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5 AI Trends Every CEO Must Act On
Earlier this year, I shared takeaways from Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends Report, which showed how AI is reshaping business at a macro level. Building on that, Google Cloud’s 2025 AI Trends highlights five forces that will directly impact companies in the year ahead.
AI is no longer experimental. It is restructuring markets, reshaping customer expectations, and redrawing competitive boundaries. Here are five AI trends CEOs are preparing for now:
Positioning for Explosive Growth: A CEO’s Guide To Enthusiastic Leadership: Part Two
Thu, Oct 29, 2020 — The Four Inhibitors of Engaged Leadership Little known fact about ducks: Though they exude grace as they glide atop the water, ducks hide a little secret just below the surface. For all the poetry they project in our view, ducks are actually shuffling their feet quite quickly to achieve that silky-smooth movement. As a CEO, you know this bifurcated existence all too well. Though you are expected — nee, required — to display a semblance of outward calm, beneath this facade are the fears, insecurities, and realities that come with the job.
Positioning for Explosive Growth: A CEO’s Guide To Enthusiastic Leadership
Fri, Oct 23, 2020 — In 2020 and beyond, the notion of leadership has been indelibly changed. No longer is it adequate to rule from 30,000 feet, to remain at arms lengths from strategies, and unable to touch tactics with a 10-foot pole. Leadership from a distance, in a time when distance is not just a suggestion, but a mandate, can strike a critical blow to a company that is already likely still trying to divine its direction in a pandemically-impacted landscape.
Selecting a Strategy for Market Leadership: Part Five
Tue, Oct 20, 2020 — Decision Time! Choosing the Right Strategy for Your Business In our previous blog, we discussed in depth the three types of market strategies from which to choose your overall go-to-market direction. As we discussed, the competitive strategy you select must fit with a company’s market, both in terms of geography, and with customer needs. It also must be completely in line with company strengths, abilities, and culture. Pick one of the three, and start positioning the organization as a market leader! Regardless of which option is selected, do not forget the point of all this — to increase business value. The success of a strategy is ultimately measured through cash, not profit.
Selecting a Strategy for Market Leadership: Part Four
Thu, Oct 15, 2020 — Evaluating Your Strategic Options Hopefully, in our last two blogs (Part Two and Part Three), you have learned a great deal about the influence that your industry and coming trends will have on your company’s overall success in the marketplace. Against the backdrop of the keen market analysis we worked through in each of the past two blogs, you now are in a position to make some tough decisions and choices. A competitive strategy must be fact-based and informed by industry analysis. By working through the steps in the previous articles, we laid a solid foundation for this strategy.
Selecting a Strategy for Market Leadership: Part Three
Tue, Oct 6, 2020 — Analyzing the Industry for Key Success Factors In our last blog, we took a look at, and charted, how longer-term trends will impact your company and its customers. Armed with this data, we can now undertake a study of the broader industry. This is a critical step if we are to identify the key success factors (KSFs), and determining how they fit with your company’s strengths and offerings. The work should be undertaken by the full executive team, to ensure diversity in thinking and buy-in to conclusions. This will be a huge help later, in the implementation phase.
Selecting a Strategy for Market Leadership: Part Two
Tue, Sep 29, 2020 — Customer Needs and Scanning for Trends In the business-to-business (B2B) world, the purchasing process is far more complex than the journey undertaken by an individual consumer. B2B deals tend to be more concentrated and have larger value, and include more people in a higher-stakes battle for large sales. In the first article of the series, we talked about the importance of having a strategy. Understanding the role that the customer and current trends take in influencing the purchasing process is critical to defining your go-to-market strategy. In this blog, we’ll take a deeper look at these influential factors.
Selecting a Strategy for Market Leadership
Tue, Sep 22, 2020 — Part I: Your Business in the New Normal Small and mid-size enterprises (SMEs) are the shoulders upon which America stands. With more than 90 percent of American businesses comprising the SME universe, it’s easy to understand why they are considered to be the backbone of the economy. Far more people deliver goods and services – and earn their paychecks – on behalf of SMEs than they do from large enterprises. In spite of this, it’s the large corporations that make headlines on CNBC and wield disproportionate influence on their chosen markets. Though these headlines make it easy to believe that competition is a slug-fest between huge players in a market, the reality, it turns out, is quite different: Even in spite of the pandemic, many mid-market companies have maintained profitability -- and are still growing.
Top 10 FAQs: What CEOs Ask Chief Outsiders
Mon, Aug 24, 2020 — CEOs connect with us because they’ve been referred by one of our clients, their private equity firm, or have found us by searching for “top strategic marketing consulting firms” or something similar. When we meet, we often find that these CEOs are frustrated with their growth. They have a vision for where they want to take their companies, but don’t have a means to turn their vision into actionable plans, and then see them implemented. After a discussion around their specific business challenges and opportunities, they’re curious about the specifics of how Chief Outsiders might be able to help.
CEO Preparedness Guide for the Post-Pandemic Recovery: Planning for the Rebound
Wed, Jun 10, 2020 — Like the eye of a hurricane, businesses raked by the leading edge of the COVID-19 pandemic are now taking a cautious look outside. Though the winds have subsided, and it’s tempting to think that the worst is over, the eye simply gives us a chance to prepare for what’s left to come. If you have withstood the worst of the impacts of the pandemic so far, you likely have accepted that the storm was coming, and had battened down your hatches (or at least applied for PPP funding to keep vestiges of your business afloat). Now, though, as we can start to imagine a future in which a return to a “new normal” is evident, it’s critical to have your plan in place when the rebound hits.