“Find Your Technique” reminds us that transformation must be rooted in the enterprise’s product and market context and be right for the enterprise’s style and routines. This ethos is captured perfectly by Bruce Pandolfini’s advice in Searching for Bobby Fischer: “Don’t move until you see it,”
For instance, rapid learning and adaptability are priorities during the launch of a new product; exploring alternative scaling options is key during the growth phase; avoiding complacency and eliminating inefficiencies are key in the maturity phase; and the declining phase is about courage and creativity that enables either a significant transformation or a graceful exit.
The launch phase requires lightweight flexible operations that evolve with feedback and the pragmatic adoption of emerging technologies. For example, 19th-century Singer Sewing Machines revolutionized manufacturing by pioneering assembly line techniques but adapted them gradually, learning to optimize output without sacrificing quality.
Similarly, a flexible culture that embraces experimentation and customer feedback works best for testing different business model dimensions and creating a product whose performance/features evolve quickly. Winning customers may require a greater focus on sensory and emotional triggers to resonate with them. For instance, Harrods in the 19th century refined its luxury retail approach by learning customer preferences iteratively.
Unfortunately, sustainability is often overlooked at this stage unless it is core to the product.
In the growth phase, the focus must shift to harmonizing and optimizing operations and adopting technology to fuel speed in the market. Toyota’s lean manufacturing system is an example. Toyota crafted a continuous improvement technique that fits its culture and market urgency, balancing speed with quality.
Enterprise culture must foster innovation and some risk-taking and drive the refinement of customer segments and propositions. Similarly, product reliability and perceived quality must be improved, and customer experience standardized while offering personalization. This phase offers a better opportunity to integrate sustainability into operations and branding. An example is Netflix’s data-driven and risk-tolerant evolution from DVD-by-mail to streaming, where the target customers and product proposition evolved.
For a mature product, where market growth slows and stability is prized, operations and technology improvement must focus on risk control and incremental optimization. Walmart, in the late 21st century, focused on barcoding and inventory management, which reinforced its cost leadership and operational discipline.
The culture must evolve to value internal focus and reinforce its strengths. For example, one enterprise chose not to change its code review process while moving to agile development methodology, as the legacy process was an informal mentorship forum. Eliminating the ritual would have caused more harm than good.
Business models must evolve to offer incremental pricing or distribution innovation; products must have incremental improvements, modular designs, or service integration; and customer experience must evolve to be immersive and emotionally resonant. For example, Disney theme parks use meticulous storytelling, environmental design, and employee training to create immersive and emotionally resonant experiences, reflecting deep knowledge of their customer base and a mature market position. Eliminating it would have caused more harm than good.
If sustainability is made integral to the product and business model, it can become a key reputation lever in this phase. For example, Unilever’s sustainability transformation took shape through localized refill stations rather than a global product overhaul. Instead of changing the product design or formulation, the company altered customer access models in geographies where single-use plastics had become a reputational risk.
For declining products, operations need to be streamlined or wound down to preserve profitability, and technology must be calibrated to the context.
The culture must prioritize customer centricity and external engagement; products must be simplified, repositioned, and service integration strengthened; and customer experiences may be simplified or targeted to niche loyalists. IBM’s shift in the 1990s to prioritizing customer-centric services and external engagement is a case in point, where it acknowledged the company’s mature-to-decline lifecycle phase, where survival demanded adaptability.
Authentically embedding sustainability can offer a route to reinvention by opening new avenues of value or restoring trust.
Whichever phase the products might be, one cannot forget Jerry Maguire’s challenge: “Show me the money!” Transformation must deliver real value and not just good intentions.
In summary, the path chosen is as vital as the destination for success.
