Success in Business

Every business we see can be boiled down to what they truly are: someone or something offering a practical route to making something better, or easier, and then profiting. Businesses, on a basic level, can always be separated into two distinct categories:

1. Those who adapt or improve a particular product or service based on identified needs, and

2. Those who attack a “solved” problem from an entirely different view, produce something new, and effectively eliminate the opportunity for present problems to exist.

Both business concepts discover customer needs. Both integrate new ideas, new ways of thinking, or new ways of doing something. And both are real-world problem solvers.

If the mechanics are the same, what makes them different?

The answer lies in the way they approach the problem.

The difference between them is that the former is operating from inside the box, seeing lengthy postal service delivery times and making them shorter, for example. The latter is looking from outside the box, sees the big picture, and understands that a piece of paper must travel from one place to another in an organized manner. In fact, they’re the people who created that postal service in the first place; stringing together horses/vehicles, people, and businesses, each segment of which containing their own individual opportunities for improvement.

The key difference is that the former is an adaption of an existing system, and the latter is the revolutionary spark that brings forth an entirely new system — allowing for further adaptation.

“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” -Henry Ford

The average person approaches a problem from inside the box. However, instead of “faster horses,” the American industrialist, and innovator of the mass-produced, mobile transportation system we know today, instead looked at the box outside-in. He understood that a lot of people needed to get places faster, but instead of making faster horses, he created a new way to travel. He built the first commercial automobile, attacking the problem from a much wider perspective and creating something new. Ford revolutionized the way we travel, do business, and live our lives forever.

He even realized the overwhelming necessity to have vehicles available to his consumers (he was targeting the everyday consumer, and there’s a lot of them!). Henry Ford adapted the manufacturing process to make it faster and eventually propel his product to a mainstream demographic. It’s worthy to note that the assembly line he developed and implemented into the creation of his vehicles is a system still used widely today, whenever speed is a necessity.

The most successful people in the world, like Henry Ford, embody both the adaption and revolutionary business perspectives. They can work inside and outside the box as needed.

As a more recent example, take two businesses that appear similar on the surface: Uber and the time-worn taxi service.

For starters, we know that they both try to solve a similar problem: readily available and reliable public transportation. They both focus on a common need (transport), and offer a practical solution (a vehicle to do so).

Most of us understand that Uber essentially eliminated the taxi service. But why? What makes them different?

Well, as we all know, the taxi service is well-known for its unkempt drivers, it’s slow arrival times, and high price rates. Uber capitalized on these faults, adapted it’s business model for use in the digital age, and provided a similar, yet improved, experience for both the customer and the driver. Addressing the problems of the taxi service is the foundation of their business.

The taxi service created a revolutionary transportation system. What it failed to do was adapt that system to increase its efficiency, like Henry Ford. Uber stepped in and did that for them and ultimately won out.

Revolutionaries set the stage, and those willing to adapt to its system are the cogs that shape a Model T into a Tesla Roadster over time. Both categories have their place, but it’s the innovator of the two that ultimately becomes the victor.

Adaptors like Amazon can become full-circle. They can create a revolutionary service, expand their capabilities, and pave a new road full of innovation. Revolutionaries, in the other hand, can fall short, fail to innovate, and be overtaken by a company that simply improved on their original design.

The differences between the two in relation to their success appears irrelevant, but knowing which they are is truly important in how they grow. When it comes to success, what matters most is the innovation and awareness that a business has throughout their development.

Innovation and awareness are two factors that appear to be an absolute crucial part to any success story within the business world.

Never be complacent.