Small is Beautiful - Big is Jurassic
Buiness News 29 Sept 1995
What two things do IBM, AT&T, Chrysler, EIE, and Adelaide Steamships have in common? They are BIG and they are almost dinosaurs.
To survive has meant major corporate change.
IBM lost megamillions of dollars in its last financial year. It has restructured into small autonomous units that function as much like a small business as is possible while still being an international public company with a Board and shareholders.
AT&T, the icon of telecommunications corporations, last week announced it would divide into 3 separate entities. AT&T's arguably most respected and well known department, Bell Labs, is to be sold off.
The same story is occurring around the world: Big business is no longer beautiful. Big business is Jurassic - doomed to eventual extinction as happened to the dinosaurs.
Like with the huge beasts of the past, large organisations are so far removed from the grass roots that they unaware of the swift changes occurring underfoot.
Even if the head honchos do detect the significant shifts at ground level, it is usually too late to mobilise for massive change.
Big business is too cumbersome to move quickly through the rapidly changing corporate jungle.
And most of the few mammoths who have mobilised for change (eg, Chrysler), underestimated the continuing speed of change in the jungle and did not plan far enough ahead with their restructuring. Once the time-consuming decision to regroup has been made, a large organisation needs more time to implement that decision. Meanwhile, the jungle continues to move....
IBM recognised that restructuring of their corporately complex organisation would not be sufficient to accommodate the new ways of doing business in this ever changing jungle.
IBM re-engineered all its organisational systems and structures, redefining what part of the communications industry IBM would focus their energies on (software) and which part it would get out of (mostly hardware).
Like dinosaurs, big business executives are accustomed to being lords of the jungle. Their organisation's size and power create a complacent attitude of false security, believing they really had few enemies (except amongst themselves!) and need not do anything more than continue doing business as usual in the jungle.
There is no longer any concept of business as usual. Change is too rapid.
Dinosaurs generally ignored the smaller beings living in the same environment, unless the dinosaur was hungry and looked around for an easy meal. The mergers and takeovers of the 80's are part of the Jurassic syndrome.
Big business today still has immense economic purchasing and manipulation power. Corporate raiding still occurs, but usually for extremely narrowly defined strategic reasons and always for short term gain.
Dare I say that many Boards of Directors are unaware of the actual brevity of the benefits of merging. Dinosaurs did not see their demise coming.
For lasting survival in the international corporate jungle, small business is beautiful. And increasingly necessary.
Small is flexible. Small organisations have a shorter lead time between the head decision-makers and the muscle action team.
Decisions are made faster, more efficiently, and more closely reflect the real jungle out there. The decisions are more adaptable to the constant change.
Small is more focussed. Fewer people involved means a more clearly shared vision of what the organisation is on about, of how it is striving to excel, of how it is unique in the jungle. Greater commitment and involvement by everyone can be achieved and maintained far more easily.
Small has more options for adapting to new initiatives and opportunities in the jungle. Small can form exciting strategic alliances very quickly and for very short time frames. The win-win formula.
Discussions, negotiations, and agreements can all occur NOW, without having to go through endless committees, hierarchies, and interminably slow waiting-for-signature procedures.
Small can have many strategic alliances, or mad affairs as I call them,
Happening at the same time with great variations in time, place, and effort. Keeping track of these is easiest for a small tight team who can have a handle on the big picture of all that the organisation is doing at every moment.
Small can make sudden significant changes in direction, speed, activity, and players without throwing the organisation into cardiac arrest. Everyone can be prepared for and welcome the sudden shift, so no shock waves are felt by anyone in or associated with the organisation.
Small can disband and re-form smoothly and harmoniously within its jungle sector. No-one need suffer whiplash, friction burns, sonic booms, or insecurity from the speed of change. Neighbours, colleagues, associates, downliners and upliners can keep informed of what's happening.
No-one need fear the possibility of unplanned and unknown events throwing people off their stride.
Seminar participants often ask me to "Name names" when I am talking about the WA or Australian corporate jungle. So, without prejudice, here are just a few healthy Smallies vs perhaps cumbersome Biggies:
| Small is : | Big is: |
| Comsys International | Data General |
| Halmac Computing | Hewlett Packard |
| James Ride | Parker & Parker |
| Mt Lawley Medical Group | Royal Perth Hospital |
| Montessori Schools | WA Dept of Education |
| Business Enterprise Centres | Small Business Development Corp |
| Gardner Business Strategies | KPMG |
You probably have heard of the Biggies. I bet you are not familiar with the Smallies. Why? Because big Jurassic organisations must spend time and energy promoting and justifying their existence, their Bigness!
Small businesses are too busy getting on with getting on to have the time, energy, inclination or need to make a noise about themselves.
Dinosaurs bellow and shake the ground as they fall into their moribund graves. Sprightly focussed innovators are quietly galloping into their challenging changing future. Which are you?
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