The Value of Looking Back while Looking Ahead

Development of your business strategy requires a long and hard look ahead to the future. Anticipating what the industry may look like, what your customer profile may be and what technology might be available is critical.  Yet as important as looking forward is, it is equally critical for an organization to look back and analyze how you got here, what has made your company great and how you’ve managed to retain and build your customer base over the years.  The combination of these views will play a significant role in designing a powerful ‘move forward’ strategy for your organization.

In recent years the financial services industry has been heads down focused on navigating the regulatory environment, including the most widely recognized and intrusive regulation of TRID. As a result, any vision for long-term strategic planning has taken a back seat. As TRID begins its final march toward implementation, it’s high time for the industry to begin looking beyond the recent strains of compliance and begin to recall the lessons learned from the past and imagine what the future might be with the development of an effective business strategy.  Adidas learned this lesson by regaining control of their future after taking a long, hard look at their past to ensure they break the chains of recent history.  Read more about it in Strategy+Business, who wrote “How Adidas Found Its Second Wind”. It’s now time for the financial services industry to get its “Second Wind”.