Posted on

Interview – A Finance Transformation Expert at DSM

Finance transformation

So I’ve decided to continue the series of transformation leaders’ interviews and I’m starting this year with Thierry Zedda, a French engineer, currently working as a Performance and Portfolio Manager at DSM [one of the largest Dutch companies with 10 bill € in revenue, and employing over 20,000 people].  Going from engineering to finance to more transversal roles, leading or involved in complex large scale transformations and with the creation of a knowledge platform [aqboost.com], Thierry has an interesting experience and perspective on finance transformation.

His engineering background grants him a pragmatic approach to transformation and a penchant for technology. But don’t be fooled, Thierry is curious but not crazy for the techno hype we have seen recently entering finance (automation, AI, block chain etc.). And for a finance guy, he has learned to look way beyond the figures and work with the cultural change required to really implement beautifully crafted solutions.

The two key subjects that struck me in our conversation were :

  • His passion for helping the finance profession to question itself and do a real introspection about its roles, about the meaning of new technologies and about its valuable new position in the organisation. 
  • Measuring the effectiveness of mindset transformation with maturity assessment, non-financial KPIs and storytelling.
Continue reading “Interview – A Finance Transformation Expert at DSM”
Posted on

So, now Apple is a bank (finally?)

In 2013, Apple launched Apple Pay as both a digital wallet and a mobile payment service, and now Apple is a bank?

Up to now, even with iPhones NFC capabilities, biometric authentication and the very robust Apple ecosystem, Apple Pay wasn’t a amazing success. An extra feature in Apple’s ecosystem yes, not a revolution. And since then, I’ve been waiting for more news and more commitment to this service.

Continue reading “So, now Apple is a bank (finally?)”

Posted on

Keynote (Pas de risques, pas de startup !)

pas de risque pas de startup - keynote - innovation copilots

I haven’t done a public keynote in a while, so just a quick heads up: I will be in Toulouse (France) and have a one hour talk on startup valuation, managing risk and uncertainties, and what it means for investors (including corporations and their innovation programs).

It’s in partnership with Nubbo the local incubator and a dear partner of us since 2013. The keynote will be on April 8 and starting at 6:30pm. It’s a free event (you’re welcome).

You just have to register here.

Click below for the full presentation (in French):

Continue reading “Keynote (Pas de risques, pas de startup !)”
Posted on

Innovation is not about being smart and fast

innovation 2030 plan - innovation copilots

There is this on-going fallacy about innovation. Innovation should be about being smart and and being fast. Or at least, smarter and faster than competitors. Seeing the next big thing, catching the next wave, seizing the white space, finding the blue ocean… These narratives are all about a promised Eden, hidden from the masses of companies that are not smart enough to read the market or the technology.

If we unpack this mindset, we get the following familiar reasoning:

  1. There will be an optimal way to go ahead and outcompete everyone else;
  2. We are then at point A in time and need to go to B (the future optimum);
  3. Investment is needed and we’ll have ROI when at B;
  4. Going from A to B shall then be as fast as possible;
  5. Knowing where B is, requires intuition if we’re looking into it too early;
  6. If we are too late (others are already getting to B) we’ll need to spend more money and, as followers, get less ROI.
  7. We obviously need to be smart to be just in time to run for B.
  8. Rinse and repeat.

This has been taught in every innovation class of every business school, university and tech entrepreneurship class since 1962, when Everett ROGERS modelled his diffusion of innovation theory.
Let me make the case that it’s actually a terrible (terrible) reasoning. Continue reading “Innovation is not about being smart and fast”

Posted on

The stone age did not end because the world ran out of stones…

stone age

The stone age did not end because the world ran out of stones, and the oil age will not end because we run out of oil. It ended because bronze tools became cheaper.

The origin of that quote attributed to Ahmed Zaki Yamani who was the Minister of Oil for Saudi Arabia in the 70s, is actually difficult to trace back (and the analogy can be critiqued in many ways). But in any case, as experts of any given industry this brings us back to what we love to forget:

We’re not going out of business, because what we are experts in is getting out of fashion by itself (or as a resource, is depleted). We get out of business because “better” comes in. Innovation answers to this simple formula: Customers x Time

So pause a minute and ask yourself:

What are your stone? What are the bronze tools coming in? And what can you do about it if your salary depends on cutting more stones?

Posted on

Our New #1Day Corporate Trainings for Execs

1 day training - practical innovation - icopilots.com

Since 2007, we’ve designed and delivered many corporate trainings for execs and management teams on innovation, strategy, culture change, etc. They were rarely stand-alone programs, but were always designed to support a consulting mission we had with a company. Following that, their goal has always been to allow the teams involved to appropriate our tools and mindset, and get autonomous cross-divisions, to follow up on the outputs of our mission.

