Embrace the Future The Soft Science of Business Transformation

ONCE UPON A TIME, there was a family whose very name connoted wealth. The
Vanderbilts had a vast empire built on freight through steamboats and railroads. Over afew generations, the wealth—worth billions in today’s money—had been frittered awayand the business itself faded as new options came up in the freight business. Theirstory remains an enduring example of what happens when business leaders fail toembrace the future and transform.BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION is a live subject, one that authors R. Gopalakrishnanand Hrishi Bhattacharyya have between them a hundred-plus years of leading in theircompanies. Their learnings, supported by numerous examples, make for rivetingreading. One chief lesson why such transformations succeed or fail has to do withcombining the art and science of the change – the heart and the mind – and getting thebalance of the two right. In life as in business, to effect a transformation, one needs acompelling narrative, one that inspires the organisation. Important too is to seetransformation as a continuous endeavour and made a part of work culture rather thanto consider it an exercise undertaken only in a crisis.Embrace the Future is a major book by two business leaders that will appeal to anyonewho has faced change—in today’s fluid business environment, most of us. AsGopalakrishnan and Bhattacharyya emphasise, companies that fail to adapt aredestined to perish.One needs to learn from the past, manage the present and preparefor the future. We must imagine the future we desire and then fold it into the present.