The Kodak Moment, is it done?
 There are 3 billion videos viewed on YouTube every day. The iPhone Instagram app has 7 million users uploading 1.3 million photos daily. Almost three million photos are posted on Facebook every 20 seconds.
Where does Kodak fit into the image sharing landscape today?
They don’t.
There was a time when a 145,300-employee strong Kodak commanded 90% of film sales in the United States. “Kodak Moment” became a part of mainstream speech as a term synonymous for a “special moment”. Because that’s what Kodak was all about: capturing moments.
But now, as a company on the brink of bankruptcy with less than 19,000 employees, the image of Kodak is no longer that of a leader. The photo industry has been transformed. We are capturing and sharing our images digitally, and Kodak has been left behind.
Consider this fact: According to Jim Harris, author of Blindsided, 80% of the technology we will use in our day-to-day lives in just 10 years hasn’t been invented yet.
Like Ford, inventor of the mass-produced car; Sony, inventor of portable music; and Blackberry, inventor of mobile email; Kodak is another company that was once so far out in front that it failed to recognize where disruptive innovation might come from. Or that it could come.
Kodak was blindsided.
What does the Brand Coach coach?
Never stop protecting and evolving your Brand. Ever.
Kodak‘s downfall was the “Curse of Leadership”: arrogant executives who were used to being at the top and whose complacency led the company down a path to irrelevance.
Leaders have to be disruptive. They must constantly challenge their organizations to reach the next frontier.
Kodak had what was once an ambitious Vision: “to make photography as convenient as the pencil”. But when this Vision was achieved through Smartphone technology – blindsiding Kodak in the process – the leadership team failed to set a new Vision.
Where is your organization going, and how will you know when you’re there? Establish, with crystal clarity, a strong and compelling Vision. And then be the loudest rallying cry as you work towards achieving it.
Be relentless. Be disruptive.
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