A SUMMARY OF THOUGHTS: INNOVATION & ENTREPRENEURSHIP III

[continued from the Last Post.]

The entrepreneurial strategies that Drucker identifies are:

• “Fastest with the Mostest”;

• “Hit Them Where They Ain’t”;

• Ecological Niches; and

• Changing Values and Characteristics;

Each of these strategies has advantages and disadvantages; they may also be combined to form hybrid strategies. Some of them are riskier than others. Market structures such as demographics, and economic conditions within the market, will certainly influence the potential for success with a particular strategy.

(1) As examples of “Fastest with the Mostest,” Drucker cites:

• the growth of the pharmaceutical company Hoffmann-LaRoche, from its beginnings as a small chemical firm in the 1920’s, and

• the decision at DuPont to grow its plastics industry after the discovery of Nylon.

This strategy is also one of the riskiest because it appears so much like a gamble; insufficient resources may cause the strategy to fail.

Nylon was a commercial success, according to Drucker, because the negative impact of World War II on the Japanese silk industry protected the fledgling plastic fibre industry; it could thus become cost competitive by the time the silk industry rebuilt itself in the late 1940’s.

DuPont was able to follow up a technology innovation with the process innovations necessary to reduce costs, and thereby to keep the market built during the absence of silk from Japan.

[To be continued in the Next Post. Excerpted from the 'Lifescaping' seminar participant's manual. The 'Lifescaping' seminar is conducted by Dilip Mukerjea about four times a year under the auspices of the Singapore Institute of Management.]