A real "Digital Transformation" with "Jobs-to-be-done" (Christensen et. al.) and the "Power of Pull" (Hagel et. al.)

This "note" was written just in time for a talk with John Hagel and Efosa Ojomo during the Global Peter Drucker Forum in Vienna. To understand the new logic of value creation within the "Digital Economy" two approaches are very promising. The "Job-to-be-Done" theory of Christensen, Ojomo et. al. is an alternative to the old thinking in building blocks like product or service. The "Power of Pull" is a fundamental alternative to the old "Push" thinking. Together they are perfect for a real "Digital Transformation" and to understand an economy of collaborative networks and services for a better value creation.

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1. The "Digital Cargo Cults" or real "Digital Transformation"

One year ago Milo Jones and Philippe Silberzahn wrote an important article about the "The Cargo Cult Of Digital Transformation". The author of this article believes that there is not one digital cargo cult, but several, e.g. pseudo actions like digital labs (if they are only islands and have no impact on the rest of the organization) or the focus on efficiency and technology only.

"Digital Cargo Cults" or real "Digital Transformation"?

What is the alternative? Really understanding the "Big Shifts" of Hagel et. al. helps to understand the impacts of the shifts on the "nature" of everything too. This article is a first try to describe a difference that makes a real difference and to present approaches with the most promising ideas for a real change: the "Power of Pull" approach (of Hagel e.al.) & the "Job to be Done" approach (of Christensen et. al.).

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2. The Big Shifts ... (Hagel et .al.) and real transformation

The big shifts, e.g. the technolgical and cultural revolution, change more than just some partial solutions, e.g. the two-sided markets. In the end they will not only change the nature of the firm, but the nature of all building blocks of our old economic thinking.

The Evolution from Product to Platform

A product, e.g. a car, finally will be transformed into a platform, where the car is only the material provider of some services / competencies necessary for a "job to be done"!

But not only technology changes the nature of our building blocks. Tear down the walls - love helps to overcome the limits of our old collaboration within a collaboration 4.0! Adam Smith believed in egoism and work division, the evangelists of the social web dicovered our social relations as platforms of collaboration. Rifikin et. al. hope that common purposes will establish a collaborative purpose economy. Hagel differentiates similar paradigms - access ("1.0"), attract ("2.0"), achieve ("3.0") - of collaboration.

The Evolution from Ego to real Collaboration (4.0)

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3. Hagel and Christensen rethinking the building blocks

If the old nature is no longer valid, what will be the character of the new one? Two theories give us complementary insights to understand the digital transformation:

• The "Job to be done" approach of Christensen, Ojomo et. al. changes the value creation and liberates it from the limitations of the old product and service thinking! Read "Competing against luck" (here) to understand it in detail. Vargo / Lusch offer a similar approach with their Service-Dominant Logic.
• The "Power of Pull" approach changes the collaboration and liberates it from the limitations of the "Power of Push"! Read "Power of Pull" to understand it in detail. Exponential Organization and serveral platform books deliver additional insights.

For the fundamental shift from old to new logic both offer the building blocks needed.

Christensen / Hagel rethinking the building blocks

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4. Integration of Hagel/Christensen: Job to be done/Power of Pull!

The new logic of value creation and the new logic of collaboration, Christensen et. al. and Hagel et. al., can be integrated. The "Job to be Done" is the purpose for the "Power of Pull", the "Power of Pull" provides the collaborative actors for the "Job to be Done".

Integration of Power of Pull and Jobs to be done!

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5. A CNLogic - a Logic of fractal Collaborative Networks

Both approaches inspired a framework of fluid and fractal collaborative "cognitive" networks including human and artificial intelligencies, which was developed by the author initially to support the Internet of Things in 1994. In this so called #CNLogic the world is not characterized by its material surface, but by the essence and emergence beyond the material world: the networks and flows of competencies within creative environments/platforms to create new competencies/values.

The "Power of Pull" and "Job to be done" fill this abstract model of value creation in a digitalized wold / internet of everything world with "life". The "Power of Pull" brings competencies (C) together to form networks (CN), e.g. in workgroups (Hagel et. al. here: "A workgroup pulls together 3 to 15 people working on an interdependent, collaborative effort to deliver a shared outcome that could not be achieved without all members of the group working on it together") to create (CN*()) new connected competencies and emerging connected services (CN) to get the jobs done.

From the Power of Pull and Jobs to be Done to Collaborative Networks

More about this after the discussion with John Hagel & Efosa Ojomo!

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PS: A meta-disruption of the dominating economic paradigm?

If you go this path go further in the end you cannot avoid a meta-disruption of the old economic paradigms and mathematics. In 10 or 20 years we will have a new framework for economic theories with new mathematics as the new platforms to rething economy.