Donald Mitchell
Most people try to improve what they do by changing one element at a time. When it comes to creating more benefits for stakeholders, a better approach is to combine many complementary improvements by building on what other highly successful organizations have done in other fields. Let’s consider three cases:
1. Some Hawaiian resorts keep fish pools that attract tourists, provide a place to entertain diners, allow children to learn to fish, and are kept stocked by feeding fish with stale bread sent back from diners’ tables.
2. Earthwatch helps scientists perform experiments by asking volunteers to give of their time and money. When a scientist makes the tasks interesting and puts them in an attractive location, volunteers stand in line to help.
3. The Grameen Bank in Bangladesh has helped eliminate a lot of poverty by providing low-cost, small-value loans and teaching its savers and borrowers how to live more fruitful lives and to start businesses.
With all of these ways to cast bread upon the waters and build a better tomorrow for all, you can see that there exist many opportunities to create hybrid business models from these successes. Consequently, these new business models will ensure even richer and higher quality harvests by expanding the community of those who can imagine better ways to create them.
As an example of what’s possible, the Hawaiian-style combination of tourism and scientific research with dolphins described above could be combined and transported to rural parts of underdeveloped and developing countries.
This business model might require a partnership among community leaders, scientists, Earthwatch, lenders willing to help start Grameen-style banks to establish infrastructure, and the local tourism providers.
While in the rural communities, tourists could work on interesting scientific experiments, share their practical knowledge with local people through translators and educators in the community, consider investing in local versions of Grameen banks and projects, and develop knowledge useful for the tourists to use in creating new markets for local products and services after they leave.
Although this kind of experience would not be appealing to every tourist, many would find that it combined all of the appeal of a safe Peace Corps assignment, an Earthwatch experiment, and a vacation without the need for excessive time and economic commitments. Each person who was involved could become richer in both human and economic terms, as a result of the process. For those who wanted to, there could still be an opportunity for plenty of recreation time by extending the vacation’s length after the intense involvement was over.
What can stakeholders gain from other successful business models that are complementary to your own?
Copyright 2009 Donald W. Mitchell, All Rights Reserved
Donald Mitchell is chairman and CEO of Mitchell and Company, a strategy and financial consulting firm in Weston, MA. He is coauthor of seven books including Adventures of an Optimist, The 2,000 Percent Solution, and The Ultimate Competitive Advantage. You can find free tips for accomplishing 20 times more by registering at:
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