The global economy has been radically transformed in recent years to become a raging battlefield where cost reductions are aggressively pursued, product development times are constantly squeezed and the hearts and minds of customers belong to no one.
The forces of globalisation and deregulation are continually drawing new armies into the fray, while the proliferation of new information technologies is being used to arm a plethora of guerrilla armies. Armed with lightweight weapons, the guerrillas employ a confusing array of attack strategies. Meanwhile, the established and entrenched combatants struggle to reorganise and withstand the onslaught.
With the rise of the dot.com era the rules of competition have been rewritten. Traditional competitive strategies are failing. Just as mighty armies of the past have fallen to more nimble competitors with new technologies, so too are today’s corporate giants seeing their market eroded by new and innovative upstarts.
The competitive landscape has changed from battles fought on the open fields by massive armies, to guerrilla warfare that is being fought in a high-tech jungle. The traditional wisdom and tacit rules of engagement no longer apply: guerrillas fight according to a different set of rules.
Their intimate knowledge of technology, and their ability to experiment with new ways of applying technology, make these guerrillas a formidable force. Their greatest weapon is agility—the new front lines never look the same two days in a row, and the inherent agility of guerrilla forces means that they can adapt quickly and comfortably to this changing environment.
More importantly, guerrillas seek to change this environment to keep their more traditionally structured enemies in a state of disarray and unpreparedness. While traditional business approaches are superior in terms of resources, infrastructure and brute strength, guerrillas are able to use their superior agility to turn these traditional advantages into legacies.
KEEP MOVING SOLDIER
The holy grail of business is the achievement of sustainable competitive advantage. Unfortunately, like the fabled holy grail of medieval legends, the attainment of sustainable competitive advantage is highly elusive, and the fighting crusaders that pursue it are likely to meet a dire fate. Part of the problem is that, like many misguided goals, sustainable competitive advantage is impossible to measure. After all, how long does the advantage have to be maintained before it is considered sustainable?
Guerrillas know that in a dynamic competitive landscape it is impossible to ensure the strategies for gaining competitive advantage today will be of any relevance tomorrow. On the new battlegrounds only the development of a capability for strategic agility will provide enterprise with a prolonged competitive advantage.
Thus, the development of an agile IT capability is fundamental to the ability to fight a guerrilla campaign. Without it, the adoption of other guerrilla tactics merely results in a traditionally structured organisation that has lost its discipline, focus and drive.
Write to the Editor at Technology and Business
* All fields are mandatory.