Peter Fisk

Fast Company has been my go-to source of business inspiration for the last 25 years.

Back in the late 1990s every youthful business person was flocking to launch a start-up, to harness the power of the new technologies – the internet – to throw aside the conventions and limitations of physical organisations, in search of eyeballs, freedom, and a better future.  I was one of them, launching a knowledge-based business platform called Zixio with a colleague, a spin off from our management consulting firm. We raced around the world in search of partners and investments. Energised and excited by the ability to launch, reach and scale rapidly. We called it the “dotcom” boom.

Fast Company, launched in 1995 by two former HBR editors, became the digital business bible of the time.

Of course many of those companies failed, and the financial crash just after the turn of the millennium had much to do with the lack of strategic thinking and business models, which would eventually drive profitability and real value creation. Others evolved into the giants of business we know today – Facemash became Facebook and most recently Meta Platforms, podcasting platform Odeo became Twitter, and Google started out as Backrub. They were mavericks – they broke the rules, they were inspired by the outliers, they searched for the next trends. Which is exactly what Fast Company has always sought to celebrate.

The best thing about Fast Company is its annual ranking of the world’s Most Innovative Companies (MIC).

Unlike other rankings by the likes of BCG and Forbes, who base their “innovativeness” rankings largely on R&D spend, Fast Company is much more about ideas into action. And while, ultimately innovation is all about turning ideas into practical value – future revenues, profits and value creation – then it is great to celebrate the best ideas that are shaping markets and minds. Not all of FC’s MIC will be a long-term success, but their ideas evolve, connect and drive futures. This is why the stories of the top 50 (and the top 10 in many diverse categories) are well worth a read.

This year’s Fast Company MIC 2022 rankings are just out, with a clear focus on sustainable innovation, so here’s a taste of some of the highlights:

#1 Stripe

Payments that enable carbon-removal … Stripe, the online payments business founded by Irish brothers Patrick and John Collison, launched Stripe Climate to enable its business customers to participate in its strategy to fund innovative carbon-removal technology by contributing a percentage of their digital sales that move through Stripe’s software.

#2 Solugen

Turning sugar into industrial chemicals, without carbon emissions … Solugen, described as the first carbon negative molecule factory that can scale to meet the world’s needs, has developed a process of turning corn syrup into industrial chemicals using enzymes and metal catalysis—removing oil, coal, and natural gas from the process.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PjbXfD1PFc

#3 Twelve

Transforming pollution into plastics … Twelve is a chemical technology company based in Berkeley, California. They develop technology to convert CO₂ into profitable chemicals, such as plastics and transportation fuel … Their carbon-transformation process uses a metal catalyst and renewable energy to break CO2 and water molecules into smaller atomic bits, and then re-forms them into new chemicals that can be used in manufacturing.

#4 BlocPower

Changing the way we power our homes … BlocPower, based in Brooklyn NY and founded in 2014, provides heat pump systems for no upfront cost, that deliver precise, room-by-room temperature control, built-in air filtration – and even more significantly, BlocPower has focused its efforts on low and middle-income communities.

#5 Climate Trace

The emissions data to transform the way we live … 59 trillion bytes of data from more than 300 satellites and 11,000 sensors are the inputs for Climate Trace, a coalition formed in 2020, aimed at updating and maintaining greenhouse gas emissions estimates to give countries the insights they need to direct climate mitigation efforts more effectively

#6 Watershed

Get to zero carbon, faster … that’s the proposition which Watershed makes to companies like Apple, Shopify, and Warby Parker – helping them to accelerate their own sustainability strategies, to assess all their emissions, develop a reduction strategy, and connect to carbon-removal solutions. It also has Al Gore and Mark Carney on board.

#7 Doconomy

Calculating the cost of our lifestyles … the Swedish environmental impact technology firm, launched by Mathias Wikström in 2018, quantifies environmental impact with such tools as its Lifestyle Calculator. Users complete a detailed survey, and Doconomy estimates an individual’s annual emissions in categories such as transport, home, shopping, and diet.

#8 Microsoft

Humanizing how we work … using a 30,000-person Future Work survey, anonymised data from Microsoft 365 and LinkedIn stats. and brain research conducted in its Human Factors Lab, to create tools for the future of work. Teams alone had almost 250 million monthly active users—no company is in a better position to help take the pain out of productivity.

#9 SpaceX

Building a rocket ship for everyone … In 2005, Elon Musk laughed at the idea that rockets had to be expensive to be reliable. Instead, they could be the Honda Civics of the sky, he said. Last year, SpaceX completed a record 31 flights of its Falcon 9 rocket, including its launch of the first all-civilian crew into orbit at a cost of $55 million per seat.

#10 Canva

Everyone can be a designer … Australian millennial Melanie Perkins and her team created a simple design studio that can be used by anyone. Edit text, an image, a background, an animation with a simple tap. Its easy-to-use, templated design platform allows people to create business cards, birthday invitations, social media ads, sales presentations and more.

Some of the most interesting sector rankings include

Most Innovative Companies in Food 2022 … Jot ultra-coffee, 20 times stronger than normal, to Oishii super-premium strawberries … Here’s more about Oishii’s Hiroki Koga, and how he brought his luxurious Omakase Berry from Japan to New York, and now using vertical farming techniques, produces them, at $50 for 8 berries:

Most Innovative Companies in Retail 2022 … Faire to Food52, GlossGenius, and StitchFix harnessing the power of data, direct to consumers in a box … Here’s more about Rick Martinez’ Food52, the online food community, and a media platform that inspires you with exotic recipes, then sells you frying pans and espresso machines:

Most Innovative Companies in Media 2022 … Hybe to Magnolia Networks, Spotify and Warner Media, engaging new audiences with new business models … Here’s a bit more from Warner Media – with brands like CNN to HBO, TNT to WB – currently in the midst of a $43 acquisition by Discovery from former parent AT&T:

Most Innovative Companies in Health 2022 … Last year’s rankings were dominated by Biotech and Moderna’s mRNA Covid vaccinations. This year Brightline, Illumina and Walgreens all star, but also GSK with a new vaccine to combat malaria … Here’s more about Illumina, and genetic sequencing that is rapidly reshaping the future of healthcare:

Most Innovative Companies in Finance 2022 … Ramp, Goodleap and Forter lead the rankings – and also Public and Promise in personal finance, just two companies helping people take control of their money and wealth … In a world of fintech, its not just about digitalising your bank, but more fundamentally rethinking why we need banks:

Most Innovative Companies in Latin America 2022 … dLocal and iFood join the latin greats like Mercado Libre, Rappi and Nubank in a region that is often underestimated for its innovativeness … Here’s more from Rappi’s cofounder Sebastian Mejia, creator of Colombia’s superapp, thinking differently about the whole structure of business :

If that’s not enough inspiration, you might also be interested in some more of the fabulous business stories that I explored while researching and writing my most recent books … I’ve profiled over 100 business leaders, and 100 most inspiring companies, largely through one to one interviews. You can dip into them here:

The curse of plastic is everywhere – in our overflowing bins, along beaches, and in trees.  Retailers across the world have recognised the problem, charging for plastic bags in some countries, making plastics a criminal offence in others. Humans have produced more than 8.3 billion tonnes of plastic since the 1950s, according to the UN, most of which ends up in landfills and could take centuries to decompose.

