I recently visited Costa Rica. We hiked in the cloud forest (the view from the continental divide…amazing), zip-lined over the rain forest, and chilled afterward with an Imperial beer or two (the only bit of high school Spanish I could recall, it seems, was “Dos cervezas, por favor.”). It was a life-changing trip, and I feel privileged to have seen one of the most ecologically diverse (and fragile) regions in the world.
Yet in getting ready for my vacation, I was struck by how unprepared I was for a new adventure. And that got me to thinking about Next Generation Manufacturers. I was unprepared because for the past 10 years I’ve primarily traveled for speeches or business—and in true Boy Scout/Lean fashion, I always have my business travel “tools” ready to go:
- A garment bag preloaded with a toiletries kit (including duplicates of everything I use at home) and workout clothing (again, duplicates)
- A briefcase preloaded with every charger, connector, and cable I could conceivably need
- Preselected “meeting ensembles,” including sport coat, shirt, and pants, that all work with the same black belt and black loafers (to ease passage through the TSA maze at the airport)
This system lets me pack and get out the door in minutes for a business trip—but was next to useless for an expedition that required hiking boots, insect repellant, headlamps, a multi tool knife, GPS, etc.
In short, the trip that I was prepared to take wasn’t the journey that I actually found myself on. Which meant that I had a steep learning curve and a not-inconsiderable amount of pre-adventure stress, even though I really did want to reach that vista over the cloud and rain forests.
It’s similar (though with less beer) for would-be Next Generation Manufacturers. These execs have spent so much time just surviving over the past few years—cutting costs, rationalizing product lines, shoring up capital structures—that in some ways they’ve arrived at an economic recovery with the wrong tools in their bags. Success over the next few years will require dramatically different thinking about:
- What customers really want
- What it really means to be a global or green manufacturer
- What talent it takes to really seize the opportunity to grow
Most companies don’t yet have those answers. And for those that do, few have them arranged neatly in a bag that they can carry confidently to the future.
The good news is that the research says that NextGen tools, techniques, and tactics are out there—and that, used properly, they’ll get you to where you want to go.
But it’s going to take a little repacking.
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