Love your competitors - how great businesses do strategy | Alex Smith | TEDxFolkestone
What’s the secret to great business ideas, and successful business strategies? In this inspiring talk Alex M H Smith founder of Basic Arts reveals that it all starts with refusing to compete.
Speaker:
Alex M H Smith founder of
www.basicarts.org/
Twitter:
/ smithesq
LinkedIn:
/ alex-m-h-smith-26182816
Drawing on examples ranging from Nokia and Southwest Airlines, to Extreme Ironing and Charles Darwin, Alex paints a new picture of how markets work that will make you see the world of business completely differently, and show you how you can uncover a winning strategy by not trying to win at all.
Whether you’re an entrepreneur, a decision maker at a successful company, or simply someone looking for smart ideas to sharpen your thinking, this talk will give you useful tips to improve your strategy immediately and reimagine the way you do business.
Refusing to compete is about so much more than mere business differentiation. It’s about choosing to be kind and generous with your competitors, stepping back, and letting them have what is theirs. Although it seems counterintuitive, this rejection of competition can help create the ultimate competitive advantage, and leads to amazing businesses which make a real impact on the world.
Along the way Alex explores:
The human tendency to make everything competitive, including things that really shouldn’t be
How competing with each other damages businesses, markets, and the people they serve
Why monopolies can be good things, and how every business has the potential to hold a monopolistic position in its category
Why market share is a bad way to measure a business success
And the similarities markets have with natural ecosystems, and what businesses can learn from them by copying their strategies
Finally Alex paints an inspiring picture of how things would look if everyone adopted a non-competitive strategy.
Alex is an award winning strategist known for his work with his company, Basic Arts where he aims to make companies without competitors.
You can follow him on Twitter ( / smithesq ,
find him on LinkedIn ( / alex-m-h-smith-26182816 , and subscribe to the Basic Arts newsletter (mailchi.mp/53e8061f1686/basic...) for more thoughts like this every month. Alex is a strategist and founder of Basic Arts, where he helps businesses create monopolies within their market categories. For him, the theme of “a reimagined future” at TEDxFolkestone connected perfectly with a new vision of business that are unfolding all around us, and which his talk addresses. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at www.ted.com/tedx
Big fan of this concept and the way Alex delivers it.
Isn't it even more fitting now?
Always be high spirited & thrive for success 🏆🍾
I read this "Competition has been shown to be useful up to a certain point and no further, but cooperation, which is the thing we must strive for today, begins where competition leaves off."
sounds good, but, is it just a hope as there are always going to corps that compete HARD and push the little fish out.
yeah, not sure man really not sure.
That's why I love Tedx talks. 😁❤
and I do too!
Fascinating perspective! This talk truly shifts the lens through which we view business. From Nokia to Southwest Airlines, the idea of not competing for the sake of winning is both intriguing and refreshing. In the realm of software development, we often find innovation through collaboration and sharing, rather than intense rivalry. This concept resonates, as fostering a sense of collaboration, kindness, and generosity can lead to profound impacts in the business world.
"You win. We all win when we don't compete". What an interesting concept.
It is but that's not how business works. If your trying to make a profit. You'll do whatever you can to get that done.
@@sucram1015 really? at any cost? and how has that worked out for the world?
to be honest, this is one of the best talks over the last couple of months hosted by Tedx
Great presentation Alex, if more people focussed on their strengths and worked together instead of fearing their competitors, the world would be a much better place in general.
‘Competition breeds complacency’ - an interesting perspective. Great talk Alex.
Maybe we needed this so we can really understand what this young man is saying, we can only have it all if everyone has it all too.
this is equality at a whole new level...
good man...
this is awesome
congratulations you're all communists now, welcome to the club
Wonderful, compassionate and clever talk in a time when we need more words like this... bravo
good send Sam..
perfect man perfect.
but - can you really love who you compete against?
🥰🥰🥰
yeah, this is very clued in..