Ecovative, believes it can massively help the world reduce its plastic waste by using mycelium, created from the root-like structure of mushrooms.

The New York biotech company grows mycelium into specific shapes and sizes by taking organic plant waste and inoculating it with mycelium. After the mycelium grows through and around the agricultural materials, it binds them together, providing a natural alternative to packaging materials made out styrofoam. The process takes around a week with minimal water and electricity consumed to make the parts.

Beyond packaging materials to replace plastics, Ecovative sees application in fashion with vegan leather, plant-based meats, construction where it is strong and has excellent insulating properties, and in healthcare to build new organs. At the end of the material’s useful life, you can break it up and you can put it in your own garden. A nutrient not a pollutant.

“My dream is to one day grow a lung and seed it with lung cells and use the mycelium to create the capillary network and use the human cells to create the actual lung,” says founder Eben Bayer.

Getting more from less

Andrew McAfee’s book “More from Less” tells the story of an unexpected change in our relationship with our planet. “Throughout the Industrial Age increases in human population and prosperity came at the expense of the earth, that pattern no longer holds in most of the world. Instead, we’re now able to improve the human condition while also treading more lightly on the world: consuming fewer resources, using less agricultural land, reducing pollution, bringing back species we’d pushed to the brink of extinction”.

He makes the counter-intuitive argument that two of the most important forces responsible for the change are capitalism and technological progress. In the past this combination caused us to take more and more from the planet over time. Now, it’s letting us get more from less. So what changed? Essentially, we invented the computer, the network, and a host of other digital tools that let us swap atoms for bits. Think, for example, of how many different devices and media have vanished into the smartphone. Quite literally, these inventions have changed the world.

Evidence from the USA shows that even though population and prosperity continued to increase steadily, resource consumption did not. Instead, it started to decline. The country now generally uses less metal, fertilizer, water, paper and timber, and energy year after year, even output grows. This phenomenon is known as dematerialization of the economy, and it’s bringing us into what McAfee calls a “second enlightenment”.

Air and water pollution have also decreased greatly, and many threatened species have seen their numbers rebound. Even greenhouse gas emissions have declined substantially in recent years. We are now getting more from less, most advanced nations are now post-peak in resource use and other exploitations of the environment.

Circular design

A decade ago, former long-distance yachtswoman Ellen MacArthur launched foundation to promote a “circular economy.” This sought to create a new economic model for businesses, which eliminated waste and replenished natural resources. Using a closed loop system, it encouraged reuse, sharing, repair and recycling as ways in which an organisational ultimately has a “zero impact” on its world.

Nike sees sustainable innovation as a design challenge – not just of its shoes and clothing, but of its entire business ecosystem – from the dyes to colour its fabrics to the production systems of its shoes, and the fair wage of workers in its factories.

John Hoke, Nike’s Chief Design Officer says “One of the most powerful things design can do for Nike, athletes and, frankly, the world, is play a role in creating a better future by making better choices that holistically and thoughtfully think through the complete design.

“By considering everything around the design solution – how we source, how we make, how the product is used, how it’s returned, how it’s ultimately reimagined. As designers, we are wired to be problem solvers. We get to think about designing ideas that have the highest performance impact possible. While simultaneously having the lowest environmental footprint or impact.”

Nike recently partnered with many other companies and academics to create “10 Principles of Circular Design” as a process to rethink products, how they are made and sold:

• Materials: Selecting low impact materials that use pre and post-consumer recycled feedstock.
• Cyclability: Designing with the end in mind. Thinking through how a product will be recycled at the end of the use phase.
• Waste Avoidance: Minimizing or elimination waste in the product-creation process, and beyond.
• Disassembly: Products that can easily be taken apart and recognizing the value of each component.
• Green Chemistry: Chemical products and processes that reduce or eliminate the use of hazardous substances.
• Refurbishment: Prolong the use of a product through repair of component parts or materials
• Versatility: Products that easily adapt to growth, style, trend, gender, activity and purpose
• Durability: Products made strongly by construction details, method of make and durable material choices
• Circular Packaging: Packaging that is purposeful and made of materials that can be repurposed, recycled or biodegradable
• New Models: Establishing new service and business models to extend the product life cycle.

Over the years, Nike’s view to solving problems that embraces sustainability has broadened dramatically, not just to reduce waste but to improve products. One of the most significant was the development of “Flyknit” which ended the process of cutting pieces of fabric for shoe uppers, and instead knitting them to the perfect shape. This massive improved the fit and performance of the shoe for consumers too. Recently they developed “Flyleather” which takes recycled natural leather fibres, and turns it into high performance leather, with all the qualities of old, plus more.

Net positive impact

A decade ago, former long-distance yachtswoman Ellen MacArthur launched foundation to promote a “circular economy.” This sought to create a new economic model for businesses, which eliminated waste and replenished natural resources. Using a closed loop system, it encouraged reuse, sharing, repair and recycling as ways in which an organisational ultimately has a “zero impact” on its world.

Many companies embraced the challenge. Of the many impacts of industrialisation, carbon emissions have perhaps been one of the most damaging. “Offsetting” became a popular action, companies paying to plant new trees which capture the carbon, as a way to neutralise their impact, or reduce their guilt, of carbon-emitting factories and travel.

Ant Financial, for example, created a fantastic loyalty program for its Chinese consumers, enabling them to collect offset points for any kinds of purchases they made, equivalent to their environmental impact. The points allowed people to plant trees in “Ant Forest”, supported by a gamified app which shows you how your tree grows, and the huge forest across Chinese wasteland is thriving.

However creating zero impact seems like only a start. Some organisations, most recently Microsoft, have set a target for “negative carbon” by which they capture more carbon than is emitted. Datacentres, for example, use huge amounts of energy, so by building solar and wind farms, they can power their facilities, and contribute renewable energy to local communities, reducing their demand for traditional fuels.

LanzaTech, based in Chicago, is looking beyond trees to capture carbon. The biotech start-up has developed a way to turn emissions into ethanol, a renewable fuel. Instead of letting carbon emissions bellow out of factory, it is piped into a bioreactor and fermented, like in beer making, into ethanol. It uses a natural gas-eating bacteria developed specifically for fermentation. One steel mill can recyle enough carbon to create 9 million gallons of ethanol, which was then demonstrated by Virgin Atlantic as an effective aircraft fuel. Similar initiatives include Braskem turning city waste into biofuels in Brazil.

We are now at the point where businesses are not simply creating zero waste, but can create a “net positive impact”.

The impacts can be environmental, but also social. A business can give more to the world, in its total “balance sheets” of resources and effects, than it takes. It can do this most specifically, not by just thinking of creating more efficient processes, which seek to reduce waste in a similar way to reducing costs, but by increasing the upside. Creating products and services that embrace a sustainable benefit, and through the purchase and application by millions of customers, can multiply the positive impact many times.

Additionally, by thinking at an ecosystem, to work with the many different partners involved the creation and distribution of their solutions, then they have more opportunities to ensure that the net impact is zero, or positive, and again more ways to multiply this impact.

