< PreviousTHE TIME TO REACH 50 MILLION USERS DROPS TO HOURS As industries become increasingly digitised and as the world becomes increasingly connected it’s only a matter of time before we see an industry disrupted in a day and a multi-billion dollar enterprise built and launched in hours or minutes - a trend that is further accelerated by the emergence of Creative Machines.of England, European Central Bank, People’s Bank of China, and the US Federal Reserve, it would have “changed the state’s control of money and the global financial system overnight.” Languishing on those statements for a moment, and to put this new disruptive world reality into perspective, Facebook could have launched Libra in the morning and could have had hundreds of millions, and possibly billions of people, using it - their new product - come the evening. In fact, the only reason why this didn’t happen was because the central banks, governments, and regulators didn’t trust Facebook. But, as they said at the time, while the organisation behind it was “flawed” the technology and the concept itself was sound. Accelerating the rate of global disruption in this way is one thing, however, new technologies - Creative Machines - are emerging that let us extend this paradigm to hardware as well and cut the time it takes organisations to go “from concept to shelf,” as they say, by up to 99% or more. THE RISE OF CREATIVE MACHINES Creative Machines - Artificial Intelligence “machines” that can design and innovate new products in virtual simulation, and then via 3D printing manufacture them in real time on demand - have arrived. And they are already accelerating the rate of hardware innovation by up to 99% or more. Capable of designing, innovating and producing new digital and physical products, from content and software, to batteries, cars, clothing, computer chips, and pharmaceutical drugs, and much more, in real time Creative Machines are truly game changing. AUTONOMOUS ORGANISATIONS But it doesn’t end there. Now add in the emergence of fully autonomous organisations and all of a sudden you have an ever accelerating virtuous cycle of disruption - all operating at exponential speed. GLOBAL DISRUPTION IN A DAY . EVERY DAY . T ODAY OUR increasingly connected and digital society makes it possible for entrepreneurs and organisations to market, distribute, and sell new products to a global audience at just a fraction of the cost and time that it used to take. The upshot of this is that new products and services can be adopted and taken up by millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions, or even billions of people in or near real time which consequently means we have already reached the point in time when global business, culture, and society can be disrupted and transformed in just a single day. To highlight this point it took 75 years for 50 million people to adopt the telephone. It then took just 19 days for Pokemon Go to hit the same milestone and just 6 days for 100 million people to adopt Call of Duty. Then, to crown it all and to really drive the point home, when Facebook launched its cryptocurrency Libra in June 2019 had the regulators approved it then in the words of the chairmen of the Bank 71311institute.comINDUSTRIES WITHOUT BORDERS All industries are connected with one another and as digitisation erodes the borders that kept them all distinctly separate not only do changes in one affect the others faster but it’s also now easier than ever before for organisations in one industry to enter and disrupt other industries, thereby accelerating the overall rate of disruption.who’ve traditionally only operated in one industry sector are now able to branch out easier and faster than ever before to capitalise on market opportunities in others. The best and most obvious examples of this trend today are in the technology sector where companies in the so called MATBAG collective, or Meta, Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu, Amazon, and Google, now seem to be able to develop new products and services that cross previously unassailable industry boundaries with impunity. Amazon, for example, was primarily a E-Tailer, but now the company has interests in everything from finance and healthcare to entertainment. Google meanwhile was originally just an advertising and search engine organisation, but now has interests in everything from communications and energy, to finance, healthcare, and transportation. And so the story goes on for all of the other companies in this collective. Born in the digital era these so called Digital Natives were unencumbered by the need to produce and sell physical products so their organisations were afforded a level of adaptability, agility, and flexibility that their legacy peers, encumbered by physical assets and products, and the associated long development cycles and capital restrictions thereof, simply couldn’t match. Now though those legacy players are spending hundreds of billions of dollars digitising themselves and trying to catch them up, and once their transformation programs are complete then they too will be able to move into and disrupt adjacent industries with increasing impunity as we’ve already seen with the likes of JP Morgan who entered the travel sector and Starling Bank who’s more of an internet company than a neobank. All of which means that the rate of industry disruption will accelerate even more. THE END OF INDUSTRY BORDERS AND SECTORS . A S THE global rate of disruption accelerates towards real time, as I’ve discussed, we have yet another force at play which, in its own way, also helps accelerate the overall rate of disruption. While it has always been the case that changes in one industry would eventually ripple out and affect other industries, when it comes to accelerating the rate of global and industry disruption digitisation simply adds rocket fuel to the already white hot fire. As organisations and industries accelerate their own rates of digitisation one of the most significant impacts of digitisation is the erosion of the individual borders and boundaries that previously kept all of these industries separate and distinct from one another - a phenomenon that also means that as more organisations take a technology first stance and many of them pivot to become super apps we’re also seeing the metaphoric death of sectors. Today we see this effect manifesting itself time and time again, where organisations 73311institute.comBUILDING EXPONENTIAL ENTERPRISESC ONTRARY TO popular belief, and as obvious as this sounds, there are two reasons why individuals and