Why I'm Following the Disruption - Scott Anthony, MD Innosight

Scott Anthony is the Managing Director of Innosight Ventures, a venture building and investing business with offices in Singapore, India, and the U.S. In this blog in the Harvard Business Blog he talks about disruption and how that ties in with his move his move to Asia.

A central argument of this blog is that every company must grapple with the reality that their current business model has a finite life, which means seeking reinvention and transformation.

Leaders, too, need to constantly think about how they can reinvent and transform themselves.

My own transformation begins this month as I transition from running Innosight's consulting operations to head up Innosight Ventures, Innosight's incubation and investing arm, in Singapore. This is a wonderful opportunity for me to move from advising companies on issues of disruptive innovation to the true front line of disruption.

Innosight Ventures has proven the most promising of Innosight's experiments. We set Innosight Ventures up a few years ago as a separate entity to incubate and invest in disruptive growth ventures. We very intentionally kept the business separate because of its distinct business model.

In that time period Innosight Ventures created close to 100 business plans, tested about a dozen ideas in markets, and has gained traction with four ventures: a laundry services business in India, a men's grooming business in India, an online education business, and a unique funding partnership with the Singaporean government.

Innosight Ventures' mission is to use the principles and patterns of disruptive innovation to foster the creation of booming growth businesses that improve the lives of unserved and underserved customers around the world. We do so by incubating and investing in the disruptive business models that venture capitalists ignore and corporations fumble.

There's a heavy emerging market focus to the business, with small offices in Singapore and India. The focus is consistent with a perception that the odds are very high that the West's innovation leadership will decrease, if not disappear in coming years. I plan to spend substantial time in Asia throughout the remainder of this year and move to Singapore in early 2010.

This kind of transition of course carries substantial risks. I will face new challenges that are completely different from what I have encountered on the consulting side of our business. On the flip side, using our tools in different ways will drive new learning that will increase our overall ability to make innovation more predictable.

I'll continue to blog on a regular basis, of course, with my focus increasingly encompassing on-the-ground learning and Asian-based examples.

I suggest those of you contemplating your own career in the face of the challenges and opportunities presented by today's economy consider three questions:

1. What are you doing to expose yourself to new challenges?
2. How can you get closer to the "action" in your field or organization?
3. What can you do to get closer to transformational efforts in your company?

I'm greatly looking forward to taking the next step in my disruptive journey — and in sharing the learning with you.

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Scott Anthony is the Managing Director of Innosight Ventures, a venture building and investing business with offices in Singapore, India, and the U.S. He previously was the President of Innosight's consulting arm, where he advised companies such as Procter & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson, Credit Suisse, Time Warner, Kraft, VF Corp, Cisco Systems, and General Electric on topics of growth and innovation.

Scott has written three books on innovation: Seeing What’s Next, Using the Theories of Innovation to Predict Industry Change with Harvard Professor Clayton Christensen (Harvard Business Press, 2004), The Innovator’s Guide to Growth with Mark Johnson, Joe Sinfield, and Elizabeth Altman (Harvard Business Press, 2008), and The Silver Lining: An Innovation Playbook for Uncertain Times (Harvard Business Press, June 2009). He has written articles in publications such as the Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, BusinessWeek, Forbes, Sloan Management Review, Advertising Age, Marketing Management and Chief Executive, is a regular contributor to Harvard Business Online and serves as the editorial director of Strategy & Innovation.