Understand and anticipate my business trends

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How can leaders stay ahead of the curve? What strategies can they rely on to anticipate in order to stay ahead of their competitors? Analysis by Valérie Rocoplan, founder and director of Talentis.

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Predicting market developments

Before the 90s, businesses were in fairly stable markets in the face of well-identified competition. Today, with the rise of digital technology, the participatory economy and new consumption patterns, they must anticipate trends, adapt constantly, sometimes reinvent their business so as not to see their competition overtake them.

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What is digital technology changing in the way companies act?

Digital technology and easy access to a large number of people is revolutionizing all industries. Leaders need to completely reinvent their business. Apart from a few sectors where technicality remains a very high variable, new players can enter the market with a very low investment cost, upset the existing hierarchy, and weigh billions of dollars in a few years.

By addressing the consumer directly, they are revolutionizing the way we consume. For this reason, in some sectors, it is necessary to completely reinvent customer access: from the point of sale, from distribution, from communication on Twitter...

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What resources do managers have at their disposal to anticipate trends?

You must first get out of your office, out of your perimeter. Be constantly curious, read, explore everything related to your business. Be attentive to the market, its customers, and the competition. This monitoring was previously carried out by the marketing department, by R&D, but this must be expanded today.

This monitoring must “infuse” everywhere in the company. Leaders need to take advantage of this skill and use it continuously. You always have to be one step ahead, broaden your gaze beyond your business area. It is an apprenticeship for everyone and for their team.

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How to get the company to “think” about its model differently?

You have to go into the gaps, look for the rough spots. Competition from many different sectors complicates the reading of the future of your business. To deal with this, many companies flatten hierarchical levels and ask younger people to reflect on new trends. What matters is to go much faster, to be more agile, to be focused on permanent innovations.

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How to have a strategic vision when everything is accelerating?

Many leaders attend conferences given by sociologists, anthropologists, philosophers. They are very inspiring and pragmatic bridges that can create links between reality and the future. Others invest in start-ups to better understand the trends in their market, accelerate innovation and the understanding of their business. See reinventing it at the same time. The main thing is to broaden your vision, to find connections, common points between different industrial worlds.