Accenture recommends a new strategy for firms struggling to unlock value
While digitalisation and innovation are both picking up in pace across South Africa, some companies appear to be more successful than others in unlocking the potential value of innovative technology. Accenture recommends a ‘Wise Pivot’ strategy for those firms that appear to be struggling.
Businesses in South Africa are facing disruption from every direction at the moment. Alongside being hit by the global digital wave, firms in the country are navigating a new government agenda, an increasingly restrictive tax regime, and overall regulatory barriers that have been established to tackle corruption.
New research from Accenture has revealed that most firms in the country – more than 75% – are particularly susceptible to disruption at present, not for a lack of investment, but due to shortcomings in growth strategies with respect to the potential benefits from technology and other innovative mechanisms.
The need for innovation has been acknowledged by several in the country’s business environment, and an increasingly collaborative scenario has come to prevail in recent years. Even smaller firms that were previously reluctant to bear the costs of technology have now come to embrace the new paradigm.
However, only a handful of firms appear to have extracted all the value that such investments present. “Our research shows there is a small group of high-growth companies—we call them ‘value releasers’—that consistently outperform the rest in the creation of both current and future value,” explains Accenture South Africa CEO Vukani Mngxati.
“Their advantage: these leaders focus on and building innovation structures and practices that drive differentiation and shareholder value and they know how to pivot their businesses wisely to the new. Our guidance in terms of how executives can respond to disruption: execute a Wise Pivot strategy that is repeatable” he added.
The Wise Pivot strategy rests on the lifecycle of any business’ core assets, which is divided into three stages: the old, the now and the new. Eliminating products that have peaked in their value, making the production of the high-value offerings more efficient, and tracing the growth of new offerings is the core of Accenture’s new strategy.