A competitor will find a way to win. Competitors take bad breaks and use them to drive themselves just that much harder. Quitters take bad breaks and use them as reasons to give up. It's all a matter of pride. Hi guys! Would just like to share our journey with you. 😀 We own a cookie shop business in our college town. When we first started it, we just graduated college and were living in our car with very little direction, just a huge passion to be successful. I started it out of a local bagel shop in their off hours at night with my boyfriend, Bran. It was a crazy experience but it worked! We became a success! And how we have our first storefront location in New Jersey and the second one in Florida! We started it to fund a year long backpacking trip around the world and to be successful while living the life of our dreams.
this is really rude to hijack someone elses video...
I really find this concept of markets as ecosystems inspiring. Sustainability is one of the most important values for me, in all aspects, and this seems a very sustainable way of creating business not only for entrepreneurs but also for customers and markets themselves.
Bravo Alex! Great job! A true thought leader in the strategy space!
This makes complete sense - absolutely brilliant… Competing is also stressful, and so choosing the alternative will become so much more enjoyable...
What a great talk, and means so much more now than ever before.
it will take new thinking to come out of covid.
@@muhammad-baksh It will for sure.
Loving your competition doesn't mean you don't want to beat them into submission !!
or does it??
love ... tough love
Perhaps you missed the point here..
Don't have words to express. Incredible!
This guy is enlightened being.. 😀😀 Nice Ted talk through!
Corporate value proposition !!! Wonderfully presented.
Isn't it funny, I have found many people are becoming much kinder and caring now as we go through this crisis. Perhaps we are starting to put people before profit.
there's definitely a change on the rise
Extremely helpful! So glad I watched this ❤️
one hundred percent correct! This actually works.
Damn this was eye opening. I’m gonna apply these principles to my business and see what happens! If it worked for that airline it could work for me too!!!
Same
This is beautiful. Simply beautiful.
amazing
🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰All we need is love🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰
Very powerful message. Thanks
Awesome talk, really valid points. Reminds me of what Safeway did way back in the 90s, giving up on competing with Tesco, Sainsbury's et al and bringing us the 'DEAL LEAFLET".
Focus on your goal .... the door of success will open for you 👍👍
definitely!! :)
Very interesting angle, I'll think about this!
Very refreshing point of view on how to think about business
Times are tough, will people be willing?
what are the options if we don't?
@@tterrydoyle what happens if we do, and then everyone else doesnt?
of course, if we all lead by example.
Really nice perspective. Thank you.
Inspired. Thank you
hi man. Glad to hear u talk, completely agree with ur speech. Let the squirrels fight for the nut and go for the mango tree. French David
I'm inspired by the life-altering nature of this content. A book with parallel themes had a notable effect on me. "The Hidden Empire: Inside the Private Worlds of Elite CEOs" by Adam Skylight
what a forking brilliant TED talk
illuminating , thanks
Brilliant!!!! 👏🏻
Inspiring stuff!
Interesting talk!
I love the synergy part, amazing! Let's just all coexist and stop doing competitions to see who has the biggest di-... I mean, market share!
Great presentation and very well exposed thoughts!!! loved it!!
wow. simply wow. makes sense a lot.
Very good research here, all you need to see if the numbers to know the truth.
Yeah. It is important to focus on competitiveness rather than fear of competitors. Strategies for competitiveness might help to overcome it. For instance; exceed customer expectation, deliver faster, restructuring and empowerment, concern for environment.
Great 👌
It was such a nice perspective
It all starts and ends with l.o.v.e.
Young Foodies brought me here. Great talk, thank you
Great speech
🥰🥰Great Talk🥰🥰
Love it!
interesting and worth a watch
Great talk
How about the positive outcomes from eg. innovation in competition? Apple is a great example of how disruptive innovation can change an industry. I doubt that people would choose to live without the smartphone today. As long as there is an difference in market demands, the highest demands will gain more profit that the others - competitors or not. I agree in sharing competencies and growing together, but letting a business “fit” in a puzzle would be like fitting 1000 pieces where there is room for a hundred. Competition is key to business, market and industry development.
