Goliath’s Revenge

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I am going to a conference https://philadelphiapact.com/phorum-philly/where a fraternity brother and friend Scott Snyder is speaking about Goliath’s Revenge: How big companies can actually be the disruptor: https://www.cnbc.com/video/2019/03/07/how-established-companies-can-be-bigger-market-disruptors-than-start-ups.html

https://www.amazon.com/Goliaths-Revenge-Established-Companies-Disruptors/dp/1119541875

I agree with his premise which is that big companies have the resources, customer base, history, and process that any startup would dream about.

The challenges for big companies doing this internally are most importantly usually the leadership culture is one of not embracing failure.

This is why it can be powerful to bring in somebody from outside the culture. If one has done many startups failure is not the career limiting move it can be for someone who has spent decades moving up the corporate ladder.

I have found that as a change agent from outside the larger obstacle than failure is actually success.

As soon as success begins to look imminent, people pile in: Legal, compliance, finance, marketing, sales, every department can smell the success, but all of these large bureaucratic organizations stifle the effort, and cause the disruptor to become mired in “corporate politics”

Important to think about. I will report on the conference tomorrow and look forward to a great day of exchanging differing ideas, which is the greatest indicator of future success.