This was business as usual. But a few years ago, things changed.

Continue reading “Our New #1Day Corporate Trainings for Execs”

Posted on

How to Feed Digital Monkeys (a discusssion on Status as a Service)

status as a service - innovation copilots

Eugene WEI has been writing on tech since 2001. I’m not going to sell you his CV that goes from Facebook to Hulu and Flipboard. Let it just be said that he knows what he’s talking about. And his latest article he’s writing on Status as a Service and this is one of the most remarkable reading I had on the digital social media and consumerism.

He starts of by dissecting how traditional network effects are twisted in social networks through three axis (social capital, entertainment and utility):

There are several different paths to success for social networks, but those which compete on the social capital axis are often more mysterious than pure utilities. Competition on raw utility tends to be Darwinian, ruthless, and highly legible. This is the world, for example, of communication services like messaging and video conferencing. Investing in this space also tends to be a bit more straightforward: how useful is your app or service, can you get distribution, etc. (…) The creation of a successful status game is so mysterious that it often smacks of alchemy. For that reason, entrepreneurs who succeed in this space are thought of us a sort of shaman, perhaps because most investors are middle-aged white men who are already so high status they haven’t the first idea why people would seek virtual status (more on that later).

Continue reading “How to Feed Digital Monkeys (a discusssion on Status as a Service)”

Posted on

What is the shelf life of Zuckerberg point of view on entrepreneurship?

Am I the only one that wonder why we still ask rock-star CEOs what was their recipe for success? I understand the father figure thing. But the 2019 market, its digital environment and socio-economics have nothing much to do with what they had to face in 2004. What can a Mark Zuckerberg or a Jeff Bezos tell us about launching a startup in 2019? At what point do we file their inspirational quotes with the ones of Tesla, Bell or Ford?

But even so, in these ‘inspiring’ talks we never take into account the survivor bias: the CEOs we look up to are the ones that survived. Were they extremely shrewd and visionary or just plain lucky? Or more exactly, what was the proportion of shrewdness vs. luck? And what is really transferable to you and your project? Shall we also work on the cultural bias? What white american males have to share with  woman in China or India? (Even when taking into account that many of these US guys were immigrants.)

I’m just saying… Finding inspiring people is probably a game you want to play looking forward, not in the rear view mirror.

Posted on

Business Model Canvas for Innovators

business model for innovators - innovation copilots - icopilots

I already made a case in 2016 for letting go of the now generic business model canvas. Story short: it’s a fantastic training tool. As such, it’s very open and can be used by a lot of  trainers, consulting enthusiasts, or business schools. The price to pay is that it’s a blunt tool with no credo, no vision, and worse: no teeth!

Innovation is a contact game that is played at high velocity. We require sharper tools.

Let’s see how it works shall we? Continue reading “Business Model Canvas for Innovators”

Posted on

Pick our brains as a Service

Some of our customers are already using this retainer-on-demand consulting format but most companies still contact us too early or too late to work on innovation projects. 

Too late, when they have thought through many points already and have engaged resources, they contact us to legitimize their approach or they hire us on a too narrow scope. 

Too early, when the initiator doesn’t have the power to put into action, doesn’t have the resources or the back up. So it becomes a very short mission/discussion to help the client have the next steps clear to sell internally.

All in all if we decided to share about our on-demand format of consulting, is to ensure our clients (and potential ones) can use us to the best of our potential of value creation. Innovation is motion, so as co-pilots it is key that we are present at the right time to support and more often the case trigger the shift.

Continue reading “Pick our brains as a Service”
Posted on

Hema Market, the Full ‘Digital is Over’ Experience

Hema Market - China - Digital is Over - Innovation Copilots

Since 2016 (a bit more actually), I’ve been pushing this simple concept: Digital is over! Being back in Shanghai right now, is among many things a perfect opportunity to check how far digital has been integrated in the every day life of this massive consumer market.

Remember, last year when I was especially impressed by how Alibaba and Starbucks did partner up to build flagships vision of the future of retail? By now this snapshot has consolidated into a full-fledged retail operating system (IT, big data platform, social web marketing, and supply chain all rolled into one “as a Service” retail mainframe) for every corner shop in China.

That’s the reason why, this year I was really excited to understand on site what Alibaba was now doing with Hema Market.

Continue reading “Hema Market, the Full ‘Digital is Over’ Experience”