Turning Challenges into Opportunities: Communication Innovation in the Reinvention Economy

In today’s reinvention economy, our role as communicators is rapidly evolving.  We are tasked with finding opportunity through the doomsday prognosis and navigating brands through the murky waters in a way that positions them for success.  It’s crucial that we have our eyes on both the dynamic changes in our industry as well as the evolving global business landscape as a whole.  This challenge is something we should face head on as communication innovation moves from the end of the supply chain to the initiation process of reinvention. 

Change abounds. And fear pervades. Nothing is gnawingly the same-yet everything remains uncomfortably familiar. Innovating at the speed of the consumer defined yesterday's success. Innovating at the speed of culture will define tomorrow's.  As the reinvention economy blooms, its eventual beauty is presently marred by its shocking initial ugliness. No one can see the forest through the trees-so the gloom pervades leaving necessary restorative optimism in its wake.

The opportunity presents itself through this lens for smart leaders to emerge who don't necessarily have all the answers, but are confident and emboldened enough to take the necessary, albeit fearful and unknown steps, to move things forward. Complacency is easy and common and readily accepted. Innovative excellence and agility are hard and rare and aggressively questioned. In today’s environment, there is only room for those willing to be bold enough to not accept the current hand dealt, while being smart enough to play it correctly so that future hands do in fact draw an ace.

Every cloud has a silver lining as they say-and so too will our current bleak economic environment. The best ideas are often borne from times of struggle as it is in difficult times that we are forced to produce ideas and innovations that will drive societal and business benefit-not just concepts that could work in principle. Necessity is the mother of invention-hence the continued dawn of the reinvention economy. And while the road forward will be undoubtedly rocky, it is clear that we can with certainty look forward to brighter skies ahead as both the public and private sector put their best and brightest forward with an eye toward finding a way out of the current darkness.

So, as the days of austerity chic continue to pervade our lives, making us abandon many of the things that have guided us to our current state, and less becomes more, as greed becomes no longer good, upon us comes a time of both reflection and what promises to be an era of positive reinvention and rebirth. What this means for brands is the need to highlight the adept and agile changes that are being taken to survive-but more importantly thrive-and what this means for leaders communicating from K Street, to Main Street to Wall Street, is a resounding call to action to put idle rhetoric to rest and meaningful dialogue into action.

In the weeks and months ahead, those who will find success, will be the brave leaders willing to convert crisis into opportunity and emerge stronger than ever. And, communicating these types of actions will be more critical than ever to winning competitive footing and achieving both increased mind and market share. The media community, albeit rocked with change and hardship, will still remain riveted on unearthing the bright lights in the storm-and will remain consumed with a hunger for quality content.

As the line between journalist and PR professional continues to evaporate, it will become more critical than ever for brands to identify the trends driving their businesses forward-thereby creating the compelling stories of the ones getting it right that the world will continue to hunger for. And, so emerges the innovation-rooted fortitude required to transform brands from mere disseminators of info into strategic purveyors of this very type of content.

As pessimism pervades, those brands that can find and communicate optimism steeped in reality and real business results will be the new victors. As this new paradigm of upheaval and resurrection continues to unfold a few critical drivers will continue to emerge as definers of what predicates success in both the consumer and corporate world.

Innovation will remain the Holy Grail-although its shape and face will continue to metamorphosize. While a renewed focus on craftsmanship and a finely honed attention to detail will spur a likely wave of superior product and technology development-ideas, processes and people that foster change and catalyze a new path forward will continue to emerge as the innovations that bolster, support and actualize our new reinvention economy.

Amidst this sea change will be the emergence of the "disruptive innovation" movement-innovations that address challenges and evoke much needed new ideas, platforms and infrastructures. No longer will innovation be viewed as something that will enhance a position-it will rapidly emerge as a critical business imperative needed to attain not only success-but assure survival.

We will see these disruptive innovations take place in obvious spots, like our banking and healthcare systems as the Obama administration works to reinvent America-and too inside big business as companies work to salvage corporate America-here and outside our borders as globalization of business becomes more critical than ever.

The disruptions we can expect to see will show their face in the way of flattened leadership structures, a renewed emphasis on people instead of technology to drive capital, in brands that lead culture instead of mirror it, and work to inspire optimism, and in processes that foster collaboration inside the walls of an organization, and more importantly in places that go beyond those traditional confines.

We will see brands continue to look for new ideas to strengthen business models with competitors, with academia and most importantly in some of the more far reaching emerging markets where they do business. This new "trickle down" approach to innovation will change not only the way business is done-but more importantly the outputs of what it is that business creates.

As less becomes more in all walks of life-brands that provide more with less will be the new champions. Mindfully watching expenses, while still being relevant to consumers will be the new mantra, as will moving business not at the speed of the consumer, but at the speed of culture.

As entrepreneurialism becomes more important than ever before-inside big business and out-the brands that succeed will no longer necessarily be the household names of the past. As small business continues to emerge as one of the vital organs of our global economy-and as austerity chic pervades with an emphasis on value as opposed to cache-the balance of competition will too shift-pitting fledgling upstarts hungry to succeed against titan giants struggling to survive. This will not only change the complexion and texture of the competitive landscape-it will change everything from what defines success to how the workforce itself is comprised.

For these reasons communication innovation moves from the end of the supply chain to the initiation process of reinvention. As a result, inculcating our brand innovation stories in the culture becomes the definer of success-and telling our success stories in new ways using multimedia platforms becomes inextricably linked with a brand's stature. As the media landscape contracts-the need for quality information expands. The reality is that there are not fewer places to tell our stories-there are just different places to be heard-and the challenge to find those new places will continue to emerge at an alarmingly rapid rate.

No longer will a traditional media plan suffice in a media world being led by the non traditional media-and in a world being dominated by media uber advocates as opposed to media uber brands. The eyeballs will now follow the name brand, not the media brand, and success in achieving third party media validation will be predicated on understanding and delivering on this new undeniable paradigm.

All in all, an unsettling, yet exciting time chock full of change. Among the changes and trends to watch out for in the weeks and months ahead include:

·the continued emergence of the reinvention economy which will mandate sweeping changes in how business is done and how business success is not only defined, but communicated

·a blurring line between corporate and consumer branding as the need to delight, excite and differentiate around not the "what" but the "who" continues to emerge on both Main Street and Wall Street

·a continued rise of innovations taking place in non-traditional settings like emerging markets as hotbed cottage industries do continue to form and as small business growth presses forward globally

·a new wave of disruptive innovations that will change not only how business is done but what gets produced

·a push for visible leadership to explain and define new market challenges not as hurdles but opportunities –and a shift where communication innovation moves from the end of the supply chain to the initiation process of reinvention

·a rising premium inside organizations on people as opposed to technology-and a new crop of market leaders who value agile and sleek entrepreneurialism as opposed to complacent and bloated former market dominance derived from sheer heft

·a continuing changed media landscape that contracts in traditional arenas while expanding in new platforms

·a mounting and palpable need for quality content that creates an opportunity for smart brands as the line between journalist and pr pro continues to erode

·a new cadre of media uber advocates who will replace the media uber brands of days past in certain situations-and who will ultimately make survival of certain traditional outlets possible