Waiting for the economy? That won't work.

The Phoenix Principle: Waiting for the economy? That won't work.. Adam Hartung is a fellow ex-CSCer and well published speaker / author on helping companies turn around and establish new growth share some interesting thoughts in the above link. In this article Adam discusses the trap of "waiting for the storm to blow over" so that happy days are here again, and I could not agree more.

Most interestingly, Adam takes the alignment of a business to a new frontier...aligning your business to the shifting markets and re-aligning as fast as the markets change. In a nutshell, for those of us involved in leading change and transformations, use the emerging markets to drive your alignment. Build organizational capabilities to seek out new markets that are core or tangential to your current offerings. Then create a system to align all of your value chain to them. And don't just do it once. Your system should be set up to align to a fluid set of emerging markets. Ever heard the saying "the only thing that is constant is change"? Does that resonate?

I prefer to frame these markets, their shifting nature and aligning my organization them in a tradition 2x2 quadrant map. In the map, I place the market paradigm on the "x" axis, and a position of complexity (think barriers to entry for your business) on the "y" axis. If you can plot the affinity of markets (relationship of markets to each other) and then categorize (traditional, complimentary, and emerging) the markets, you have established your "x" axis or "market scope". Then by plotting the complexity of the barriers to entry and operation for your organization to participate in these markets, you can identify the markets you could target, with a degree of prioritization. Other analysis could include more external factors on the "y" axis like market opportunity, annual market growth, etc. You need to shape your analysis to reflect classic business concepts as well as those factors that are germane to your current industry, leadership team, and culture.