Relevance is defined in terms of pertinent to matter at hand, appropriateness to the users needs and capable of making a difference in decision making. Staying relevant is indeed best assurance for guaranteeing survival. Need for sustaining relevance and threats to relevance are obvious, especially when pointed out. But still we see irrelevance eating out organizations, brands, technologies, products and experts all around. And in most of the cases, although the movement to irrelevance has been gradual, its realization has been sudden and often too late.
Measuring relevance of regular basis and picking signals early may help. So how do you measure relevance rightly, even if not necessarily quantitatively accurately? Financial Performance, present customer satisfaction index or order pipeline may not be right meausres.
Here are some initial thoughts around measuring relevance as a Consultant:
Type of Engagements: Advance booking of your time beyond present engagement is not sufficient to construe sustained relevance but business. Are you getting engagements with enhanced complexity, seeking greater innovation and creativity and by more demanding customers? Or order book is full by customers seeking similar advice and efficient reliable solution in their quest to catch-up fast.
Type of Competition: Consultant is known by the “Competition” he is is compared with. Often the early indication of loss or shift in uniqueness of position comes from change in the type and number of competitors one has.
Type of Praise: Who is praising you and for what? Most sought after praise comes from competition (in disguised form), and at the same time praise that is easiest to come by but with least business benefit (however most endearing) is from your own team.
What are other measures of Relevance that you believe help?
Sunday, February 28, 2010
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As a business, "relevance" of its products or services to the value chain or value network could be the most important parameter which correlates with sustainability.
ReplyDeleteHeavy Armour was relevant but no longer so. Floppy discs / CDs were relevant but no longer so;
In that context would like to propose the following measures for relevance
1) Fit within the value network or total experience - This is focused on how essential the product is to a particular customer experience or lifestyle
2) Ease of Substitution: How easily the same experience can be achieved without the Product or service
Impact of new technologies: It is possible that the product or the entire experience may become redundant due to new technologies. The relevance of the institute for shorthand and stenography would be an example
Relevance is to a context, which is made up of people and situations.
ReplyDeleteIts not a linear but circular concept, much fluid in nature. People, situations and circumstances leading to it keep changing. Hence relevance is relevant to the context in which the consultant operates which keeps changing.
As a afterthought, I think relevance of the consultant is also his ability to understand the context - problem and client and ability to solve them.
relevance is segmental.segment means the market your company wants to cater.significance of the given four options, as in the question,changes accordingly.with regards, alok.
ReplyDeleteHi,
ReplyDeleteAnother key measure (interconnected to the three areas mentioned above) for consultants can be the flexibility of skills and the relevance & speed of new offerings which are brought to the market (w.r.t. to the emerging business trends).
For e.g. The rise in technology and innovation has led to boundaries being blurred between various industries like Telecom with M&E, Banking with IT and Banking with Retail. Some of the organizations which have successflly done this include Apple, Google and HSBC.
For consultants, the demand for cross industry knowledge and offerings has also become imperative and they cannot limit their focus on single industry.
So, for staying relevant, consulting organizations should try to stay ahead of the competition by identifying business trends and accordingly coming up with relevant offerings before anybody else. This is critical for delivering future capabilities to the customers.
Two industry leaders come to my mind - Kodak & Encylopedia Britannica.
ReplyDeleteKodak ignored a technological breakthrough in the industry. It chose to stick to its old world built around film-based photography, while the industry moved to digital photography. One of the reasons could have been watching for competition from non-traditional competitors with substitutes - small new companies. Had they watched this sector instead of underestimating the power of their new technological substitute, Kodak could have responded on time to retain its leadership position in the photography industry.
Similarly, Encylopedia Britannica 'phoo phooed' the low-end digital encylopedias and labeled them as 'cheap imitations' that would go nowhere. They refused to consider the threat since it was coming from a completely new medium/industry. Software substitutes were could not pose a threat to the elite printed, glossy, high-end product that Encylopedia Britannica had had a monoploy in for several decades. By the time the company was forced to accept the triumph of the substitute, it was too late to retain its monopoly. It had to struggle to remain viable and work very hard to stabilize.
Interestingly, Fujifilm, which faced the same problem as Kodak (digital photography), tried to innovate itself by moving into an all together different category - skincare products.( It realized that human skin shares similar properties to thin-film photo process. The company launched a line of skincare products, called Astalift, based on technology it had developed for film.
ReplyDeleteThis fact signifies that organizations need to consistently look within themselves and act innovatively. This can only be done if they are flexible and agile.
In my opinion, another important dimension that an organization need to focus on is how well it is able to utilize knowledge & information from the market - including its consumers, partners and collaborators - to interpret, predict and integrate the applicability of its products & services in the context of buyer ecosystem.
ReplyDeleteAs long as an organization can keep ahead of the buyer, on the knowledge curve, it can command premiums and profits through a higher perceived value for its products and services.
Of the 500 S&P companies in 1957, only 78, or just 16%, were still on the 2008 S&P 500 list. These organizations were able to stay relevant over the decades by capturing and converting knowledge emanating from their ecosystems into intellectual capital and used it to create competitive advantage in a sustainable manner.
Building on some of the perspectives shared above, here's another one - A Darwaninian one when peering through the lens of a consultant on being a consultant
ReplyDeleteMy interpretation of relevance is akin to survival.
The Darwaninian thoery teaches us that those that survive are the fittest. Now, keeping this in mind - key measure of 'Relevance' would be what 'NEW' tool / ammunition have you added to your tool bag that will help you survive / be relevant better. This may not necessarily be limited to skills, technologies that one may add to one's own knowledge pool but may also include - steps taken to enhance one's own maturity,clarity of thought, intellectual bandwidth, interpersonal relationships, resourcefulness.
Agreed, that it may not be the most quantitative measure but unlike the other measures that have been shared & our more reflective of the feedback from external environment - this one is more about undertaking an introspective assessment and being premptively proactive towards being relevant
- Karan
Thanks Guys. And Yes, we have instances of organisations facing relevance challenges due to disruptive developments, which have come as surprises especially to those that were enjoying success. The source of disruption may be technological breakthrough, or business model innovation or regulatory interventions. Those with limited portfolio of services, markets, pricing options or customer segments seem to be more vulnerable. Hence portfolio composition can also be one of the measures. Revenue earned from new offerings is one such measure, traditionally referred to? Others include percent of R&D budget spent on incremental, evolutionary or radical experimentation.
ReplyDeleteWhile some of philosophies relevant to sustaining relevance of organisations are relevant to professionals (Consultants) as well, there are unique challenges and options relevant to individuals facing "relevance" question.
One key factor by which a consultant can sustain relevance is through the ability to move beyond what the client wants and to see what he may want.
ReplyDeleteSo we are there to provide him additional insight or even address a problem which he may not believe to be one at that moment. - Radhika