DailyPost 560
”BLUE OCEAN STRATEGY”
Blue Ocean” Strategy now a part business vernacular, was coined in 2005, in a path breaking book by the same name. While cut throat competition is the buzzword in business with endless strategies & tools to make you the victor, the battle can only get bloodier. The zero sum game cannot be a panacea as a business strategy. Blue Ocean is intended to be the antidote to this strategy; the metaphor being used is the Red Ocean & the Blue Ocean. ”How to create uncontested market space & make the competition irrelevant,” is the tectonic strategic business shift.
The commonality of management thought is becoming conspicuous today. Understanding of the undercurrents of business is vital to its creation, sustenance, scalability & diversification. The first magnum opus was The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton M. Christensen in 1997, the next to follow was The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman; 2004 & with Blue Ocean Strategy,2005, the base of present day management thought was laid. The Über connected world is a reality, which no business can dispense with. Give the nature digital world changes, Blue Ocean is the Ocean of Opportunities for the future.
Last decade or more has seen innumerable IT & other companies making big, with linkages to this concept. From Walmart to Facebook, are different Blue Ocean models, creating new market spaces & capturing it. Technology is at the base; retail or media. Competition then becomes irrelevant. It will take time for these areas to become Red Oceans. The simple strategy is shift from a Static Blue to a Dynamic Blue.
While getting out of Red Ocean Thinking one still ends up getting into Red Ocean Traps. The strategy is moving consistently from Zero – Sum to a New Zero – Sum Game. Innovation & creativity has been viewed as black box, unknowable & random, is not the case. Recent businesses successes clearly unravels the broad contours with clarity, in these business accomplishments.
TODAY’s MASSIVE CREATIVE MONOPOLIES ARE THE CREATION OF BLUE OCEAN THINKING.
Sanjay Sahay