Code Rules: A Playbook for Managing at the Crossroads

Today’s high-flying companies — the outliers in revenue growth and value creation — are winning with a new set of rules.

They are dominating their sectors by managing the information that surrounds people, organizations, processes and products — what we call Code HalosTM— to build new business and operating models.

Code Halos contain a richness of business meaning that forms the new basis of competition. When Code Halos scale, they spark new commercial models in a predictable five-step model that can take entire industries to “the Crossroads,” a compressed period of time in which market dominance can dramatically flip from industry stalwarts to challengers.

What separates today’s high-flying outliers — such as Apple, Google, Amazon, Netflix and Pandora — from fast-followers and wannabes? It’s the ability to disrupt markets by capturing customer insight and market meaning from the flood of data swirling around us all.

The data — or the Code Halo™ that accompanies people, organizations and devices — contains a richness of potential business meaning that far outstrips the value of bricks, mortar and other physical assets that have historically powered market leadership. Many Global 2000 companies are already acutely aware of the insights contained within these Code Halos and are working hard to step into this new competitive arena.

In this white paper, we define the new rules of success by decoding the business of meaning and the pattern of success that has emerged.