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DEVELOPING NEW BUSINESS IDEAS212

convention The section on boundary-hopping in Chapter 3

illustrated just how strong conventional thinking within a sector can be.
The natural inclination of conventional thinking to reject or eliminate
non-conformism and outsiders is immense, whether motivated by
values and beliefs, self-interest, lack of imagination or lack of faith in
the innovator. Conventional thinking can apply equally to competitors,
suppliers, financial backers, regulatory authorities and, crucially of
course, customers.

We saw earlier how lack of big-company clout initially held back James
Dyson, when his development grant application for his Dual Cyclone
was rejected by the Secretary of State for Wales. The rejection assumed
that if the product really did represent a superior offering, then one of
the big conventional manufacturers would already be producing it.

The conventional Swedish furniture market literally closed ranks in an
attempt to exclude Ingvar Kamprad. By forcing Kamprad to site his
stores out of town, stocked with products made from outside Sweden,
the competitors contributed to their own demise by steering Kamprad
towards his low-cost business model targeted at the emerging market of
young house-owners seeking affordable new furniture.

the natural inclination of conventional
thinking to reject or eliminate non-
conformism and outsiders is immense

if you want a bank loan, wear a suit and carry a folder The
refusal by Anita Roddick’s bank manager to grant her a £4,000 loan
when she turned up with the children and wearing jeans contrasts with
the subsequent successful application by her husband, Gordon. Legend
has it that he satisfied convention by ‘wearing a suit and carrying a
gobbledegook-filled business plan in a plastic folder’.161

women don’t work and software doesn’t sell Dame Stephanie
Shirley challenged a number of conventions in the 1960s when she
founded the FI Group, which developed into the £1 billion-turnover
business technology company, Xansa plc.

Contemporary attitudes held that ‘no one expected much from women
in work because all expectations then were about home and family