The Future Starter Book

The Future
Starter Book

In recent years, Henrik Hyldgaard has developed, tested and applied an effective method of becoming a so-called future starter - the leader who favors the courageous, innovative and offensive development of the company while continuing to deliver good results at the bottom line.

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Praise

My collaboration with Henrik Hyldgaard has taught me that, like no one else, he can expand my horizons and make me see opportunities I was unable to see before. When I thought I was standing on the top of Mount Everest, he made me see that it was really just a plateau on the way to Himmelbjerget (a very small Danish hilltop). I am convinced that this book will leave you with this kind of feeling.

Rasmus Ankersen
Chairman of the board at FC Midtjylland, Director of Football Brentford FC, Author of the books: A Winner’s DNA, Leader DNA, The Goldmine Effect and Hunger in Paradise

If you have the courage, start reading this book. It can give you and your business a better, brighter and safer future, but you should not necessarily believe it will be easy. You have to dig deeper and more intensely than you probably have done in your previous strategy work.

On the other hand, you will be enriched with an insight and prospects that you have not experienced before. Really good reading. With the hope of a better future for you and your weaknesses.

Karsten Okholm Larsen
40 years in B&O, LEGO, Flextronics and KK Wind Solutions

I recommend that we all embrace the precepts outlined in Future Starter. No matter what industry. Or who our current customers are. Embed these refreshing basics into your culture to transform future trends into your business today.

Imagine and architect new business models, de-risk innovation with experiments, and by all means, move fast.

Embrace your inner bravery. Become a new type of leader.

Andrea Kates
CEO, I-Scale Corporation (i-scale.io) San Francisco, California

Reframe potential

The first step in the company's transformation is to spot the business opportunities of the future. Here's a simple process of reframing your company's potential. The model is to reinterpret the factors that are vital to ensuring a future success of a company – the foundation, the ability, the dream and the possibilities.

I have developed a solid process and model to reframe my clients’ business potential as the decisive driving force in the work with their companies’ transformation.

The purpose of the model is to reframe the factors that are vital for ensuring the company’s future success – the foundation, the ability, the dream and the opportunities.

I call the reinterpretations the true starting point, the true core, the true destination and the true potential. These reinterpretations must be completed in such a way that they represent the truth about the business opportunities of the future, rather than just a description of today's business.

The starting point is not the success of the past and the economic performance of the present.

The core is not the products and business models that the company is currently executing.

The company’s destination is not the ambitions reflected in a continuation of the company’s current activities.

Hence the company’s potential obviously won’t be just the business that is being conducted here and now.

The reframing starts with the definition of the company's true starting point – the real situation and capacity to unleash the true potential of the company and ensure the success of the future.

The company's true starting point is all about knowing the foundation of ensuring future success. The company's real performance, capacity and competitive situation – for good or for bad – are mapped. The first step in any kind of development is to understand that it is necessary, possible and obvious and that there are great gains in store.

The company's current capacity can be a strong starting point for developing new business activities. Perhaps the company's existing competencies, facilities and relationships provide a strong foundation for establishing new business models. But it may also be that major changes and improvements will have to be made if the company is to succeed in implementing a successful transformation.

Unleash Potential

Stop talking about the company's potential at a metaphorical level. Instead, start unleashing it. Here's the model that gives a clear overview of what it basically takes to unleash the true potential of a company. For that, you can actually concretize and simplify.

Let's stop talking about unleashing your company's true potential. Let’s do something about it.

I have created a model outlining the basic requirements for unleashing a company’s true potential. That potential can actually be concretized and simplified.

In the outer perimeter of the figure you find the reframing of your company’s potential from Chapter 2. That’s the potential you are going to unleash.

The true starting point represents the actual initiation of the work to unleash the true potential − the company's real performance and its collective organizational capacity. All these factors may constitute a strong foundation for growth, but they may also be far too weak and require vast improvements and changes, if they are going to succeed in exploiting the business opportunities of the future. The true destination is the long-term goal, and is the next milestone in unleashing the potential. The true core is your basic ability and vital driving force for succeeding in unleashing your potential.

Do not regard the reinterpretations as yet another concept and additional statements that need to be implemented throughout your organization.

The reinterpretation raises the awareness of your company's potential and allows you to develop its new strategy to unleash the potential. If you fail to incorporate the company’s true potential when working with your business strategy, the existing business will continue unchanged. If you want to take the step from frivolous talk about the potential to actually unleashing it, then that potential must be the focal point of your strategic work.

The outer perimeter of the figure also indicates the need to succeed in achieving the most efficient utilization of the company's current platform as well as the innovative exploration of new opportunities. Value must be created and money must be earned in the short term in order to create much more value and earn much more money in the long term. It’s not either or, but both and. This is the kind of duality in your leadership that will actually unleash the potential.

Inside the perimeter of the figure you see the company’s vision, mission, identity and culture – what I call the company’s DNA, the company’s fundamental self-perception, meaning and essence.

It’s vital to redefine your company’s DNA so it can serve as inspiration and drive the unleashing of the company’s true potential. Your company’s current vision, mission, identity and culture are based on a continuation of your company’s existing successful business.

Merely expanding the company’s DNA to reach towards future opportunities is insufficient. The DNA must be delimited and exceptional in order to drive the valuable differentiation of the new business activities. Delimiting and differentiating the company’s activities provide the best opportunities for successfully unleashing the potential.

The company’s true potential is not all-comprehensive but includes the products and services that create additional value for your customers and differentiate your company from your competitors; they are also the ones you produce and distribute most successfully.

There is no reason to believe that an ordinary, unremarkable or all-embracing company can generate extraordinary and successful activities.

Your company’s DNA must therefore be just as unique, ambitious and focused as the unleashing of the true potential requires.

Henrik Hyldgaard

Henrik Hyldgaard is the strategic developer for a number of major Danish companies.

He is the driving force of the long-term success of designing and implementing the company's transformation.

In addition, he is co-author of the book Hunger In Paradise – How to save success from failure.

Free Chapter 2 – Surf the waves of change

Praise

Reframe potential

Unleash Potential

Henrik Hyldgaard

The Future
Starter Book