Digital Disruption: Unleashing the Next Wave of Innovation

by James McQuivey

Overview

The barriers to entry in your market just vanished. Unexpected competitors are swarming in. Are you ready?

You always knew digital was going to change things, but you didn’t realize how close to home it would hit. In every industry, digital competitors are taking advantage of new platforms, tools, and relationships to undercut competitors, get closer to customers, and disrupt the usual ways of doing business. The only way to compete is to evolve.

James McQuivey of Forrester Research has been teaching people how to do this for over a decade. He’s gone into the biggest companies, even in traditional industries like insurance and consumer packaged goods, and changed the way they think about innovation. Now he’s sharing his approach with you.

McQuivey will show you how Dr. Hugh Reinhoff of Ferrokin BioSciences disrupted the pharmaceutical industry, streamlining connections with doctors and regulators to bring molecules to market far faster—and then sold out for $100 million. How Charles Teague and his team of four people created Lose It!, a weight loss application that millions have adopted, achieving rapid success and undermining titans like Weight Watchers and Jenny Craig in the process.

Regardless of your background and industry, you can learn how to be a digital disruptor too. First, adopt the right mindset: Take risks, invest as cheaply as possible, and build on existing platforms to find the fastest path to solving a customer’s problem.

Second, seek the “adjacent possible”—the space just next to yours where new technology creates opportunity. That’s how Benjamin Rubin and Paolo DePetrillo of Zeo created a $100 sleep monitor that does much of what you’d get from a $3,000 sleep lab visit.

Finally, disrupt yourself. Use these tools to make parts of your business obsolete before your competitors do. That’s what Tim FitzRandolph did at Disney, creating a game that shot to the top of the app store charts.

With the tools in this book you can assess your readiness, learn the disruptive mindset, and innovate rapidly, starting right within your own business.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781477800126
Publisher:	Amazon Publishing
Publication date:	02/26/2013
Edition description:	Unabridged
Pages:	171
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

James McQuivey is a vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research and the leading analyst tracking the development of digital disruption. He comments regularly in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal and has contributed to the websites of the Harvard Business Review, The Economist, and Forbes. He also appears frequently on news outlets like CNBC and NPR. McQuivey lives in Needham, Massachusetts, with his wife and the four youngest of their six disruptors.

Table of Contents

Part 1 What is Digital Disruption? 1

Digital Disruption: What It Is and What It Means for You 3

Part 2 Adopt the Digital Disruptor's Mindset 17

Change Your Mindset to Change Your Business 19

Free the Tools, Free the Disruptors 32

Digital Disruptors Exploit Digital Platforms 43

Digital Consumers Want to Fulfill Their Needs 54

Part 3 Behave Like a Digital Disruptor 69

Generate More Ideas More Quickly 71

Deliver Total Product Experiences 85

Part 4 Disrupt Yourself Now 99

Assess Your Digital Disruption Readiness 101

Your Path to Digital Disruption 119

The Next Disruption 139

What's Next? 151

Acknowledgments 153

About the Author 155

Notes 157

Index 163

Editorial Reviews

I have studied disruptive innovation for more than two decades. Here, McQuivey offers insights about disruption—and about the accelerating pace of disruption—that I truly hadn’t understood before. This is a very important book about what tomorrow holds in store; it shows us both what will happen and how to address it. I recommend it enthusiastically.” —Clayton Christensen, professor, Harvard Business School, and author of The Innovator’s Dilemma

“As James McQuivey says, ‘Digital disruption is not only a possibility for your company’s future but the only possibility.’ Once you accept that premise, decisions that previously seemed courageous or outrageous will instead appear to be rational and inevitable. James offers a road map for business leadership in the digital age that is thoughtful, inspiring, and liberating.” —Baba Shetty, CEO, The Newsweek Daily Beast Co.

“There is a powerful change happening in the way we consume and process information. It’s a democratizing force that is drowning out the oligarchy of media who have told us what’s important and what to think. It is incumbent upon all of us to master this new method—and to take the power into our own hands. James’s book is an important step in that direction.” —Cory Booker, mayor, Newark, New Jersey, and co-founder, Waywire

“In Digital Disruption, James McQuivey persuasively demonstrates how to shift your mind-set by thinking and acting ‘disruptively’ in order to drive radical change to best meet the future needs of your consumers.” —Markus Dohle, chairman and CEO, Random House

“As McQuivey vividly shows, advances in hardware and software have totally changed the way we do business and the way we live. This valuable book helps business leaders join this accelerating revolution and transform their relationship with customers.” —Kevin Rollins, former CEO, Dell, Inc.

“Technology disruption used to affect other people, not you. No longer. This is a frightening and useful manifesto about how the rapid changes in technology are going to overturn every corner of the world as we know it—and how you can take advantage of that.” —Seth Godin, author of The Icarus Deception

“Many Fortune 500 companies that existed three decades ago are now gone. If your company is to survive the next decade, read this book ASAP to learn how to innovate faster, better, and cheaper—or else, you will succumb to digital disruption.” —Navi Radjou, coauthor of Jugaad Innovation and From Smart To Wise

“In his new book, James makes a compelling argument to think beyond change for change’s sake and instead focus on giving customers what they truly want. This book is a must-read for anybody who wants to succeed in the next era of consumer technology.” —Jim Lanzone, President, CBS Interactive

“James McQuivey issues a provocative mandate for business—disrupt yourself or be victimized by legions of innovators with widespread access to low-cost digital technologies. He not only describes the digital disruptor’s handbook, he provides many examples on how disruptors create deeper, more sustaining connections with customers. The book is both smart and practical.” —Scott E. Howe, CEO and President, Acxiom

“Disrupting healthcare as an industry has become a national imperative. Forrester’s book, brilliantly analyzing the anatomy of disruption, is just what the doctor should have ordered.” —Roy Shoenberg, MD MPH, CEO/Founder, American Well

From the Publisher

McQuivey brings an emphasis and energy to his narration that some authors who narrate their own audiobooks lack. Exploring the ways that digital technology changes the nature of business and organizations, he identifies traits, practices, and key considerations leaders will want to consider as the digital world increasingly weaves into the physical world. McQuivey’s performance sounds flawless, and he imbues the narration with a steady energy that doesn’t cross over into exuberance, as some author-narrators are apt to do. He balances the technical portions of the book with a more emphatic and deliberate voice but moves swiftly through the lighter material. His overall conversational manner will keep listeners engaged throughout the production. L.E. © AudioFile 2013, Portland, Maine

MARCH 2013 - AudioFile