© Peter Fisk 2022. Extract from new book “Business Recoded“

Imagine if anything could be made on demand – to order, in seconds, at home?

Clothing. Maybe you will subscribe to the Prada design platform, which gives you access to thousands of clothing designs. Click to select the one you like, tweak it a little to add some personal flair, and then press print. In 30 minutes you’re trying it on. All for a flat subscription of $100 per month.

Engineering. You need a spare part for a machine. Ordering it from Taiwan could take 30 days. Instead you look up the IP code, and can immediately print one out in your factory. In minutes. Forget  global supply chain. Or standardised parts. You can make anything you want.

Healthcare. A heart transplant patient lives on the edge. Waiting for the phone call to say that somewhere, a donated organ has become available that meets your specific blood type and other needs. Instead we can just print one out, using your personal genetic code. We could live for ever?

And it goes on. 10 years ago 3D printing was a gimmick, watching the liquid plastic merge and make a simple ball. 5 years ago Icon launched huge 3D printers that could construct a new home in 24 hours for $4000. 1 year ago Singularity Sushi gave us 3D printed sushi, specifically to match your DNA.

3D printing is ready to transform our world.

Manufacturing. Supply chains. Business models. What you eat, wear, make can be endlessly personalised, made to order, on demand, by subscription.

Who are the most innovative companies currently shaping the 3D printing revolution?

3D Systems

Over 30 years ago, 3D Systems brought the innovation of 3D printing to the manufacturing industry. Chuck Hull, CTO, pioneered stereolithography and obtained a patent for the technology in 1986. Today 3DS manufactures and sells 3D printers, 3D printing materials, 3D scanners, and offers a 3D printing services, to create anything imaginable. Each application-specific solution addresses a variety of advanced applications in healthcare and industrial markets such as medical and dental, aerospace and defence, automotive, and durable goods.

Carbon

Carbon is based in Redwood City, California, manufacturing and developing 3D printers utilising its Continuous Liquid Interface Production process, with its first commercial product being the Carbon M1 printer. Carbon’s digital manufacturing platform enables repeatable production of end-use parts with industrial grade materials and exceptional surface finish. Whether you’re making one or a million. In 2017, Adidas announced the first 3D printed midsole developed using Carbon technology.

FormLabs

Formlabs was founded by three MIT students who met while taking a class called “How to Make (almost) Anything”. They also drew on their experience with MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms Fab Lab program, “We make the world’s best 3D printers so anyone can make anything.” One of the first companies to enable 3D printing for the mass market and is a leader in innovating with materials, including new ceramic and greyscale resins. These resins are capable of producing prints and have a wide range of applications across engineering, design, medicine and dental care.

Icon

Icon develops advanced construction technologies that advance humanity. Using proprietary 3D printing robotics, software and advanced materials, Icon seeks to transform the way home are built. In its early stages it linked up with NGO New Story, to provide fast replacement homes for those hit by natural disasters, and also to address homelessness.

Luyten

Australian 3D printing technology company established in 2020 seeking to make construction easier and more sustainable across industries. Project Meeka seeks to construct a 3D printer to build a base on the moon. The foldable 3D printer ‘Platypus Galacticus’ will use lunar regolith (a substance on the moon’s surface) to create the settlement, which could happen as early as 2030.

Mighty Buildings

Building sustainable 3D printed homes. Seeking to reimagine the building industry from factory to foundation, the construction uses award-winning Light Stone Material offering an energy efficient and near-zero waste solution, with 80% of the production process automated. “The future of cities will not only have cleaner transportation, but cleaner buildings too. Homes that don’t use steel or cement that are 50 per cent less carbon footprint,” says investor Vinod Khosla.

Organova

Founded in 2007, it specialises in 3D bioprinting, having internally developed the NovoGen Bioprinter to enable the automated fabrication of multicellular tissue. To date, its bioprinter technology is responsible for creating a range of tissues, including skeletal muscle, liver, eye, kidney and skin.

Stratasys

Created one of the first 3D printing technologies over 30 years ago.  Stratasys’ automotive clients include Honda, Volvo and Ford.Working with the top aerospace, automotive, technology and medical players. One of its most ambitious clients is Boom, seeking to recreate the age of supersonic flight. How I would have loved to have 3D printing in the days of Concorde!

Upprinting Food

Founder Elzelinde van Doleweerd  wants to reduce food waste through printing leftovers (bread, vegetables and fruits), which become new gourmet creations to be enjoyed. Her company collaborates with high-end restaurants to repurpose their waste in creative ways using extrusion technology. “Simply, a 3D printer is just like a big piping bag” she says, blending the ingredients together to create a puree, which is then printed, baked and dehydrated, giving it a crunchy texture.

 

In the summer of 2019, fires ravaged the Amazon rainforests, causing alarm around the world. For Brazil’s João Paulo Ferreira, CEO of Natura, one of the world’s largest cosmetics company with a passion for sustainability, it was a disaster. Natura is committed to working with 35 local communities in the Amazon region, including more than 4,300 families, to help develop products and sustainable business models that benefit the forest and its inhabitants.

Natura is also seeking to accelerate its growth, looking for new ways to grow across the world, helped by the acquisition of brands such as Australia’s Aesop luxury cosmetics, the UK’s Body Shop, and Avon, the network-marketing business with 6 million representatives across the world.

Ferreira’s growth model seeks to bring together three important shifts in the market – the consumer’s demand for more sustainable products, the drive for accessible luxury particularly in the wellness sector, and the shift to peer to peer communities and business models. On top of this his notion of growth is not simply the sales revenue, but the increasing positive impact for all its stakeholders, including his Amazonian partners, who desperately need his help to recover their livelihoods.

Finding the future first

William Gibson, the sci-fi author said, “the future is here – it’s just not very evenly distributed.” Much of what will create the future therefore is already in front of our ideas. Our challenge is to make sense of it, to see how it fits together, to imagine how it can be more.

Newness occurs in the margins not the mainstream. We need to look to the outliers, the early adopters and extreme users, for emergent behaviour in markets. We need to look to the smaller, specialist innovators for the new solutions. Finding newness is less about waiting for a completely new technology, such as quantum computing, more about connecting the dots of what is already here, then using imaginative fusions to understand how they will be shaped into a new reality for many.

As new ideas gradually catch on, they begin to spread more rapidly, a bit like how ice melts from the edges almost imperceptibly slowly, and then much more perceptibly faster. Sometimes they can seem cool to the geeks, but then get shunned by the mainstream, because they are not practical or desired. Geoffrey Moore calls this “the chasm”, which new ideas need to leap to reach most people.

How can you see the megatrends, and how they will affect your business and customers, before they arrive?

“Seeing around corners” by Rita McGrath focuses on the inflection points in our changing markets.  If we think of market evolution as a series of “s-curves” then a market takes off slowly but then accelerates, where it inflects. Malcolm Gladwell termed it the tipping point. The inflection is typically caused by external factors, such as new capabilities or attitudes, economic or regulatory change.

