Don’t think fastener distribution needs to change? Consultant Dirk Beveridge of UnleashWD pointed to shopping malls with 30% of space empty. “The customer base has changed,” he declared.

Beveridge then showed slides to the joint conference of the National Fastener Distributors Association, Mid-West Fastener Association and Pacific-West Fastener Associations of the once “undesirable” job of milking cows. Today it is automated and that took an “innovative mindset.”

“Think big, not in daily incremental chips,” Beveridge advised. “Somebody is going to change the industry.”

While Beveridge acknowledged the importance of “honoring past entrepreneurial and innovation,” today’s company leaders “can’t continue business models of distributors who died 50 years ago.”

“We need new insights in these disruptive times,” Beveridge declared. “The future is available to all of us.”  

Your success depends on ambition, your desire and your mindset.

Are you an early or late adopter?

You need a personality who walks into work asking, “What can we change today?”

The future for those who don’t? “While the economy grows, fewer are taking part in its growth,” Beverage finds. “Growth will be harder to generate.”

Beveridge cited eight ways business is changing:

1. Generational shifts  – selling to five generations now.  Apple is recruiting 13- to 17-year-olds.

2. Disruptive technology. The structural changes in technology are “foundational,” Beveridge said.

3. Changing requirements of customers.

4. Intensified competition with fewer family-owned distributorships.

5. There are alternative channels such as Amazon when the competition used to be local.

6. Today it is commoditization rather than the relationship business of the past.

7. Power is transferred to the customers: “Previously you had the product knowledge,” but today 68% of customers “would rather look online that go out to lunch with you,” Beveridge said.

8. Margins are compressed.

Get ahead rather than float. Learn, unlearn and relearn.

“A doer thinks big and acts bigger,” Beveridge noted.

Noting the story of the name for WD40, Beveridge the product failed in first 39 times. It is that kind of mindset of experimentation you need in your organization

A key to your success is the type of employee you have. The entitled employee consumes, feels owed, shows up, is static and seeks to preserve. The value creator seeks to grow, earn, to create new and to transform, Beveridge said.

“Your competitors are afraid to change,” Beveridge said. You need to be willing to open up your eyes and ask, “Why?”

“Own the future mindset,” Beveridge said. That requires energy, optimism and “an awe of life and future each day.” Web: MyInnovativeMindset.com