How strategy and innovation leaders stay smart on the job
The Olympics is a perfect example of the Red Queen effect: falling behind by not making enough progress.
The world around us is constantly changing and evolving. If we make no effort to change, we won't just not evolve: we will actually de-evolve.
It takes effort just to stay in the same place.
To grow, you need to double that effort.
In sports (and in business), this means not just skating to where the puck is going, but seeing where it’s headed and getting there faster than anyone else.
👎 It’s no longer enough to execute big, planned quarterly projects.
👎 It’s no longer enough to react to executive asks or ad hoc requests.
👎 It’s no longer enough to scan headlines, and hope you got the gist of important developments.
Leading strategy and innovation teams know that the best strategies, decisions, and bets (not to mention career growth) come from living and breathing in their category to stay smart on the job.
💡That means proactively seeing around corners, uncovering latent needs, and unearthing powerful insights to skate to where the puck is going – all before your peers or competitors.
BUT HOW?!
The de facto way of doing this is “monitoring,” but it’s really hard to do well.
Think of the hundreds of unread newsletters in your inbox, the stream of Google Trend alerts you get, the random articles and posts your colleagues send you… 😵💫
(just me?!)
Figuring out the best way to track the latest in your category, consumers, competitors or otherwise is often messy, time-consuming, mixed ROI, and hard to set up.
With so many clients coming to us for help staying on top of important dynamics and developments, we recently launched a new offer based on what a world-class "monitor" should look like.
Being relevant, actionable, and timely is a function of 3 things:
Focus / scope: What topics are you looking to stay smart on?
Source preferences: What sources of information do you care about or trust most?
Other preferences: What’s the most helpful way to get this information?
By approaching each of these systematically, with an eye towards your goals and priorities, knowledge gaps, stakeholders, and personal workflows, monitors go from another headache on your to-do list to a massive unlock (for your company, and your career).
So instead of running blind – or falling behind – maybe it’s time to stop wishing you could get access to all of this information, and start planning for what you can do, decide, and build once you have it? 💪
To learn more about Wonder’s hyper-personalized monitors powered by our network of custom-built AI agents and expert human researchers, grab some time with us.
Here’s to staying smart (and 10 steps ahead)!
Victoria