As they use to say “we would like to disrupt your regular broadcast to bring you this special message…. beep beep beep.”

Are you a disruptor or are you being disrupted in your business? It’s likely only one or the other, there is no 3rd direction. This week we had the pleasure of hearing Shawn Kanungo speak about this mindset. He works for Deloitte on their innovation team. They know what innovation is as they are one of the largest digital companies out there.

It’s not a new concept about ‘being a disruptor’, but there is something to it that should be fascinating for all of us to take note of. Experimenting on our businesses, customers and processes is a great way to try something radically new and not feel freaked out if it will work or not.

Here are 5 ways to be an innovator and not just ‘the idea person’:

Set aside time for the process of innovation: Whether it’s things like a hack-a-thon, FEDx days, weekend retreats or mandating time to do something completely different you need to build this thinking into the makeup of your company. The goal always must be to get it out into the real world and try it out. Just talking about it or writing it down won’t do anything for you. SHIP IT! (Seth Godin has some great thoughts on this if you are interested).

Conduct experiments: Think like a scientist and set up controlled experiments for one aspect of your business. Question > Research > Hypothesis > Experiments > Data > Results
. Repeat again then next quarter.

“It’s not an experiment if you know it’s going to work.” – Jeff Bezos

Leave room to fail: You need to leave from for these experiments to fail, miserably, but it won’t really feel like failing if you are learning from them and have set it up in a way where you weren’t sure what you were going to learn from it in the first place. “It’s not an experiment if you know it’s going to work.” – Jeff Bezos

Observe humans in the wild: Kanungo talked about how we all know it to be true but that what we say we do and what we actually do in our behaviours is disconnected so in order to really understand your avatar, target audience, you need to observe them in the wild. Kanungo talked about “Don’t find HUMANS for your EXPERIMENTS, but rather find EXPERIMENTS for your HUMANS.”

“Don’t find HUMANS for your EXPERIMENTS, but rather find EXPERIMENTS for your HUMANS.”

Create disciplined chaos using digital: In this era where digital has changed everything your experiments need to be centred around technology and what’s available to you now. The digital needs to connect to humans, their experiences and disrupt their thinking in order to revolutionize your industry and business.

When the mindset of your organization is to disrupt the status quo you are turning your business into a forward thinking machine that will be light-years ahead of where your competition would be otherwise. There are no more barriers to entry, you could be wiped out or could explode if your next experiment is the winning combination of experience and satisfaction. There is endless data to back up why it’s profitable to follow these steps above. Don’t be disrupted, BE THE DISRUPTOR.

 “I believe you have to be willing to be misunderstood if you’re going to innovate.” Jeff Bezos