Surviving Disruption

This article was first published on 7 December 2012.

This article from the Harvard Business Review provides an introduction to one of the most important ideas regarding "disruption" and one of the most common traps into which industry incumbents fall.  In essence it advocates the need to have a very clear understanding of the "work" that your product or service does for your customers.  Companies get blindsided when they confuse the "form" of their product or offering with its "function".  It's not enough to be able to draw the distinction conceptually.  You have to be able to translate it in a very practical way to your customers, your products and services and your industry if you want to begin to see where disruptions to your industry may come from and where you might go to combat them.