The challenge is to be ready for these inflections. Indeed, much of future thinking is less about predicting with any certainty, but about being prepared for uncertainty. We can search for clues that an inflection is close or upon us. We can look to adjacent markets for parallel behaviours. Food trends tend to lead drinks trends, sportswear trends lead couture, gaming leads entertainment.

McGrath observes that inflection points don’t happen instantly. They take a long time. The original title for her book was taken from Ernest Hemingway’s novel “The Sun Also Rises”. One of the characters asks another: “Well, how did you go bankrupt?” And the response was: “Oh well, gradually and then suddenly.” Which is how inflection points feel. When they are upon you, they feel as though they’ve emerged from nowhere and they’re just disruptive and difficult. But if you really look at the roots of them, they’ve been coming on for a really long time.

Nike’s shift to direct to consumer channels has been evolving for some time, but now it has become the norm. Perhaps by watching start-ups who have created direct relationships with consumers, like Casper mattresses or Harry’s shaving products, Nike gained the confidence to switch away from traditional channels and create a better shopping experience of their own, both in their flagship stores and online. By using the consumer relationships built up through Nike+ fitness trackers and membership, the brand can have a one to one dialogue, offer personal incentives, and a truly individualised experience directly with consumers. Competitors don’t get a look in. Nike acquired new capabilities such as data analytics company Zodiac to support it, and Invertex to create Nike Fit, 3D remote scanning of shoes enabling consumers to ensure they get the perfect fit. $16bn of sales flowed through Nike’s DTC channels in 2019.

However too many leaders resist change. Too many leaders have grown to love their status quo. Stability brings more certainty and efficiency. Constant change requires more effort and turbulence. Carefully made plans need to be written, production lines adapted, new products and packaging developed, new talents recruited, and partners forged, new ads created.

As McGrath says, “Leaders turn a blind eye quite deliberately because it is just more convenient not to take in news that things might be changing.”

Seeing things differently

Airlines are one of the worst industries to work in. Every time an economic downturn comes around, their businesses are hit worse than most. I remember working for British Airways through economic downturns. Within days, bookings would have evaporated, and planes would be grounded. The problem was that they saw themselves as an operator of aircraft, and little more.

An alternative frame of thinking would be that they are in the business of connecting people. For travellers on vacation, they help them to explore the world, to meet up with family and friends. For business travellers, they are in the business of facilitating trade, finding new partners, reaching new markets, doing new deals. If they framed their business around the customer, and what they seek to achieve, there could be many alternative options to sustain their business, even in a downturn.

Similarly, Adrian Slywotzky, author of “How to Grow When Markets Don’t”, says that too many companies over the last decade have stagnated because they have forgotten how to grow. Whilst their businesses grew rapidly in their entrepreneurial years, they then become fixated on their existing products and services, framing themselves in these ways, and thereby in markets which have matured and stagnated. He says that most companies have relied on traditional “product-centred” strategies for growth.

“Reframing” therefore becomes an incredibly powerful way in which to see your opportunities differently. By redefining the boundaries of what market you are in, you immediately escape the limitations of the old thinking, you jump to uncontested spaces which are no longer fought over by the same competitors, and you potentially engage customers in new, more inspiring and valuable ways.

CVS famously reframed their pharmacy business into a health business. Whilst a pharmacy is seen as a slightly negative place, a store to go to when you are sick, in search of a specific product transaction, health is a more positive idea, where you might go more often for a wider range of wellness-based products and services, and even pay more for. In other cases, you might even find that you see a significant change in stock prices, as analysts apply different p/e ratios, for example in shifting from a communications to media business.

Whilst one way is to reframe your market, another is to understand what else is inside your business that could add value to customers and differentiate your proposition.

Chris Zook worked with Slywotzky on another book, “Unstoppable”, which encourages companies to understand what their “hidden assets” are and find ways to leverage them to generate new opportunities for profitable growth. Hidden assets include undervalued business platforms, unexploited customer assets, or underused capabilities.

The 12 sources of growth

 Growth remains the overarching pursuit of a business, even when it embraces a more socially engaged economic model where value is shared more equally between all stakeholders. Growth creates a bigger “pie” which can be shared amongst everyone, and that growth can be driven in a way that is efficient and has more positive impact as it is created, not just as a result. Positive growth, if you like.

You could argue that Igor Ansoff still has the answer to growth. His “product/market expansion grid” from the 1950s explores the opportunities and risks of growth – a simple 2×2 matrix that explores new and existing markets, and new and existing products and services. The limitation of course, is that it encourages thinking based around products, and the existing frames of markets.

Finding growth is an increasingly creative and multi-dimensional process, that combines the ideas of searching for new opportunities based around changing attitudes and behaviours, new capabilities and aspirations, and creative ways to frame, connect and define them.

This gives us at least 12 sources to explore:

• New audiences … reaching new customer segments, or those which have not been explicitly addressed in the past, through same or adapted products and propositions. Example: Nivea’s skincare for men. 
• New propositions … exploring the new or different needs and aspirations of customers, or new price points, such as line extensions, or a low end or luxury version. Example: Mini, Mini Cooper, Mini Clubman, Mini Countryman.

• New channels … reaching underserved or inaccessible audiences, either with direct channels, or through new types of intermediaries. Example: Bolthouse Farms selling carrots as snacks through vending machines.
• New geographies … taking the existing business to new geographies – new locations, cities, nations – in the same or adapted forms. Example: Hershey’s have five different chocolate formulae for different parts of the world.
• New products … this is largely driven by new capabilities, that are embraced to better meet new and existing needs and aspirations, new varieties and formats, and new applications. Example: Innocent’s smoothies, juices, snacks, water.
• New services … adding chargeable services, such as support to enhance the use of the product, or shifting from products to charging for access, like SaaS, software as a service. Example: Eataly’s cookery classes, beyond stores and restaurants.
• New experiences … combining products and services of your own, and potentially partners, into a richer added-value experience for customers. Example: Airbnb Trips, adding flights, car rental and activities to accommodation.
• New categories … creating new market spaces, that emerge from new needs, or fusions of existing needs, with distinctive products and services to address them. Example: Red Bull’s energy drinks.
• New partners … collaborating with partners who enhance the offer, from affinity brands to competitors and complementors. Example: Clothing brand Supreme partnering with Louis Vuitton to enhance brand reputation.
• New business models … developing new operational or commercial models for businesses – subscriptions, freemium, one for one, and more. Example: Microsoft 365 cloud-based subscription.
• New acquisitions … enhancing your portfolio, your capabilities or reach by acquiring new businesses that complement your existing. Example: Facebook acquiring Instagram to reach people more actively and intimately.
• New possibilities … developing entirely new markets based around novel capabilities and solutions which have no precedence. Example: Virgin Galactic developing its space tourism business.

Growth of course is easy if only measured by sales – any fool can discount a product. The challenge is to find sustainable, profitable growth. This list is not exhaustive, nor the approaches mutually exclusive. Many growth initiatives will use a combination of these approaches, and will focus as much on accelerating existing sources, as finding new. Growth accelerators range from new brands and propositions to exploiting network effects, such as social media and distribution platforms, that multiply reach.

