Cracking the digital code: McKinsey Global Survey results | McKinsey & Company

When asked about specific challenges to meeting digital priorities, executives cite a variety of hurdles that reflect the complexity and difficulty of implementing a successful digital program. A lack of leadership or digital talent tops the list, followed closely by a limited understanding of how digital trends affect the company and industry, difficulty keeping pace with digital development, and an inability to adopt an experimentation mind-set.

Source: Cracking the digital code: McKinsey Global Survey results | McKinsey & Company

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A Look Back At Why Blockbuster Really Failed And Why It Didn’t Have To

The irony is that Blockbuster failed because its leadership had built a well-oiled operational machine.  It was a very tight network that could execute with extreme efficiency, but poorly suited to let in new information.  Antioco’s fatal flaw wasn’t one of intelligence or capability, but a failure to understand the networks that would determine his fate.

Source: A Look Back At Why Blockbuster Really Failed And Why It Didn’t Have To

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Low-End Disruption in Consumer Markets | Tech-Thoughts by Sameer Singh

In the 1960s, General Motors held a ~50% share of the US automobile market and 80% of the industry’s profits. General Motors’ integrated value chain allowed it to dominate the industry in an era where products were still not “good enough” (with respect to performance and reliability). But as automobile performance improved, modular, “low-end” disruptors like Toyota attacked it from below and profits evaporated. Toyota did not succeed by immediately attacking the premium segment of the market. It started with the low-end Corona and “then moved up-market by introducing sequentially its Tercel, Corolla, Camry, Avalon and 4-Runner models, and ultimately its Lexus”. Honda and Nissan followed similar approaches to disrupt integrated incumbents like General Motors, Ford and Chrysler. Now, these disruptors are in turn facing low-end disruption from the likes of Kia and Hyundai.

Source: Low-End Disruption in Consumer Markets | Tech-Thoughts by Sameer Singh

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Epic Fail: How Blockbuster Could Have Owned Netflix | Variety

Barry McCarthy, Netflix’s former chief financial officer, said in an interview with the Unofficial Stanford blog in 2008, “I remembered getting on a plane, I think sometime in 2000, with Reed [Hastings] and [Netflix co-founder] Marc Randolph and flying down to Dallas, Texas and meeting with John Antioco. Reed had the chutzpah to propose to them that we run their brand online and that they run [our] brand in the stores and they just about laughed us out of their office. At least initially, they thought we were a very small niche business. Gradually over time, as we grew our market, his thinking evolved but initially they ignored us and that was much to our advantage.”

Source: Epic Fail: How Blockbuster Could Have Owned Netflix | Variety

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Blockbuster laughed at Netflix partnership offer – CNET

But ask Antioco. Netflix’s management is not a group to take too lightly. There were signs of this in 2000 but apparently Blockbuster managers overlooked them…

McCarthy told the Unofficial Stanford blog that for Blockbuster it was a classic case of the the innovator’s dilemma: “You end up competing with a business that you initially ignored.”

Source: Blockbuster laughed at Netflix partnership offer – CNET

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The Checklist Manifesto | Atul Gawande

Over the past decade, through his writing in The New Yorker magazine and his books Complications and Better, Atul Gawande has made a name for himself as a writer of exquisitely crafted meditations on the problems and challenges of modern medicine. His latest book, The Checklist Manifesto, begins on familiar ground, with his experiences as a surgeon. But before long it becomes clear that he is really interested in a problem that afflicts virtually every aspect of the modern world–and that is how professionals deal with the increasing complexity of their responsibilities. It has been years since I read a book so powerful and so thought-provoking.

Source: The Checklist Manifesto | Atul Gawande

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