Emerge with Urgency Creating Value through Creative Destruction

As we adapt to the new normal during the COVID-19 pandemic, rapid business process transformation and automation will become increasingly important to business’ very survival.

That’s why it is so critical for businesses to take control of their integration technology to ensure the effects of COVID-19 don’t cripple their business.

Companies need to be diligent, purposeful, and strategic in how they move forward to emerge successful in the last half of 2020.

And the very best way to do that is by replacing what is old, outdated, or underperforming with newer, better, and more promising technologies. Such ‘creative destruction’ is what truly drives innovation and transformation, quite organically – especially following periods of economic upheaval.

In April, a survey of Fortune 500 CEOs said that ‘one of the single most important lessons’ they have learned from COVID-19 is:

“A business cannot wait for the transformation it knows it needs.”

Think back to the Great Recession of 2008 and 2009. Recall the massive business transformations that happened then. Why did they happen? They happened in response to the economic disruption and not because of it.

The business downturn catalyzed change, and established companies that attacked the downturn -- such as Vanguard, Walmart, and Target -- came out the healthiest. On the other side, companies such as Sears, Toys ‘R Us, and Payless Shoe Source all waited too long to act, ultimately failed, and in most cases, it was a slow and painful demise.

Now, look at all the companies that were founded during that time, companies such as Venmo, Instagram, Uber, and Slack. Each of those companies aggressively attacked a competitor in their space, and the value of these companies is now massive in 2020.

What do all of these companies have in common? It goes back to a phrase I mentioned above – ‘creative destruction.’

All of these stories are examples of ‘creative destruction’ in action, and going one step further, proof that it works. There’s a reason the expression ‘out with the old, in with the new’ has been around as long as it has, these companies founded since 2008 and 2009 are living proof.

When we emerge from an economic downturn, old business models not only give way to new ones, everything changes and evolves fast. A recession is an opportunity to leap-frog your competitors, and by utilizing emerging technologies, push out the older, outdated business models in order to evolve.

As we now emerge from the pandemic and into the so-called “new normal,” we all have the opportunity to reinvent and transform our businesses, no matter the industry. But, as with any economic recession, there will be winners, and there will be losers.

Which do you want to be? And what sort of transformation is needed to be a winner and not a loser?

The answer is digital transformation, across your ecosystem, and within the end-to-end processes that drive your supply chain. Digital transformation is happening quickly, accelerating rapidly, and that’s because the world has embraced eCommerce far faster than anyone could have imagined.

On August 18, hundreds of our customers, partners, and prospects joined us for our first completely virtual conference, Cleo Connect 2020. We had customer panels about critical integration best practices, key integration technology trends, trainings, and solutions and strategy sessions designed to help you emerge from 2020 thriving and better than ever.

My keynote address – “Emerge With Urgency: Creating Value Through Creative Destruction” -- is now available on YouTube, where I go into further in detail about ‘creative destruction’ and how businesses everywhere can emerge a winner.

Check it out, and let’s emerge from 2020 better than we ever have before!