We need this sort of mindset now in these times, a lot of people are on the edge of losing.
thanks Nora. agree with you
gets worse each day.
@@oscarkluk we need to have faith Oscar.
@@noraandrews8215 I am trying to.
Where did this Ted Talk take place? Anyone know?
I think just love everyone right now.
it is the only way we will survive.
@@tterrydoyle yes it is
This is the concept of blue ocean strategy against the traditional red ocean one
Exactly .
Waooo very good sir
Nice video i liked it very much
Respect
thank you
Has anyone considered the antitrust implications of the market-allocation approach being encouraged.
Tell you what we are going to really need to find a way for people to all win now, so many going to go under.
Interesting view...
So, if I find a better solution to a problem (e.g. a better cure for an ailment), I shouldn't compete with the existing ones? And where do you draw the line to what's competition and what's not? Isn't the iPhone competing in the cellphone market as a whole (where do you draw the line)? These are honest questions, I wish I could ask the Alex directly.
true
Hey - thanks a lot for the questions, I can answer. Your first point re cure for an ailment etc. is valid: there are some circumstances were X comes along and makes Y obsolete, especially if you're talking about something hyper functional like a drug. My view on this is that, simply, there's no guarantee that something should last forever, and sometimes the context will shift and concepts will cease to be valid and will go "extinct", much in the same way a species can go extinct through natural environmental churn. However I would add two things: 1) if a business focuses on the *value* it gives to the market, not simply the product it makes, then it should be able to keep ahead of these things because it's constantly looking for new ways to keep offering the same old value. And 2) moreover, this direct replacement of X product by Y product is very rare - vast majority of businesses don't make things this applies to. For the second point, I think the key way to understand it is simply this: if two companies are trying to play the same role in the market, they are competing. If two companies are trying to play different roles in the market, they aren't competing - *even though purchase of one might mean not purchasing the other*. With my logic you don't care about that, because the goal isn't 100% market share, it's maximising profitability. Therefore it's really more about how you define competition rather than where you draw the line. Is that helpful?
@@AlexMHSmith Thank you very much for your response Alex. Do I understand correctly that the theory relies on how you define both your mission AND Competition itself? If that's the case, wouldn't the premise be more accurate in saying that competition is good as long as you differentiate enough from your competitors? Because a good way to test if you're competing with someone is to withdraw from the market and see if that impacts your " potential competitor" positively. Namely, if apple were to stop producing iPhones, would that drive up the sales of Samsung Android phones? If it does, that would be a clear indication that they're competing products, wouldn't it? Sorry if I'm taking too much of your time. It's a subject that interests me very much. Because instinctively I feel we should be able to find a better way to increase the production of value, where you don't affect or hurt someone who's trying to do the same; make it win-win for everyone participating in value creation. But I have never found a better alternative to competition. It feels like it's a natural process: if you try to decrease the existing value of a market (producing a bad or unnecessary product or service) you won't be rewarded in the long-run. Same if you don't keep improving the value created. And, it seems to me, that the key element, that allows this natural process to work, is competition. But I still search for a solution to the 80-year-old umbrella-fixer that is left with no value to offer and no time, energy or room for improvement. This is a real example and the reason why I'm so interested in the topic. Thank you PS: Also, if you can point me to any book or resource on the subject, I'd appreciate it. Thanks again.
@@AlexMHSmiththe biblical way to do business it’s right up my alley
We all need some love these days. I wonder when Alex did this did he realize what was ahead? Things are so difficult now.
true
Hey - thanks for the comment - I did this June 2019 ---- and yes I agree in the wake of what's going on there's going to be a restructuring of the way commerce works, and I would hope something like this would be a collaborative, but still free, approach.
@@AlexMHSmith wow good reply man, i was thinking the same thing.
@@AlexMHSmith we can all hope, I agree good ideas are timeless alex, great talk
@@AlexMHSmith big changes happening man, good talk.
how to learning english effectively especially skill listening?
