Autonomous Transformation

CHAPTER 16The Reformational Economics of Linear and Exponential Value

As organizations transition from being data‐driven to reason‐driven in the era of Autonomous Transformation, one of the most entrenched paradigms that will need to shift is individual organizational linear return on investment calculations and required justification in order to receive funding.

This economic paradigm follows the logical, data‐driven concept that organizations should only invest in initiatives that can rigorously demonstrate the path to return on investment with a certain timeline. One of the organizations I have been a part of required the demonstration of 10 times the investment within three years, or the initiative would not be funded.

This kind of requirement naturally leads an organization down the path toward maintenance mode, and when experts and leaders conceive of acts of creation or transformation that will not be able to justify investment within this paradigm, but that they feel are important to the evolution of the market or their own careers, this construct naturally propels these kinds of groups out of the organization to build the idea from scratch and without oversight.

This focus on achieving short‐term, measurable results narrows the aperture to incremental improvements, to the exclusion of strategic investments that may not yield immediate benefits. This has systemic roots, as it is based on and reinforced by individual and organizational economic incentives for which leaders ...