Guest Blogger Dov Seidman: How You Do What You Do Is the Real Competitive Advantage
You can find the words outperform, outfox, outmaneuver, outspend, outthink in the dictionary because they describe deeply engrained habits of how we think and act. The source of sustainable competitive advantage in the 21st century, however, is such a new idea that the term has not yet entered Webster's or Oxford's. You will not find outbehave in the dictionary--not yet, anyway.
In the 21st century, it isn't what you do that matters most. If you make something new (or just better, faster, and cheaper), the competition quickly comes up with a way to improve and deliver it at the same or an even lower price. Customers instantly compare price, features, quality, and service, effectively rendering almost every what a commodity. To a large degree, the same holds true for the way individuals get ahead and accomplish their goals. Specialized knowledge or expertise differentiates you for a moment in time, but it likely won't carry any of us through an entire career. Changing jobs, companies, and even industries now often involves adapting knowledge skills to a new set of conditions. Yet we all want to stand out, be uniquely valuable, and distinguish ourselves from the competition. In a commoditized world, we are running out of areas in which to do so.
There is one area where tremendous variation and variability still exist, however, one place that we have not yet analyzed, quantified, systematized, or commoditized, one which, in fact, cannot be commoditized or copied: the realm of human behavior: how we do what we do.
Think about it. If you make stronger connections and collaborate more intensely with your coworkers, you can win. If you reach out and inspire more people throughout your global network, your productivity skyrockets. If you keep promises 99 percent of the time and your competitor keeps promises only 8 out of 10 times, you can gain critical advantage in the marketplace. If your interactions with others deliver a more meaningful customer experience, you engender a loyalty that brings them back again and again. And in a connected world, the ability to thrive lies in the ability to create strong connections with others, to reach out, build trust, enlist others in a vision and share passion.
When it comes to how you do what you do, there is immense variation, and where a broad spectrum of variation exists, opportunity exists. The tapestry of human behavior is so varied, so rich, and so global that it presents a rare opportunity, the opportunity to outbehave the competition.
+ + + + + + + +
About the Author: Dov Seidman is the founder, chairman and chief executive officer of LRN, a company that helps businesses develop ethical corporate cultures and inspire principled performance, and the author of HOW: Why HOW We Do Anything Means Everything...in Business (and in Life). Read more about what it means to outbehave the competition in an excerpt from HOW.
Related Entries
Leave a comment