My name is Jim Mesterharm, I'm a
managing director in the North American
Turnaround and Restructuring services. You know, disruption is the key buzzword
in today's market. I think it's people
really sort of putting together a number
of thoughts of how do companies need to react to changes, and what sort of
changes are at such a macro level that
they really can't be ignored? Data and
utilizing data has become such an
important part of companies being ahead
of things in the marketplace. I think
about geospatial data, gathering
information on consumer habits, how that
impacts things. About how a retailer
should stock a store. How a retailer
should think about what stores to invest in.
If a retailer has to downsize, how to
downsize with the lowest
potential impact of losing customers, and
being able to transfer customers who
usually shopped at one store, to another.
I think you have to evaluate
technological change that's happening. You could say in automotive for example,
there's been a lot of technological
change, whether it's autonomous driving cars,
whether it's ride-sharing, whether
it's moving towards electrification of cars.
All of those things are going to
have a major impact on the auto industry,
the number of cars purchased, the type of fuel those cars utilize, and then how
that cascades down through the supply chain of an automotive company.
Businesses should always feel uneasy about the future,
because it's not today, and I think
you always have to be thinking about
not just who are your competitors
today, but who are the competitors on the
horizon? What's the relevancy of your product?
And how do you maintain your competitive position with your product, but what's
your next product?
 
