OCTOBER 2020CIOAPPLICATIONS.COM8M any companies feel the earth shifting beneath their feet as asymmetrical competitors flush with VC funding challenge them with new ideas and new ways of serving their market. If you're in the situation, you're probably asking will it work? Will you get Amazoned or Netflixed into oblivion?Anchored by monolithic architecture while agile startups flit about the cloud trying to pick off your customers makes any established market leader feel vulnerable. Do you burn a pile of capital in an attempt to boost operations to the cloud for a dogfight? Is it even a technology fight, or is there a more systemic issue opening your customers to competitors?Answering this second question determines how you answer the first. Some market leaders who flamed out by not innovating when hit by a disrupter may not have known their customer as well as they thought they did. It wasn't just new tech that extinguished their fire. Technology can fix a lot of things, but it can't fix complacency.Complacency shouldn't be mistaken for a clear-eyed vision and solid value prop backed by a deliberate strategy to not engage in a costly head-to-head battle against a rival with little chance of stealing your market share. There are triumphant Goliaths out there standing over flattened Davids wheezing out a haze of vaporized VC.IN MY ViewRainmaking in the CloudJEFF DIRKS, CTO, TRUEBLUE INC.
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