Why should your business exist? Not just today, but also tomorrow?
A fundamental question that fluidminds – the business innovators – deals with every day.
Are you? Let’s talk.
fluidminds is a think tank and consulting firm in Zurich that specializes in business model innovation and operates globally. Behind fluidminds is Dr. Patrick Stähler, who was one of the first to describe the concept of business model innovation scientifically in his dissertation over 23 years ago and has been writing about it on his blog https://blog.business-model-innovation.com ever since. He is also the forefather of the now well-known Business Model Canvas.
We are not industry specialists, but experts in the process of how companies can find innovative business models themselves. We call our process Business Model Design. Customers can be established companies that want and need to rethink their business model, or start-ups that need to find a business model in the first place.
Starting Points
Where to start with business model innovations?
The design of innovative business models is based on three principles:
Customer Insights or which job does the customer wants to solve
The starting point for every business model innovation is a deep understanding of the tasks that a company solves for its customers.
We do not start from existing markets, but from jobs that customers want to solve using the company. We put the customer’s job-to-be-done at the beginning. We seek insights into customer behavior (customer insights) on which an innovative business model can be based.
Technology insights as enabler of big dreams
The second starting point is a deep understanding of technology and its economic characteristics. Using new technologies is not only innovative, but innovative use. This requires an understanding of the economic properties of technology.
Business Model Canvas
The base for understanding and shaping firms
The business model canvas is just a tool. So if you are a fool, it is just tool for a fool.
However, when applying the business model canvas wisely, it is a great tool to understand the interdepencendy of all the building blocks and elements of a business
Dr. Patrick Stähler, the founder of fluidminds, layed the foundation for the business model canvas in his scientific works, he published in 2001. So we have a background in applying business model thinking already for over 20 years. The canvas is not a tool, but a great unit of analysing for developing holistic strategies.
Our offer
How can we work together?
You can work with fluidminds in a wide variety of ways and revise your business model.
What all the offers have in common is that the focus is not just on input, but on guided action.
We also offer what is normal for consulting – support through to the testing of prototypes – in the CAS Business Model Innovation at Bern University of Applied Sciences or in the Sustainable Startups course in the Master’s degree program at the University of St. Gallen. We also aim to design prototypes of new business models during internal training courses.
Consulting & Coaching
Would you like individual support with your reinvention process? If you want to work with us on your business model, tailored to your challenge, then we offer individual consulting & coaching. Here we often work with partners with industry expertise.
In-house workshops and executive training
Do you want to strengthen your employees’ skills for the future and initiate change directly from further training? Do you want to be inspired?
Then our company-specific workshops, training courses and keynotes are for you.
Executive education & training at university
Business model innovation, digital transformation and entrepreneurial design are topics that play a role in many university courses. Patrick Stähler is a lecturer at several universities that offer courses with different focuses.
For example, in the eMBA at the Grisons UAS, in the Master program at the University of St. Gallen and in the CAS Business Model Innovation at the Bern University of Applied Science. Patrick has smaller assignments in the CAS Digital Marketing at the FHNW, in the CAS Digital Sales & CAS Selling Innovation at the HWZ, in the Masterclass by Prof. Faltin in Berlin and in the Management Education Program at Steinbeis University (Stuttgart).
Unsere Philosophie
The focus is on people
People create great companies. People want to shape their future. They want to do business with companies that put them at the center and want to help shape the future. Change is negative when companies cling to the past for too long and go under.
People as customers buy, not markets
Customers are people. They want to be placed at the center of attention with their tasks and needs. Customers buy, not markets. Companies often forget this in their strategy.
Employees make the difference
A company from which people are removed is an empty factory floor. There is no one who makes good (or bad) products. There is no one to answer the phone in a friendly (or unfriendly) way. It’s the people who make the business.
Radical changes to the business model only work if people are brought on board as employees at an early stage, if there is psychological security in the company to address even unpleasant topics.
The future is already here, regardless of whether an established company is on the move or not.
Focus on the future
What we don’t do: optimize the past
Thinking in terms of business models also helps with optimization. Many companies have the feeling that they can arm themselves against the adversities of the future with low costs. This works if the business model also works in the long term. But does it?
We believe that future viability lies in innovative business models that focus on the customer. Only those who generate revenue, and that comes from customers, will be able to withstand the adversities of the future.
No cost-cutting programs
We could also run cost-cutting programs. We could also optimize existing sales structures.
We could help you keep your existing business model alive for a few more years by optimizing your balance sheet with financial engineering. We did this in our professional lives before fluidminds.
We could, but we don’t want to. Do you want to optimize the past or create the future?
Focus, focus, focus on the future
Even if we can, we focus on innovative business models, on the interplay between all the elements and building blocks of a business model.
