Innovation Is Hard
With the exception of the tech sector (where to innovate is to survive), big companies have a hard time being innovative. Why? Many reasons; but, most notably, the fact that true innovation is the enemy of the status quo. The status quo is a big company’s happy place. Innovation is messy and disruptive. It looks to upset the status quo in search of new, better ways. Most people don’t want change. This is why venture capital and startups exist. They aren’t afraid to “break it”, they’re designed to do so. The bigger the market a startup looks to disrupt, the more valuable it may be.
But some industries are difficult to disrupt from the outside. I think commercial real estate services is one such business. It’s a big target – a huge market. And it’s notoriously behind in these digital times. If you’re contemplating where to begin in your quest to disrupt the business, you have to start with the data. It’s everywhere, but it’s nuanced and not publicly recorded like data in the US housing market. So unless you’re inside the business, it’s really hard to get the data. The best source is large firms that are deeply engaged in the markets. There is a big opportunity to better aggregate, analyze and store data.
Beyond data, you have to isolate the focus to an individual market, since commercial real estate services covers a lot of distinct markets. Take office leasing, for example. Leasing an office is so complicated that it requires input from experts in multiple areas, including; legal, design, financial, markets (brokerage), construction, project management, etc. Big firms have distinct service lines that address many of these essential elements. The opportunity here is in how these essential services are organized and delivered to maximize their value while reducing friction in the customer journey.
For the past few years my partner and I have been working to innovate tenant services, specifically to create a technology platform with which to improve the visualization and management of data and services. We’ve done so from within one of the world’s largest commercial real estate firms, Cushman & Wakefield. Our work has resulted in the creation of something we call TenantSee. The platform is designed for mid-size companies having 250 – 7,000 employees. What’s cool about TenantSee is, for the time being, there’s nothing like it…anywhere. It has been incredibly rewarding (and hard) to innovate from within. But we’re proud of the collaboration with Cushman & Wakefield and the solutions we’ve created.