© Peter Fisk. Excerpt from his book “Business Recoded: Have the courage to create a better future” published by Wiley.

More for business leaders from Peter Fisk:

• Next Agenda of best ideas and priorities for business
• Megatrends 2030 in a world accelerated by pandemic
• 49 Codes to help you develop a better business future
• 250 companies innovators shaking up the world
• 100 leaders with the courage to shape a better future
• Education that is innovative, issue-driven, action-driving
• Consulting that is collaborative, strategic and innovative
• Speaking that is inspiring, topical, engaging and actionable

What is innovation?

Sounds like an easy question. Or should be. But we still stumble over phrases like making ideas happen, solving problems, doing it profitably, or at least with a positive impact.

And of course its easy to resort to Apple, or more specifically, Steve Jobs. Whilst you’ve heard everything about him already, there is one moment worth recalling from that magical Stanford commencement speech he made in 2005. Whilst he talked about life, and making the most of your time, he captured the spirit of innovation in three sentences:

You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something—your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8kHDJKdJXM

Leonardo da Vinci was a great one for making new connections. His greatest breakthroughs came from connecting the unconnected, and in particular, the insights gained by bringing different perspectives together. His expertise in anatomy helped him to create better portraits and sculptures, and also helped him make sense of mechanics and engineering. He himself defined innovation as connecting the unconnected.

Another great disruptor, Albert Einstein was often challenged for making what seemed like absurd connections. Like the connection between energy and mass. Of course, there was no existing logic which suggested such a connection, it needed to be shaped through imagination. Almost every great scientific breakthrough has come about through hypothesis and then making sense through practical demonstration.

Back in the business world, I explored innovation with Sir Richard Branson, and the culture which he seeks to create across his Virgin companies, he reached for a pencil and paper and jotted down his equation of life … A+B+C+D (Always Be Connecting the Dots). Its not about creating newness, but making sense of what you have, maybe in fragments and different places, but can be shaped in new and interesting ways.

We spend much of our time collecting dots – seeking new insights, reading more books, generating more ideas – but too little time connecting dots. This requires confidence and creativity, to think bigger and laterally.

“The magic of connecting dots is that once you learn the techniques, the dots can change but you’ll still be good at connecting them.”

Indeed we live in an incredible world with so many great sources of ideas, insights and inspirations. I spend my exploring the world’s most innovative companies, the new markets which they shape, the business models which they develop, the new experiences they deliver to customers. There are so many ideas out there.

So many dots to connect …

• Connecting ideas with different ideas to create new and unusual concepts
• Connecting diverse people to combine talents, experience and perspectives
• Connecting customers with business to gain insight and engagement
• Connecting partners with business to gain capability and reach
• Connecting customer needs and wants, to solve bigger problems
• Connecting ideas from different places, across geographies and sectors
• Connecting products and services, into richer customer experiences
• Connecting markets in new ways, to operate different and better
• Connecting business with new business models to be more profitable
• Connecting media, channels and market networks to amplify the impact
• Connecting customers with customers to build richer communities

The real skill is to see the bigger picture, the bigger space in which you can make the new connections – and then to make new connections – interesting, unusual, distinctive, better. Even if at first you question how will it work, how will it make money, don’t be disheartened. By adding more connections you will soon find ways to implement and sell your uniqueness, often in ways you never imagined.

And so innovation in every aspect of what you do.

And as I googled for more clarity (as you do), I came across this video:

It finishes with a great few lines, worth remembering for when you’re asked that question about what really is innovation:

So what is innovation?

Those other dots. The ones others miss.
And having the certainty to know that the dots you see are not only valid, but necessary if the world is to move forward.

 

Explore more from Peter Fisk about innovation:

• Introduction: Innovation. Making the best ideas happen successfully.
• Program: Business Innovation. Design Thinking to New Business Models.
• Article: Innovate your business model
• Article: Innovation by Leonardo da Vinci
• Toolkit: Innovation Diagnostic
• Toolkit: Gamechangers Creative Lab

 

Driving transformation is not easy as part of everyday business. Organisations therefore develop a range of alternative routes to creating more radical change, faster.

Spot is a dog-like robot that can climb stairs and run across rough terrains, has 360 vision, can carry  40kg loads, and endure – 20C. Handle is a robotic arm that can move boxes in a warehouse or guide surgical instruments within operations. Atlas is the world’s most dynamic humanoid robot, it can run and jump with 28 hydraulic joints.

Boston Dynamics began as a spin-off from MIT, where they developed the first robots that ran and moved like animals. The lab combines the principles of dynamic control and balance with sophisticated mechanical designs, cutting-edge electronics, and intelligent software to explore  how robotics can transform the worlds of healthcare to manufacturing.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in Beijing acts as the national scientific think tank that provides advice to Chinese businesses, large and small, and the government, specifically on using technologies to develop the economy and social improvement. It is the largest research organization in the world with over 60,000 researchers working in 114 institutes across China. Based on the total number of research papers published in Nature and its affiliate network, CAS ranked #1 among the world’s leading research organizations.

Silicon Valley’s PARC is an open Innovation company that has been at the heart of some of the most important technological breakthroughs. It brings together scientists, engineers, and designers focused on specific future themes. Creativity and science are core to PARC’s mission to reduce the time and risk of innovation. Teams assemble and grow organically, combining expertise and capabilities to work with start-ups and corporates.

Innovation Labs

Innovation labs have evolved from the Skunk Works which Lockheed Martin started decades ago. Moving from insular research and development roles of the past, like the secretive projects of Xerox PARC or Bell Labs, to a more open structure, with two roles:

• Develop innovative concepts and business models without the distractions, demands and expectations, and internal obstacles of most organisations – to create significant new opportunities for existing business.
• Develop new ventures, that require collaborative working and investments with external partners – be that other companies, new start-ups, and specialists – and may even lead to a new business.

An innovation lab is typically an open, collaborative space where people from different departments with outside partners, tech experts, designers, and academics, seeking to emulate the culture, speed, tech integration, and disruptiveness of a start-up, in order to develop new products, services, experiences and business models that take advantage of new business strategies and advances in technology.

Innovation Labs may be run in-house, or by independent companies, or venture capital funds who want to ensure that their investments are spent effectively. In-house labs run by corporates may want to bring start-ups into their fold providing resources or investment, with a motivation to learn from their specialist expertise, share in their entrepreneurial culture, or to have first option on the outcomes.

Incubators and accelerators

There are many different types of innovation labs – often known as incubators or accelerators. Incubators give birth to new start-ups and nurture their early stage development whilst accelerators enhance the ability the ability start-ups to scale-up into more significant business,  by adding more corporate structure, collaboration and more.

Of course many companies also develop innovation labs as vanity projects – colourful bean bags, lots of white boards, bikes hanging from the ceiling, a few robots sliding around, table football in the corner, you get the idea – but innovation labs can play an important role in driving more radical ideas, new cultures, and future growth.

The dedicated focus of an innovation lab has significant commercial benefits:

• Faster development of new products and new business models that solve core customer needs and drive new revenue streams.
• Protect against the threat of disruption from competitors, especially start-ups using new digital approaches.
• Be a working lab to collaborate with customers to address specific challenges and develop more customised solutions.
• Demonstrate products and capabilities to current and future customers, and business partners.

