Strategic repositioning in unprecedented times

The pandemic has shown how displaced we are , with respect to the real world theta . A quick definition of theta – If one were to put all the information available from wherever one can garner and run it through high performing sophisticated models like xgboost and random forests with say number of models totalling to more than couple of hundreds . The ensuing result would yield one hypothetical and all encompassing coefficient or the global optima where the losses/costs are almost zero. What is inferred is that the prediction slope gets fitted in the forest in a manner that it hardly leaves any data point( barring outliers) to drop out . It is highly representational of the real world. This coefficient is the theta which can be interpolated to predict future course of events to reposition our strategies

We have been deluding ourselves to think that our approaches and incisiveness along the way have got sharpened to a level that we could see future in its eye .Maybe just like a ship sighting a shore miles away.

Alas there is the cold numbness now like that ship having lost its course all of a sudden. Yet few are steering it back on its course successfully. Essentially because they had moved on from the legacy settings. These great performers had embraced technology with agility , and more importantly , had already weaved it into their culture. Technology adoption alone is not good enough. It has to be breathed into the organisation . Pandemic has shown that changes will happen rapidly and the ‘adoption to embedding’ cycles will be shorter. This will call for repositioning of our strategies continually by becoming more data and technology driven. Gone are the days when we would have an annual planning ritual followed by a gala maybe to celebrate the grandstanding . The more data we are able to capture , the better is the theta. Daily Strategy would be the order of the day and will focused around metrics with respect to the customer centric theta.

Data driven technologies and culture will sustain competitive edge, improve customer retention and make customer experiences even better. Customer expectations will change very rapidly and the touch points will force multiply. AI will replace traditional processes as it would be more around ingesting and processing humungous data from the real world in order to make accurate projections of the customer needs. Customer needs will evolve very differently from the trajectories of the past. For example online content management will become the strong driving force for advertising and promotions. Billboards will go extinct .

Unless we are able to be data driven to the extent that we are ready to suck in avalanche of all the customer preferences in real time , we will drop out of the race sooner than later.

Data understanding has orbited beyond the realm of Operational analytics. It has become strategic. Data analytics will be centred around how much we are able to get into the customer’s psyche and connect our offerings from the deep insights we will draw.

The way we manage customer relationships, improve efficiencies of our supply chain to re skilling our personnel in order to re position their relevance in the organisation and finally to drive Operational strategy aligned to the business needs.

Lets move on from staring at numbers on spreadsheets and plots on ppts.