April 9, 2024
Remember the old television commercial in which the spokesperson for an investment house proudly proclaimed that “we make money the old-fashioned way, we earn it?”
I was reminded of this recently when I was reflecting back on how Long View Ontario has grown significantly in just five short years. Even though the dollar amount may be what garners the most attention initially, it is how we arrived at this point that is the real accomplishment. Or to put it another way, we grew the old fashioned way; organically.
As an industry, the high tech world is according to some experts entering a new and perhaps unprecedented phase of anticipated market growth through mergers and acquisitions. One might be hard-pressed to disagree with such assessments given the frequency of M&A announcements these past few months. And while I would not personally discount the merits of an M&A, from a Long View perspective, my thinking falls more in line with the August 2017 McKinsey Quarterly article The roots of organic growth.
In the article, the authors rightfully indicate that there are “many paths to growth, and high performers take more than one.” However, the organizations whose growth was greater than that of their sector were the ones who were able to “diversify their organic growth portfolio.”
This ability to diversify according to another earlier McKinsey article is what creates “organic growth champions” who can “create their own momentum and win the race” as a result of having a “clear growth agenda.”
In this regard, our agenda from the very beginning was driven by what I would call a purposeful approach to digital transformation. Specifically, and rather than chasing the technology, our focus was on helping our clients empower their people to deliver greater value to their customers through the core areas of hybrid IT, end-user experience, and security. Once this strategy was in place, we then built the required expertise in specific vertical markets by hiring the brightest and most experienced professionals with proven track records of success in these key sectors.
And it is our continuing commitment to this strategy that has led us to assume a leadership role in the emerging digital era and is also the main reason why we are hosting the ActivateDigital2018 conference in Guelph on the 27th of February.
Featuring an impressive lineup of Canada’s leading high tech executives such as Microsoft’s new President Kevin Peesker, and Cisco’s President Rola Dagher as well as other notables this is an event that will help to chart the innovation course of this country over the next decade.