Whilst culturally, being separate from the main business has additional benefits:

• Explore the potential of new technologies separately from current solutions, enabling more creative applications.
• Build multiple innovation centres dedicated to important new categories, geographies and technologies.
• Create a collaborative working space closer to industry innovators, and new technology centres
• Shift the company culture towards greater innovation, technological integration, and collaboration internally and externally.

Inside Daimler’s Lab1886

The origins of today’s Mercedes Benz go back to Gottlieb Daimler who started out in a Stuttgart garage in 1886.Today, Daimler’s Lab1886 continues the tradition of innovation. It is a network-based initiative, where the German car maker explores new business models, through to new engine mechanics, fuel concepts and interior designs.

“Today, we are facing a lot of mega-trends like digitalisation and globalisation” says the lab’s director Susanne Hahn. “All these technological and social regulatory movements will change the automotive industry over the next 10 years significantly. We already have, within the Lab1886, a bunch of products ready for the future”.

The incubator works along the four pillars: connected, autonomous, shared and service and electric drive. The lab has locations USA, China and Germany, defining its goal as “to move faster from an idea to a product or business model”.

Employees can submit ideas based on any of the themes to the company’s internal crowdsourcing platform, with the best forwarded to the company’s “shark tank” panel of experts, and then to the incubation phase. Any of Daimler’s 300,000 employees can submit an ideas, and then work on it full-time in the lab if successful. Teams are also given coaching, co-working space, and funding to develop prototypes and pilots.

Projects are eventually either transferred into the appropriate line of business or spun off into new companies, where the employee could become the new CEO. Hahn says that the original ideator also has the potential to become the CEO of the new company.

Car2Go, a peer-to-peer car sharing platform, is one graduate of Lab1886, spun out as a separate company with 2.5 million customers. Other projects include a travel optimization app called Moovel, and external partnerships, such as a collaboration with start-up Volocopter, to explore the world of urban air taxis and vertical take-off vehicles.

(Excerpt from “Business Recoded” by Peter Fisk)

Jim Collins’ book “Good to Great” is regarded as one of the all time greats of business literature.

At the heart of his approach, built on years of research, is a map. He spent decades exploring what makes great companies perform better.  The map is the answer, and you can find a fabulous interactive version online.

Collins’ map is divided into inputs and outputs. The inputs includes all the practices that he believes that it takes to become a great company, and is divided into 4 different stages. The outputs refer to the results, or what is a great company. Here’s his map as it appears on his site:

Inputs: What does it take to build a great company?

There are four stages:

Stage 1. Disciplined People

• Reach for Level 5 Leadership. Cultivate getting the type of leaders and becoming the type of leader who leads to serve a cause and does so with humility.
• Practise First Who, Then What. Get the right people on the bus and on the right seats of the bus, and only then you figure out where to drive it.

Stage 2. Disciplined Thought

• Embrace the Genius of the And. Look for how to have purpose and profit, long-term and short-term, execution and innovation, etc.
• Confront the Brutal Facts in the context of Stockdale’s Paradox.Confront the brutal facts and retain faith that you can and will prevail in the end.
• Clarify your Hedgehog. Make a series of decisions based on what you are passionate about, what you can be the best in the world at, and what drives your economic engine.

Stage 3. Disciplined Action

• Turn the flywheel. Build momentum by making a series of good disciplined decisions and executing them well. Then you will get a click on the flywheel.
• Hit Your 20-mile Marches. Relentlessly try to hit self-imposed performance markers, not just for years but for decades.
• Fire Bullets, Then Cannonballs. First fire bullets to get empirical validation of new ideas that they will work. Then, convert them into large cannonballs to scale your ideas up.

Stage 4.  Building to last

• Practise Productive Paranoia. Understand the five stages of decline, and practise constant productive paranoia.
• Shift from being a Time-teller into being a Watch-maker. Build the right mechanisms so that the company can succeed far beyond the presence of any single leader or any single great idea.
• Preserve the Core and Stimulate Progress. Hold true to your core values, and change your practices. Hold true to your purpose, and change your strategies.
• Set Big Hairy Audacious Goals. Set BHAGs as there is a difference between merely having a goal and becoming committed to a huge, daunting challenge.

Collins also adds a 10 x multiplier: the return on luck – or what you eventually do with the luck you get whether it’s good or bad. This is the amplifier of everything else in the framework. “About 50% of great leadership is what you do with the unexpected.”

Outputs: What is a great company?

Collins is quick to remind us that “big doesn’t equal great, and great does not equal big.” He says a great company is one that achieves three specific outcomes:

• Superior results. “You win at your game” … to be a great company, it’s not enough that you have a great purpose and that you treat your customers well. You need to deliver superior results.
• Distinctive impact. “You make an indelible impact in the world that you touch” … your impact can be for example the distinctive thing that you do, or it can derive from the level of excellence you deliver.
• Lasting endurance. “You are able to do this over a very long time” … a truly great company is not dependent on a single leader or specific circumstances. They last no matter what.

Of all of Jim Collins’ concepts, for me, the flywheel is most significant.

Amazon is a great example of a business thriving on a flywheel, a circular process that is not easy to start but then builds – and builds – momentum over time, with multiplying impact. In a digital world, flywheels can have magical impact – building insight through data, building audience through referral, building profitability through customised relationships.

 

 

 

Larry Fink shocked the financial world in 2018, when he declared that his BlackRock investment firm would only invest in companies that could demonstrate that they had a meaningful purpose beyond profits.

Over the previous 30 years Fink had built BlackRock into the largest investment firm in the world, with almost $9 trillion in assets under management. However, he was always a leader who looked beyond the numbers. His letter to the CEOs of nearly every large company in America deplored the corporate culture of short-term thinking and threatened to vote out board members who did not hold management more holistically accountable. Other large investment firms have followed BlackRock’s lead.

“If the system is really going to change, pressure needs to come from the investment community,” says the Drucker Institute. “And no voice has been more important or more forceful in this regard than Larry Fink’s.”

2018 Letter to CEOs: in his most disruptive letter, that marked his shift to purposeful thinking, he wrote that a long-term perspective matters more than short-term returns:

• Expectation that companies deliver more than short term financial returns: In the current social and political context, society is increasingly looking to the private sector to provide more than short term financial returns.
• Without a sense of purpose, no company, either public or private, can achieve its full potential. It will ultimately lose the license to operate from key stakeholders.
• ‘Social licence to operate’ and long term prosperity depends on making a ‘positive contribution to society’, and the absence of a long-term focus or ‘sense of purpose’ exposes companies to greater risks.
• A new model of shareholder engagement is required with clearer and fuller disclosure of strategies to deliver long-term growth reviewed at board level.

2019 Letter to CEOs: he became more specific about the relative importance of purpose and profit, saying that profit was an outcome, but purpose was the goal:

• Purpose is not a mere tagline or marketing campaign; it is a company’s fundamental reason for being – what it does every day to create value for its stakeholders.
• Purpose is not the sole pursuit of profits but the animating force for achieving them. Profits are in no way inconsistent with purpose – in fact, profits and purpose are inextricably linked.
• Purpose unifies management, employees, and communities. It drives ethical behavior and creates an essential check on actions that go against the best interests of stakeholders.
• Companies that fulfill their purpose and responsibilities to stakeholders reap rewards over the long-term. Companies that ignore them stumble and fail.