Hello Alex and Zaza. 💕
Very nice
Competition isn't right as u try to become ur competitor,lose urself,clutter the business instead don't do what they do give them space to flourish,u do yours,over all market will flourish e.g nokia and apple
I have seen so many store closures, so many small companies get swallowed up by this pandemic, feel like the big corps are going to take over everything, scary times.
Yes. Easrly humans survived through collaboration.
This is why Andrew Yang is such a strong political candidate. He doesn't make enemies. He loves everybody and while everyone is busy beating up on each other, Yang is playing the long game and getting people on his side by using logic and honesty to win over our trust. We've lost trust in our institutions but we've finally found a politician we can trust. He wants to build teams and build up America much like he used his business, Venture for America, to help start hundreds of news businesses in struggling economies like Detroit and Baltimore. If you haven't checked out Andrew Yang yet, you should Google him to at least get in on his $1,000 a month giveaway but then to stay for his excellently crafted policy and his love for all humanity.
🙂 🤗 🤩Great Talk🙂 🤗 🤩Love always wins🙂 🤗 🤩
Great insight Alex
Yeah that makes sense, you become that which you compete to be better than, hopefully a better version though.
Nice
Didn't Nokia make a silly deal with Microsoft that stopped them from moving onto eg: Android - Windows Phones kind of flopped and they were stuck.
No choice for consumers, I was thinking this the other day in the grocery store, 20 brands of beans all the same price all the same flavor.
Ehhhh better thn ever!~~~
This is the time for this idea, in such a crippled economy we cannot let the corporate sharks eat all the small businesses.
Can I love those that hate me in business? Is it not suicidal?
Good thinking, great delivery - but perhaps a repackaged idea of differentiation? or maybe just a little bit too idealistic ;)
Amplify your Attributes...
It probably like bottle neck of competition, whoever break it then win something similar to this i think
Cc: Vince McMahon
Him saying Nokia should have not tried to fight Apple is like saying the slowest runner should not try to beat the number one runner, “instead just be the slowest! that way you’ll never lose!” I do agree with his overall ideas, I’m just not a huge fan of his apple vs Nokia example.
A book every business person should read is 'CASHVERTISING' by Drew Eric Whitman. The author speaks a lot about how to deal with competitors :) Has anyone read it?
I like the sound of the idea of a utopian marketplace but I don’t think the concept can hold up. Ofc if everyone differentiates from each other’s USPs we’ll have a wide array of possibilities as customers. But at the end of the day we’ll all be gravitating towards something homogeneous as we want a standardized ecosystem in the products we use. Imagine a world where every product is different so nothing goes together. Ofc the business model for big corporations is to create these ecosystems to keep you in the them but at the end of the day that’s where you as a customer experience most effortlessness.
Now this is good, kind of conscious capitalism
Hey Jhon - thanks a lot - yes exactly what I intended. We are given this false choice between centralised / anti-business control, or a corrosive free for all. I don't think these are the only two paths available.
Really solid talk, this guy is a natural presenter with a good story - but not sure about his subject. I mean dog eats dog right.
Ignore the naysayers, what we have done has not worked, what we need to do has to be different!
An interesting view, but not sure I agree with it. You used an example of Nokia, but not of Samsung. Samsung competes fiercely with Apple, but they’re not apple and they still succeed.
Can you love them when they don't love you? Are you not at risk of losing everything?
That's the beauty part - this works even when it only goes in one direction. Stepping back from them puts you in the position of power, you don't need them to reciprocate (but if they're smart they will)
For a second there I thought it was Gordan Ramsay on TED talk
Win Win used to be a thing, what happened, did we all just get too greedy? Is this was this COVID is about" Greed?
I think it was too.
mmm....you are forgetting how blackberry went broke precisely for not competing with apple, also apple was definitely competing with every company in the market lol, Steve Jobs even used images showing how they were better than blackberry and Nokia in his launching presentation. Competition doesn't make companies look the same because all of them are constantly trying to improve, they are on the leading edge expanding, each one integrating the improvement of the other at a time but also finding new horizons, that's how apple was created. Also what you are proposing make companies look "different" but stuck in their own character, which i think is a pretty bad idea, is forced polarization.