The New Definition of 'Essential' in Essential Business

Leveraging M&A to generate value in purpose-led ecosystems

To remain relevant and viable, businesses need to continuously develop a strategy and an operational environment that meets customer needs. As COVID-19 has increased the rate of change in consumer expectations, C-suites are increasingly curating and participating in one or more purpose-led economic ecosystems to ensure resiliency and create new opportunities using emerging digital platforms.

Mergers, acquisitions and divestitures can not only drive inorganic growth, but help evolve an organization into an essential business. But that is one side of the coin. Transforming into a resilient enterprise and remaining ‘essential’ also requires focus on three key factors:

• A differentiated product, service, or capability suited to the purpose(s) of ecosystem(s)
• A Lego-like infrastructure that allows the snapping and unsnapping of the products, services, and componentized capabilities of various ecosystem players
• Agile values and practices, and change management capabilities