2020 Letter to CEOs: he called for a fundamental reshaping of finance, driven by the urgent need for governments and businesses to respond to the challenges of climate change:

• A company cannot achieve long-term profits without embracing purpose and considering the needs of a broad range of stakeholders. Ultimately, purpose is the engine of long-term profitability.
• BlackRock believes that the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) provides a clear set of standards for reporting sustainability information across a wide range of issues.
• Over time, companies and countries that do not respond to stakeholders and address sustainability risks will encounter growing skepticism from the markets, and in turn, a higher cost of capital.
• We will be increasingly disposed to vote against management and board directors when companies are not making sufficient progress on sustainability-related disclosures and the business practices and plans underlying them.

2021 Letter to CEOs: he wrote that achieving “net zero” carbon emissions is the best way to drive investment growth, and economic recovery.

• The pandemic demonstrated the importance of ESG: reflecting on 2020, he argues that these issues – with climate change as the existential threat that affects us all – matter more than ever, revealing a 96% increase in sustainable investing in 2019
• Now, because of Covid-19, we know how fragile we are, we must act to remain under 2 degrees. He challenges all companies to achieve “net zero” by 2050. Companies who ignore this, he says, will rapidly lose investor confidence, and economic value.
• We need a single global reporting standard. He says most companies, even the best, do a poor job in accounting for carbon emissions, and demands the same standards of accounting as applied to financials. What gets measured, gets done he says.
• Social issues are rising fast, he argues. Racial and gender equality came into focus during 2020, although economic inequality is still less visible. Business, he says, holds the key to inclusive capitalism – DEI – diversity, equity, inclusion.

2022 Letter to CEOs: he addressed the power of capitalism, but also the changing nature of capitalism – from profit to purpose, shareholders to stakeholders, and more:

• Stakeholder capitalism is not about politics. It is not a social or ideological agenda. It is capitalism, driven by mutually beneficial relationships between you and the employees, customers, suppliers, and communities your company relies on to prosper. This is the power of capitalism.
• In today’s globally interconnected world, a company must create value for and be valued by its full range of stakeholders in order to deliver long-term value for its shareholders. It is through effective stakeholder capitalism that capital is efficiently allocated, companies achieve durable profitability, and value is created and sustained over the long-term.
• At the foundation of capitalism is the process of constant reinvention – how companies must continually evolve as the world around them changes or risk being replaced by new competitors.
• It’s never been more essential for CEOs to have a consistent voice, a clear purpose, a coherent strategy, and a long-term view. Your company’s purpose is its north star in this tumultuous environment.

Institutional Investor has called Fink “the Steve Jobs of the money game” for his ability to foresee a changing world, where most peers are limited in their mindsets by conventional assumptions and incremental solutions. Fink says he is ready to shake-up BlackRock and the entire industry “We need to be willing to reimagine every aspect of our company and how we manage it,” he wrote “and so should every other business”.

Every business seeks purpose.

At its heart, purpose is about describing how the world is a better place with you. Or, alernatively, to consider how the world would be a lesser place without you.

Another way to describe it is legacy.

What will you achieve, what will you leave behind, what will you be remembered for? Or, as I call it, what is your future story? Defining the future you will create, the vision you have, and the impact you will make.

In business I see many generic, forgettable statements of intent.

Purpose, vision, or is it mission? Strategic pillars, horizons, imperatives? Values, principles. It’s great to have them. But they need to matter. They need to change things. To drive choices. To create distinctiveness. To energise people. To deliver results.

Meeting the All Blacks changed me.

I live in Twickenham, often called the home of rugby. New Zealand’s famed rugby team, the All Blacks, are frequent visitors, staying at my local sports club, the Lensbury. Mixing with them, you feel something special.

They are awesome, intimidating.

They stand tall as people, not just physically or famously, but with confidence and passion, and together. On the pitch, they are fearless and fabulous. From the moment of their Haka, their traditional Maori salute, they are different, and better.

In my new book “Business Recoded“, I tell their story – as inspiration for your own future story.

One person who knows them particularly well is James Kerr, who has spent much of his life as a business coach learning from the All Blacks and applying their magic to organisations.

Finding legacy is a great way to find more purpose, and to tell your future story.

Richie McCaw, the former captain of New Zealand’s “All Blacks”, is regarded by many as the greatest rugby player of all time.

His teams won a remarkable 89% of their 110 matches in which he was their leader, including two world cups. He even played through one World Cup final with a broken foot, knowing that he was a key component of the team. Whilst he recognises that the team is always more than any individual, he also believed that a leader defines a team, brings together and creates great individuals.

After lifting the World Cup in 2015, McCaw said “We come from a small Pacific island, a nation of only 4.5 million, but with a winning mindset. At the start of each game, when we lock together in our traditional Maori haka, we know that we are invincible”.

Create your “Kapa o Pango”

The All Blacks have a bold and unwavering ambition to win, working on a 4-year cycle with a common team, and setting mini goals along the way to retain sharpness and evaluate progress. They search out the best players who bring each technical specialism, but equally who will work best together, whilst also retaining a search for new talent and skills.

Being part of the team is everything, with a sacred induction, and commitment to the higher purpose.

As a team they constantly evaluate, challenge and stretch, themselves, whilst searching the world of sport and beyond for new ideas, ways to improve physiological fitness, mental agility or technical skills. Like most sports, whilst they have a coach to guide them and captain to lead them out, their approach once in the game is that every one of them is a leader, all equal, all responsible, all heroes when they win.

In “Legacy” Kerr describes some of their team beliefs

• “A collection of talented individuals without personal discipline will ultimately and inevitably fail.”
• “Character triumphs over talent.”
• “A sense of inclusion means individuals are more willing to give themselves to a common cause.”
• “The first stage of learning is silence, the second stage is listening.”
• “High-performing teams promote a culture of honesty, authenticity and safe conflict.”
• “If we’re going to lead a life, if we’re going to lead anything, we should surely know where we are going, and why.”
• “Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.”

Richie McCaw talks about some of the distinctive beliefs which the team has embraced. These include many concepts from Maori culture, such as the “Kapa o Pango” which is the name of the haka, the traditional dance performed by the team before every match, and reflects the diversity of the nation’s Polynesian origins.  Such rituals become important in bonding the team, but also in creating its identity to others.

Another Maori concepts is “whanau” which means “follow the spearhead” inspired by a flock of birds flying in formation which is  typically 70% more efficient than flying solo.  And finally “whakapapa” which means leave a great legacy, or translated more directly,  plant trees you’ll never see by being a good ancestor.

Finding more purpose

So why does your business exist?

Purpose defines what the business contributes to the world, or equally, why the world would be a lesser place if the business did not exist.

Purpose creates an enduring cause which the business is willing to fight for. For some this might be an urgent call to action, for others it might be a more personal inspiration. Saving then planet, or achieving your potential, with Nike, or seeking happiness, with Coca Cola.