organisations get disrupted. Firstly, there are the things that disrupt you because you never saw them coming. In short they blind-sided you and, if you have them, your foresight teams. Secondly, there are the things that disrupt you because even though you saw them emerging and then ascending you never took the necessary actions to counter them. And while the markets and stakeholders will sometimes forgive executives for the former, they rarely forgive them for the latter - especially in a world where disruption is an ever present stalking horse. Needless to say, disrupting a competitor, an industry, or even a country, is complex, but while many people often like to think of disruption as a singular event it’s actually a series of events that, in the majority of cases, have clearly identifiable milestones and markers that we can monitor and track. However, while everyone agrees that disruption has always been with us and that it can take many forms, from the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs to the emergence of Netflix who wiped out the video-saurs, one thing that many people still struggle to understand is how the nature of the animal’s changed over time and how it will continue to evolve in the future. Often the reason for this is because sometimes they’re looking for disruption in the wrong places, trying to predict it based on historical perspectives, and sometimes it’s just because they haven’t been exposed to it before. And as for those among you who believe that the majority of disruptions are behind us I can assure you they aren’t, and trust me when I say you haven’t seen anything yet. MAPPING THE DISRUPTION LABYRINTH The process of disrupting anything, whether it be a competitor, an industry, or even perhaps a country, is generally so complex it’s positively labyrinthine. Like all of us though I’ve lived through many disruptive events and it’s these experiences and the impact they had, on enterprises and workforces alike, that drove me to map the labyrinthine-like process of disruption so that companies could understand it, navigate it, use it to their advantage, and ultimately come to 75311institute.comterms with a world that operates using a new rule book and that no longer behaves like it used to. As highlighted in earlier chapters, irrespective of how fast disruption seems to materialise it isn’t a single event - it’s a complex series of events that, in the majority of cases, have clearly identifiable milestones and markers that we can monitor and track, and it’s these events that will be the focus of at least part of your discovery process and that will help the vigilant among you identify the next disruptors and disruptions long before they have a chance to wreak their havoc on our companies. Similarly, these events, and how they combine and the timings of their combinations, also help explain why only a fraction of companies ever make it through the labyrinth to claim cult disruptor status, so let’s dive in and have a look at them. Notes: 76311institute.com“ DISRUPTION ISN’T A SINGLE EVENT . IT’S A COMPLEX SERIES OF EVENTS WITH CLEARLY IDENTIFIABLE MILESTONES & MARKERS . ” - Matthew Griffin, Founder, 311 Institute . MATTHEW GRIFFIN 311INSTITUTE.comTHE DISRUPTION TRIANGLE The likelihood that a new product or service an enterprise or industry, can be assessed by its progress against three main axes - namely the Exponential Enterprise axis, the Exponential Technologies axis, and finally the Exponential Adoption axis, all of which are intrinsically inter-connected with one another.enterprise will often be able to change the attitudes and opinions of those who fall within their sphere of influence it has to be argued that true change within an enterprise must be inspired and promoted from the top down. Over the past decade I’ve made it my mission to understand what sets enterprises that achieve cult disruptor status, as well as fabled Unicorn status, apart from the rest of the pack and frankly it’s a myth that a company’s ability to disrupt itself or a market is based on its ability to outperform its competitors in just one single area. In my estimation it’s their ability to outperform them in over thirty different areas, often simultaneously, that makes the difference. From the way they build and communicate their culture, values, and visions, to the way they identify valuable problems worth solving and develop their products, ecosystems, and go to markets, and much more, it all counts. In short, and to be crystal clear, it’s not any one thing, it’s many, and that’s the reality that anyone wanting to build an Exponential Enterprise has to contend with - you’re either all in or you might as well go home, anything less and you’ll be increasing your likelihood of failure. Furthermore, it’s not simply enough to be moderately better than your competitors, whoever they are and whatever industry they hail from, you have to outpace, out perform, and out think them all in almost every one of these areas. Now we’ve covered the basics let’s dive in and have a look at what makes these serial disruptors we’re all fond of so special. In order to make it easier to digest I’m going to divide the DNA of an Exponential Enterprise into five foundations. In order these are Vision, Culture, Discovery, Prototyping, and Execution, and within each of these individual foundations there are at least six main areas that, when performed well and combined, will move the dial in the company’s favour. Firstly comes their Vision, something that conveys a huge amount of information about their over arching purpose and THE THREE AXES OF DISRUPTION . I N MY experience the likelihood that a new concept will disrupt a market can be assessed by its progress against three main axes as shown in the diagram on the previous page - namely the Exponential Enterprise axis, the Exponential Technologies axis, and finally the Exponential Adoption axis, all of which are intrinsically linked with one another. EXPONENTIAL ENTERPRISE If you’re one of those individuals who doesn’t want to change the world, and let’s face it, not everyone does, and that’s fine, then it’s unlikely you ever will - at least on purpose. But, if you feel that it’s your calling and you can’t think of anything else then with the right approach and support you may well just pull it off - never say never, especially in a world where it’s easier than ever before for one individual or one company to impact and influence the lives of billions of people. However, while a determined rebel unit with a disruptive mindset within an 79311institute.comNext >