are changing and then a conduct a rigorous and creative reflection on the business' entire suite of knowledge, capabilities and assets to identify what might be relevant now. It requires an outside-in approach.

Pivots, by basketball definition, involve keeping one foot planted in your current position while shifting the other foot and the rest of the body in different directions to explore strategic openings and new options.

Applying this to business, you might take your existing product or service to new customers or markets. Or perhaps you might keep everything the same except your distribution or sales channel. You could also, look to satisfy other needs of your existing customer with complementary services products or services. See image below.

These are the more common approaches. Although it is not unheard of for pivots to involve more radical changes with shifts along multiple dimensions (different product, different market) as was the case with Shopify.

Pivots of course also apply to careers. This is also nothing new. What Color is your Parachute? which has sold 10 million copies has been considered the go to guide for job seekers looking to make career changes including those outside of their current function and industry. The more recently published book Designing Your Life is an excellent handbook for creating a life and career where one can thrive. It provides a helpful framework to start from a place of self understanding to generating options for alternative career paths.

I am on my sixth career pivot. I have moved in all directions in the figure above. The ideas, tools and exercises that are now available for deep reflection are very helpful.

In my opinion, career pivots are different from business pivots. Instead of starting outside-in, they start with deep personal reflection - more of an inside-out. But its important to develop multiple career options because the market may not be interested in your first inside-out idea.

Human ingenuity and agility continue to amaze me. Of course, many businesses unfortunately will not survive. But through this crisis, many will pivot and more will launch to provide the services called for by consumers' whose needs are changing. New jobs will emerge, careers will transition. New demand will be created.

It will be remarkable to watch.

So yes, life will not be the same. It will be different and in many ways it will be better.

Do you know someone who wants to learn more about pivots in business, careers or in life? Perhaps you or someone you know needs to find a path to transition during this time. I would be pleased to chat with you - for free, with no obligation.

If you have the time, I would love to hear whether you found this article helpful or not. And if you think it might be helpful to others, please share.