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Taking Action on Opportunities

By Jack Mixner     

The Tipping Point's Malcolm Gladwell demonstrates clearly that New York City crime rates fell because of a broken window strategy, namely, repairing graffitied subway cars immediately along with later strategies of focusing scarce police resources on high crime areas.

Freakonomics

Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner say that falling crime nation-wide during the same period was caused by changes in abortion laws twenty years before.

The Strategic Response

Who cares why crime fell? When we do our situation analysis to answer the simple strategic question "Where are we?” we need list only the opportunity of falling crime.

Disney did. Then they built a new theater in Times Square and began the much-heralded renaissance that is still going on.

Market Mastery

Spend lots of your analysis time on opportunities. The sub-text of why something is happening may not be clear. However, deciding what steps to take because of it may be very profitable. Actually implementing the steps leads your company to market mastery.

References Gladwell, Malcomb. The Tipping Point How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. Back Bay Books. 2002.

Levitt, Steven D. and Stephen J. Dubner Freakonomics A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. HarperCollins. 2005.

 

Comments

Jack,
The blog looks great! It will be the perfect forum for your strategic commentaries.
Continued good luck,
Frank

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