If Progress is the Journey...

I fundamentally believe that entrepreneurs, and the businesses that they create, are vital for the growth of our economy. Through our game-changing new enterprises we create jobs, generate wealth, are the catalyst for progress in the respective industries that we operate within, and increasingly we do good.  Entrepreneurs have always been on a mission to challenge the status quo, and whilst this will never change, with every new wave of startup businesses we see more and more responsible business behaviours.  Encouraging and enabling this approach is vital to make sure that we deliver economical value in the most sustainable of ways.

Progress across the board

Whilst entrepreneurs are most often at the riskier end of change, the end where failure is a more regular by-product, change is required in every business and it’s the level of resistance to it that dictates how fast or slow the business progresses. Progress and change are inseparable. If progress is the journey, then change is the engine getting you ever closer to the destination. So, to the point of progress across the board.  Every entrepreneur will tell you about the hurdles they have had to jump to bring their idea to fruition, these hurdles are friction, resistance to change on a macro level. However, over time an entrepreneur (or a group of them normally), convinces the industry of a need for ‘new’ and lubricates the gears of change. This in turn drives value throughout the entire chain as all parties start to embrace change. These parties reap rewards through adapting to new processes, designing new IP, and developing new skills to cater for new needs.

Setting the pace

In my opinion, industry-wide endorsement of change dictates the pace at which progress is made. This logic can be used to explain why some industries are more accepting of change than others. A propensity for change in a given industry increases if exposed to its influence and results on a more frequent basis. The technology sector has set the pace for progress and boasts of change at unrivalled levels. This industry doesn’t have a status quo (or at least if they do they are all very recent ones) so everything is open to being challenged and as such we see progress every single day on a mass level, regularly in the form of ‘evolution’, but more frequently than most other industries, this change can be revolutionary.

Change is an idea. Execution is the reality

“an act or process through which something becomes different”

I’ve touched on progress being the journey and change is the engine, but without execution, the wheels simply don’t exist never mind turn. Execution is arguably the most important piece of the puzzle, there are many great journeys that never started. Change is but ideas and these ideas are born of experiences. If we choose to work for a progressive business then change is encouraged (if we don’t, we may just build our own) then all that is really left is execution, and it is the execution that turns ideas into reality.

I refuse to believe that there is even one example of a business that can survive without a degree of change. Zero change equals zero progress and who wants zero progress? I do however believe there is a time and a place for change and some businesses aren’t being challenged to change just yet, maybe their product is great (for now), but the real world doesn’t stand still, and no business can afford to either. It’s just about knowing when to move into a higher gear to get your change engine working a little harder. You set the pace…until someone else does!

Moral of the story?

Change drives progress and progress moves us forward - wouldn't the world be a mundane (and uncivilised) place without it? It's time the consumer industry got behind the game changers ;-)