The latest issue of Fortune magazine focuses on the challenges faced yesterday and today by the behemoth companies of the past 100 years (GM and Ford) and the household names of today (Microsoft, Wal-Mart, Verizon, etc.).
Yesterday’s Challenges:
- Sourcing, making, and marketing goods in a manufacturing-based economy
- Trying to amass market power in commodity businesses
- Negotiating with unions
- Fighting domestic competition
- For big companies (AT&T, GM, IBM): keeping market share down to avoid antitrust problems
Today’s Challenges:
- Continually altering business models in an information-based economy
- Confronting increased customer power and investor power in all businesses
- Attracting and keeping top talent
- Fighting global competition
- For all companies (including the biggest): finding profitable growth in a world of overcapacity
According to Fortune, it’s extremely vital that companies constantly reinvent themselves and develop and sustain flexible business models to remain competitive in an information-based economy (very difficult to do, but Intel did it).
And, customers are more powerful than ever before thanks to the power of information and the Internet – they know how much everything costs and how much you’re charging in each market. Investors are also more powerful than ever, as are highly skilled employees.
These challenges are important to note for HR/Benefits suppliers as the HR marketplace continues to become more and more globally competitive and the struggle for market share more difficult.