The great Peter Drucker said that when it all boils down, the only two levers to drive growth if you’re a business, or social impact if you’re a non-profit is “innovation and marketing.” Drucker came to this conclusion after chasing a few red herrings himself.

But here’s the rub. Invariably most organisations are neither good at innovation or at marketing. In the non-profit sector, most outfits are clawing each other’s eyeballs out over who got that funding and why didn’t they, or spend most of their time (government funded time) on complaining how difficult their gig is. After working for many years in that sector, I can literally say that despite coming across hundreds of non-profits, there are a handful that are truly innovative and reaping the rewards through enhanced funding or other dizzy accolades.

In the private sector, the same is true.

If innovation and marketing isn’t your organisation’s second nature, then it may be time to either develop it, or get some help in that can incubate it. There are often numerous impediments to becoming an innovative outfit, but none of which in my experience are insurmountable.

A great place to start is to look at your competitors who you despise. Why? Because so often we find that the competitors we love to hate reflect some deficiencies in our own organisation. And of course, while you’re looking there, look for their weaknesses that if your organisation was innovative and fast-paced enough, could really capitalize on.

History is a rich landscape that throws up lots of examples of organisations who have been extraordinary at the expense of learning from, and outsmarting their competitors. Jobs and Wozniak did it to Gates. Ray Kroc did it to countless fast food competitors. Amazon are literally scouring the streets sourcing out big outfits that have become fat and lazy and in doing so, innovatively beating them at their game and are disrupting industries in a huge way.

What are you going to do to help position your firm, business or non-profit today?