Social Business Imperative, The: Adapting Your Business Model to the Always-Connected Customer

4. The Management Team and Board Mandate

“The riskiest thing we can do is just maintain the status quo.”

—Roger Iger, CEO of Walt Disney

As venture capitalist Marc Andreessen has said, “Software is eating the world.” In an age when every aspect of our lives from physical devices to offline services is being digitized, every company needs to think of itself as a technology company.

But that’s not enough. Every business today must also think of itself as a Social Business. Social media and the new business models it enables are changing the relationship that it’s possible for companies to have with their customers. For many companies, a successful transition into Social Business will require a change not only in their customer engagement model, ...