Ready for growth: Shaun Mah

By the time the numbers tell you the time has come for change, it’s already too late. As a business goes into decline, it becomes increasingly difficult to reinvent itself in the face of fewer options and dwindling time.

That’s why it’s so important to create the next source of growth before disruption or decline force the issue, says Shaun Mah, FUJIFILM Australia’s General Manager – Electronic Imaging & Optical Devices Divisions.

"I look for two kinds of signals," he tells The CEO Magazine. "The first is changes in behavior – are customers buying the same things for different reasons, entering through channels we did not build, or behaving differently from the patterns our existing model was designed around?"

The second involves anticipating trends to create value for FUJIFILM Australia’s customers.

"That requires moving beyond ‘What else can we sell?’ and asking what customers may value next, even before they know it themselves," he says.

Of course, there is always an element of uncertainty in answering such questions, but as Mah points out, leadership is not about predicting the future perfectly.

"It is about recognizing when the assumptions underpinning today’s success may change, then creating options before change is forced upon you," he explains.

"Waiting for certainty is often riskier than moving early on an informed idea. The best time to build the next growth engine is when the current one is still strong enough to fund it."

Solid judgment

Balancing such trendspotting with delivering in the now is essential to ensure business success – an equation that FUJIFILM Australia appears to have mastered under Mah’s leadership.

"Over the past five-to-six years, we have roughly tripled market share while delivering a CAGR of around 20 percent," he reveals. "That performance created both the financial capacity and the strategic headroom to allocate capital, talent and attention into new businesses and capabilities with longer-term potential."

This requires good judgment, devoting the right amount of attention and funds to short-term goals as well as longer-term objectives.

"‘We are investing in the future’ cannot become cover for weak current results, but short-term deliverables also cannot become an excuse to defer investing for the future," Mah stresses.

"Strong leadership means doing both at once."

Capabilities are king when it comes to building an enduring legacy, with brand trust, customer relationships, distribution and infrastructure all crucial components of FUJIFILM Australia’s ecosystem, which has been built up over many years.

"For us, the answer was not more products. It was how we connect with our consumers – a reshaped brand, an invested creator community and a direct relationship with consumers that did not exist a few years ago," Mah says.

That’s not to deny the importance of products, which are, after all, the backbone of the company’s business model.

"The product still matters enormously. It is what earns the customer's engagement in the first place," he says. "What has changed is that the transaction is no longer the end of the relationship."

Greater value

Now FUJIFILM Australia’s ecosystem delivers value beyond the point of sale by deepening relationships and generating richer insights.

"That thinking sits behind House of Photography, our flagship experience center, and our broader initiatives such as Creator Summit," Mah says.

But for an organization to build a connected ecosystem, it must be unified, with functions such as sales, marketing, operations, finance and service all aligned under one vision.

"That makes ecosystem building a business strategy, not a functional initiative," he adds. "To make significant shifts in an organization, the structural mechanisms should change along with it."

Organizational agility has therefore become more important than ever, Mah explains, with technology now essentially compressing time. Competitive advantages can be brought to the fore with relative speed, but the window of opportunity can similarly close faster.

"Speed is not about asking people to work harder. It is reducing the distance between identifying something, deciding what to do and acting on it," he says.

The right people

The issue of the talent shortage also needs to be viewed through a different lens in Mah’s view.

"Most businesses do not have a talent problem," he insists. "They have an environment that prevents talented people from performing at their best."

Narrow remits, conflicting KPIs, slow decisions and limiting structures are among the organizational hurdles clipping the wings of staff who otherwise demonstrate great potential.

"I have seen people operate very differently once given clearer authority, broader accountability and permission to work across boundaries," he says. "Their capability did not change. The environment did."

Although there are certainly times when fresh expertise is required, Mah believes it’s important to hire for where the business is going, rather than where it is today.

"There is a leadership development opportunity here too," he reflects. "The next generation of leaders will need broader context across technology, consumer behavior, culture and business models.

"Some of the best future leaders are developed by giving them problems larger than their existing function and making them think across boundaries."

There is no time to lose, according to Mah. The moment to act is now – a message he is passionate about sharing with other business leaders and the upcoming generation of fresh-faced executives.

"Do not wait for certainty," he urges. "The window between an early signal and general consensus is usually where the opportunity sits."