Tesla exists to “accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy”, Starbucks to “inspire the human spirit”, Dove to “help the next generation of women realise their potential”, Microsoft to “empower people to achieve more”, and Swarovski to “add sparkle to people’s everyday lives.”

Purpose creates a richer sense of meaning in your business, inspiring employees to raise their game, to transform and grow themselves and the organisation. It encourages a strategic focus, to rise above the distractions of today, to align on bigger goals and to innovate more radically. Productivity and performance typically follow.

It is a cause shared internally and externally, that investors want to be part of, partners want to align with, and customers want to promote through their consumption and loyalty.

Purpose goes far beyond the old mission and vision statements, which were largely internal mantras, about how good the company wanted to be – “the best”, “the industry leader”, “to maximise performance”. Purpose is much more altruistic and inclusive. It is about what the inside does for the outside world. It sits above other ambitions, and should probably replace them, as an inspiring, single-minded intent.

If purpose is “why we exist?”, then mission is more about “what do we do?” and vision is “where are we going?”. Or as Ashley Grice the CEO of Brighthouse says “When you go to bed at night and you are worried about something, that is generally your mission. But when you wake up in the morning and you are excited about something, that’s your purpose?”

The power of storytelling

As a business leader you are a storyteller.

Not of fictional stories that go between truths, but stories of the future, stories of where the business is headed, and what it will be like. Stories that engage people in understanding those simplistic purpose statements in profound, human and inspiring ways.

Steve Jobs was a master of storytelling. In 2001 as the technology world was still in shock from the crash of the dotcom boom, Jobs mounted the stage for Apple’s annual meeting. He was in his prime. His new iMac computers had been a success, the company had been transformed under his renewed leadership.

Jobs talked about his passion for music. How music inspires him, and every one of us. It marks the great moments, it defines moments in our lives, it can change our worlds. The Beatles. Dylan and more. By now, it felt like Apple could be a music business. And then from his jeans pocket, he pulled out a small white device, and held it up.

“A thousand songs in your pocket” he said with a huge grin.

As a business leader you need a story.

What’s your future story?

Purpose statements, business strategies and brand slogans are not enough.

We need something more human and personal. A story can resonate with people today and explain how tomorrow can be better. A story can bring a future vision to life, inviting people to imagine it with you, exploring its benefits. A story evolves, and shows a path from where we are, to where we could be. A story is more memorable and can be retold from person to person. People seek hope and want reasons to believe in better.

Elon Musk doesn’t quite have the drama or fluency of Jobs, but he has become one of the best future storytellers of today’s business world.

His businesses are founded on future ideas, building for future possibilities. They start with an inspiring purpose, be it SpaceX’s desire to sustain life through a new civilisation beyond Earth, or Tesla’s drive to accelerate the shift to clean energy.

SpaceX might have created a satellite launch business that is around 10 times cheaper than NASA, but he uses this capability to tell a far bigger story. They are just practice runs, for a much greater mission to Mars. Who can forget the dramatic moment when he landed his returning Falcon 9 spacecraft back on an incredibly small platform in the middle of the ocean? Or when the much more powerful Falcon Heavy launched a (Tesla) car into perpetual orbit playing David Bowie’s “Life on Mars”?

Musk writes his Master Plan for his businesses, publishing them on his blog, and updating them every so often. His style is informal but informative, visionary but practical, combining scientific logic and technical facts. In 2006 he wrote his initial Master Plan for Tesla:

• Create a low volume car, which would necessarily be expensive
• Use that money to develop a medium volume car at a lower price
• Usethat money to create an affordable, high volume car
• While doing above, also provide zero emission electric power generation options

In 2016 he continued his future story, with Master Plan “Part Deux”:

• Create stunning solar roofs with seamlessly integrated battery storage
• Expand the electric vehicle product line to address all major segments
• Develop a self-driving capability that is ten times safer than manual
• Enable your car to make money for you when you aren’t using it

Musk can appear quite humble, quite nervous, when he speaks in public, but his bold ideas portray a great confidence.

When he first talked about the Hyperloop, he explained the concept relative to what we already knew, the magnetic levitating Bullet trains that speed between Tokyo and Osaka, and then went further. Imagine if it was in a frictionless tube, at 750 mph, taking 12 minutes from downturn San Francisco to Los Angeles. And then he showed us the video simulation. It almost felt real. We believed in the possibility, and how it would be better.

Strategies are stories. Brands are stories. Business cases are stories. Project plans are stories. When people say “tell me your story” they are rarely asking about where do you, or your company, come from; more likely they are interested in where you are going.

Pixar and the hero’s journey

“Storytelling is the greatest technology that humans have ever created” said Pixar’s former chief creative officer Jon Lesseter, in my book “Creative Genius”.  He said storytelling involves a deep understanding of human emotions, motivations, and psychology in order to truly move an audience.

Luckily, storytelling is something we all do naturally, starting at a very young age. But there’s a difference between good storytelling and great storytelling. Great stories start with human experiences, feelings that people can relate to. They have structure and process, typically taking a character on a journey. They have moments of joy and despair, surprise and unexpected, appealing to our deepest emotions.

They are brought to life in words and pictures, polished in a movie or told one to one. But they are also incredibly simple and focused. Pixar’s former story artist, Emma Coates, defined 22 rules of storytelling are as relevant to business and its leaders as to Buzz Lightyear and his millions of followers.

Pixar always starts with a character, one who you admire, who want to achieve something great, typically overcoming adversity, usually making the world better in some way. Or to fill in the blanks, “Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___.”

 That “adventure” type of narrative reflects a popular structure which we can see in many stories from “The Wizard of Oz” to “Star Wars”. The Hero’s Journey concept comes from Joseph Campbell’s book “The Hero with A Thousand Faces” which tells how the character, the hero, faces a crisis, achieves a great victory and comes home transformed.  Campbell describes 17 stages in the journey, over three “acts” – departure, initiation, and return.

The future story of your business

For business, the “hero” is most typically the customer.

The future story for a business leader describes how we help the customer to overcome the challenges of today.  The purpose reflects a positive cause, how good triumphs over evil, how the customer lives a better life.

Whilst stories might seem simple, they require thought. Framing is key to the initial stage, the context and way in which the challenge is presented. Equally important are some of the small details.  A story is about emotions, hopes and dreams, love and friendship, fear and euphoria. It is about resonating with people.

There are many ways to tell the story. Some organisations turn to thought leadership, developing reports on the future of their industry, or maybe a letter to all stakeholders, like Larry Fink sends each year. Elon Musk is particularly fond of visuals and videos, creating sci-fi-like movies that simulate his visions. These might evolve in to “We imagine” type of concept advertising, like Microsoft famously did, in portraying the future of work, or education, or travel. Another way is to create a manifesto, like companies such as Patagonia and Lululemon have done.

The best way to tell your story, however, is to stand up and talk. Authentically, personally and naturally. And be ready wherever you go to tell your “future story” in ways that inspire people to believe, to want to be part of that future, and to join you on the journey.

Excerpts from “Business Recoded“ by Peter Fisk