Disrupt or be Disrupted: The Agile Leader's Guide to Staying Ahead

Having worked with many global organisations over the years, it’s become clear that the ones who achieve greatness are those who make change happen. Instead of sitting and waiting for competitors to take the lead, show them where the market is heading. Being proactive in development is an essential lesson seen we’ve seen play out time over time. If no action is taken in response to market trends and evolving customer needs - the game of catch up begins.?

This is about being a disruptor, a leader who establishes authority in the industry and knows what tools and techniques to draw upon to help them become and remain leaders. Being Agile is key to success. In this blog, I explore how to build a culture of continuous disruption.

The Lifecycle of Disruption: Adapt or Lose Out

The speed of change means that the current ways of working could be outdated tomorrow. That’s no exaggeration, especially with technological advancements like AI. With constant changes in the industry, businesses can no longer cruise by doing what they’ve always done best. Instead, the best is yet to come, and if you don’t have that mindset and structures in place for seeking constant improvement and opportunities, you’ll get left behind. Disruption doesn’t always start with a big bang - it often starts small at the edges of the industry, but it can soon pick up speed once the market opportunity is clear.?

The Cost of Complacency: A Case Study

When Netflix introduced streaming, it completely changed the way we watch movies and TV shows, destroying Blockbuster in the process. Some argue that the industry underestimated Netflix at the beginning, assuming they were just operating on the fringe, not seeing the threat they posed. Blockbuster ignored Netflix at first and missed the rise of streaming as a result. In the words of Marc Randolph, Co-Founder and First CEO of Netflix, "If you aren’t willing to disrupt yourself, there is always someone else willing to do it for you."

The Netflix streaming model is now the norm, and many entertainment companies have followed suit, with a wealth of media available for customers to view. But even now, industry insiders are talking about the changes ahead, even now they are discussing how Netflix and its competitors could become outdated. Why? Because new technologies and consumer behaviours will keep pushing the boundaries, and even the most successful models must adapt or be left behind.

If you’re on to a good thing in your industry, that’s great - roll with it - but always remember someone will be hot on your heels, and evolving technology will provide a never-ending list of challenges and opportunities. It’s fast-moving, but with the Agile mindset, you and your team will be able to keep up and flourish.

Building a Proactive Strategy

There are many early steps you can take to put yourself in a good position. That includes keeping your ear to the ground to see if anything new is emerging, don’t brush off anything just yet, take stock of it, because the future, especially customer preferences and external forces, can create unpredictability. So instead, consume all the hot and not-so-hot information in your industry and evaluate it.?

You could set up regular processes for scanning for disruptive innovations, like quarterly reviews with specific objectives and regular market research to help identify emerging trends. Even if you’re market leading at the moment, never be complacent, because it can be snatched away from you in a flash. When you’re at the top, that’s actually when you need to watch the most.

Those hot on your heels will be hunting for the weaknesses in your organisation and how they can exploit this, so continuous improvement is key to staying competitive. We can’t wait for things to go wrong before we rethink how we do business. Build a routine and culture within your teams which always challenges what is working.

Fujifilm’s Reinvention: Adapt to Thrive

Sometimes reinvention is the way to go. If your industry is in decline, you don’t have to sink with it; instead, there will always be an opportunity to redirect your expertise to another area. Fujifilm effectively did this when the digital revolution hit the photography industry and look where it landed them.

They accepted that their traditional business was now the past, so they pivoted, diversified, and unlike Kodak, which didn’t embrace change at first, Fujifilm was able to move with the market. The key is flexibility, not fearing change, identifying the? opportunities, and knowing there will always be a place for you and your organisation - it just may not be how you traditionally work. For Fujifilm, one of their key skills was chemistry, so they applied this to new industries, like healthcare and cosmetics.

The Agile Leader’s Playbook: Turning Disruption into Opportunity

Agile leaders understand that they need a team of empowered individuals, generating ideas on a regular basis, so that it’s part of everyday work and not just a special project. Colleagues just going in and doing the basics won’t help you outpace the competition. So you need to energise those individuals, motivate them, support them, and give them an arena in which they can explore opportunities and test ideas.?

If you give them a level of responsibility and accountability, it fuels their ambition and enthusiasm, and your organisation benefits by having proactive individuals within your team because a reactive way of working is the opposite of disruption and instead can lead to your company being disrupted. In Agile, we work in sprints, conduct regular retrospectives, and welcome feedback and the opportunity to explore different avenues, even if we’re not convinced of the outcome. This is because ongoing improvements and testing are part of producing the best product or service outcome. Nowadays, there are a wealth of data insights that go towards making measured decisions at every stage.

To innovate in your industry on a scale that will disrupt the market, you have to take chances. Some will pay off, some won’t, but with an Agile project management approach, if you fail fast, you can learn quickly and become more resilient in the process. You won’t uncover that hidden gem, that moment of inspiration, if you’re playing it safe. We don’t mean taking huge gambles as part of project management; instead, it’s about small-scale testing of ideas with quick iteration, meaning you have room for experimentation without harming the company.

Agile, adaptable organisations will always find a way to succeed and see disruption as an opportunity. In today’s market, you’ve got to be ready for anything before it happens, so what will your next move be?