The New Instability looks at how cloud computing, globalisation & social tools are changing the way business operates. Its hypothesis is that the current unstable business environment is a permanent condition – a side effect of generations spent tweaking and improving our organisations – and there won't be a return to business as usual as we used to know it. The New Instability argues that enterprises are going to be revolutionized, looking extremely different in the future, and that companies that don’t adapt will struggle to survive.

1. “A key book to read, to
learn from, and, most of
all, to change one’s
perspectives”
Andy Mulholland,
Global CTO, Capgemini
The New Instability

2. The New Instability looks at how cloud computing,
globalisation & social tools are changing the way business
operates.
Its hypothesis is that the current unstable business
environment is a permanent condition – a side effect of
generations spent tweaking and improving our
organisations – and there won't be a return to business as
usual as we used to know it.
The New Instability argues that enterprises are going to be
revolutionized, looking extremely different in the future, and
that companies that don’t adapt will struggle to survive.

3. So what changes have globalization, the
internet and social media forced on business?
The pace of change has accelerated, opportunities seem smaller and shorter than
they used to be. Success seems too hard to catch, and even harder to hold on to
than ever before.
• The British East India Company lasted Deloitte has quantified this trend with
over 200 years its Shift Index showing that business
competition has intensified in the past
• The robber barons from the 1800s –
few decades
Bethlehem Steel et al – lasted around
100
• Many of the titans from the start of the
computer age lasted ~ 40
• How long does Apple have left?
Is this simply a case of more change more often? Or is something deeper at work?

4. incremental technology improvement has
finally resulted in a climate shift in business
Business used to be dominated by Now business is dominated by
seasons; long planning cycles and the disruptions. Like the Tasmanian aborigines
need to rally resources. Change was slow our success now depends on our ability to
and predictable. Like the eskimos, our adapt. We need simple, flexible tools that
success depended on having the right allow us to quickly create a response to
tools, investing in the right assets, as if our the challenges in front of us, as we fail if
tools failed then we did too. we are unable to adapt and respond.

5. Success now requires us to unlearn many of
our old behaviours and to learn new ones
Business used to be focussed on Now you need to be focussed on
collecting assets mobilization
• Resources, Computing and Data • Reactions, Connections and Decisions
• While a large business might be slow to • Size no longer matters and mass, being
turn, the huge assets at its command big, is not as important as it used to be.
allows it to crush the smaller Managing instability is the name of the
competition game
• Companies that can collect and • Nimble companies that can respond
manage the most assets are the ones when opportunities strike are the ones
who are successful who will be successful
• Companies that have realized that the environment has changed are seeing double
digit growth
• Those stuck in the past are seeing double digit declines
• Making the change requires us to change our understanding about what it means to
be successful

6. What does it take to succeed?
John Boyd – a military strategist and one of the drivers behind
modern manoeuver warfare – taught us that success in a rapidly
changing environment requires us to break away from the numbers
game that is a war of attrition
• Optimise power-to-weight. Create small, lightweight and
therefore nimble organisations who can quickly tap into vast
resources when they need them, shifting the focus from
collecting resources to optimising our reactions
• Provide sensible controls. Provide easy to use controls that enable the team to
focus on what they need to do rather than struggling to do what they must, shifting
the focus from collecting and communicating data to optimising decisions
• Be adaptive. Create a strong connection to the environment around you, focusing
externally to understand both the challenges and opportunities you see and how to
best leverage them, shifting from worrying about computing (and getting work
done) to connections

7. The opportunity
The creation of a new breed of more flexible and adaptive businesses, businesses
whose success is based on their ability to mobilise resources rather than their ability to
collect them
• Organisations that can rapidly evolve their product portfolios to follow customer
demand
• Organisations that can quickly reconfigure how materials are sourced, products are
manufactured and customers are served, across the full breadth of the value chain,
allowing them to sail through disruptions that leave competitors stranded
• Organisations that can dynamically reconfigure the end-to-end supply chain,
delivering the right product to the right customer, just when they realise they need it
(or even before they come to this realisation)
• Organisations that can rapidly enter and leave markets and geographies, as need be
• Organisations that can do all of this with resources and services that it does not
explicitly own or manage
Businesses that will be impossible to compete with on conventional terms

8. “Written from the
perspective of business
transformation, [Peter] Evans-
Greenwood uses examples
from virtually every industry
to argue that it is how you
partner rather than what you
own that defines success in
the digital era.”
— Robert Hillard, COO,
Deloitte Consulting
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