I am Rob Ryan, co-founder and founding CEO of Ascend Communication. I live in Montana and Hawaii. I am retired but I still run a Montana Bootcamp for invited entrepreneurs. This blog will be about a new process, I call “The Sunflower”. This process represents a new way of thinking about your business which can result in more creation and better execution.
The purpose of the “Sunflower Blog by Rob” is to explore what people think about the concept and to determine whether there is enough interest for me to do a book. The Sunflower model was introduced as chapter 3 in my first book “Entrepreneur America” published by Harper Collins, it was republished as a paperback under a new name ( same book) , called “Smartups“.
Rob’s Sunflower
Here is chapter one of the yet to be printed book , “The Sunflower model- A thought process for building high growth businesses“.
A man was crawling around on his knees , he was looking for his lost wedding ring. Others joined in the search. Fortunately for all, there was good light from a nearby lamppost. An hour went by, no ring was found. A frustrated searcher had the insight to ask, “where do you think you lost it?” “Over there”, the distraught man pointed. But that is hundreds of yards away, mumbled the searcher. “Well yes”, exclaimed the man, “but the light is better under the lamppost.”
The “ light is better under the lamppost” phrase sums up much of business planning. I live in the beautiful Bitterroot Valley of Montana. Running thru the valley is a beautiful river and a not so beautiful highway, route 93. If you drive route 93 enough, you will begin to spot patterns on businesses. For example, there are dozens and dozens of storage rental businesses ,backhoe excavating places and log building businesses. Now, exactly how many storage places and excavator places does a valley of 30,000 people need? How many can the valley support? I think the businessmen running those companies are practicing “looking under the lamppost”. Because others have done it, because there is data on someone, sometime, and someplace making money on a storage center or a backhoe business, that justifies yet another one. Each new one thinking it is different in some way “ I have bigger storage bins, better lighting, better security” or “my backhoe equipment is newer”, “my operators more efficient” and so on. It is all wishful thinking and a simple case of looking under the lamp post.
Whether you are a small business or a high technology business, you can be trained on where and how to look, so as to improve your odds of building a successful business. The model is about the art of looking. There are three parts to the Sunflower 1. the stem, looking back 2. the petals, looking forward and 3. the center, looking in.
Think of the Sunflower as a way to represent your business and a process for planning. Lets look at a company like Honda. They are involved in cars, motorcycles, lawnmowers, generators and so on. So what business are they in? If Honda used what I call “Analyst Speak” and relied on analysts’ reports, they would have landed in whatever was their first business, lets say cars. They would be duking it out in the car business. Instead they are in multiple businesses leveraging their core competency, “building engines”.
As noted in the introduction, Managers faced with sagging revenues, collapsing markets, declining margins, disruptive technologies and unexpected competition can succeed if they follow the Sunflower principles. Again, these are:
1 ) The ultimate “billion dollar” application for a new technology, a new service is unknowable in advance. History has 20/20 vision in identifying the “billion dollar” application for a proposed technology/product/service. Analyst reports are best read as history reports. Do your own primary research for prognostication. Note: “billion dollar” is a placeholder for whatever number indicates success in your business, perhaps as with most, it is a million dollars.
2 ) You find and develop new markets, markets for which your core competency is highly valued.
3 ) You avoid mainstream markets where your core competency would fare less well under competition.
4 ) You focus on understanding “what you do well”, your core competency. You use this core technology as the foundation to attack a new market and new application.
5 ) You focus on understanding the industry, local and national driving forces behind your core competency.
6 ) You set company goals to build a new petal, product/market/application, each year.
a) You build new core technology, a new core competency and marry it to your old core competency.
b) You find a new market that uses and values the old core competency.
c) You find a new application that values the old technology; the ultimate size of the application and market are unknowable.
d) You leverage the old core technology.
7 ) You size the project correctly. You structure the project inexpensively and execute the project with a small team. The small team has the authority and the responsibility to succeed.
8 ) You are constantly creating new petals and sometimes removing old petals.
9 ) You insist customers validate the new petal with conditional POs’. No Purchase Order means no new product gets built.
10 ) Ask the “right questions” of the “right customer”. “Right questions” are questions about:
- How do I leverage my core competency?
- What application could benefit most from my core competency?
- Does my core competency have a great barrier to entry from possible competitors?
11 ) “ Right customers” are those customers who have an application that best uses your core competency. I prefer my “right customers” to:
- Have money
- Be recognizable
- Be able to make a decision
- Have a value need for the product/service
Tags: book, core competencies, driving force, first post, market products, new blog, next book, sunflower, The Sunflower Model
Rob,
Great concept, the Sun Flower model, I plan on using it in our business. I am looking forward to your next book.
Bill,
Thanks , it should help. Do a Sunflower , show it to me.
Congratulations Rob,
I am already using your Sunflower model as I develop my business plan (a friend of mine lent me his copy of your book!). Your method is helping me expand outside of my normal “box” to look at markets I would have never else thought about!
Sincerely, Cynthia in Montana
Cynthia
So would a book devoted to the Sunflower be helpful and if yes what would you want to see in it?
Hi Rob;
A book devoted to the Sunflower model - Yes, you could cull tons of real life examples from all companies, from small startups with a stay-at-home Mom to a large multinational who use the model for breakout teams! During your interviews, each company is going to have a different slant because of the various industries that could be highlighted. Your going to notice different methods of using your same Sunflower model because everyone thinks differently. Find out why it works for certain companies and yet it may not work as well for others. Why? What did they learn from it and what’s next. I get inspired by creativity, success stories and real people.
Cynthia
The concept of the interviews is a powerful one, I am trying to hook up with an academic at Cornell to cover that aspect. I am not an interviewer. My plan was to use my companies the ones that i have seen at Entrepreneur America or sit on the Board, so that would give me several but not a cross section. Within our small town I could probably cull a few more but Cornell hasa access to a lot of CEO’s big and small from different industries. I need to inspire one of the Professors involved with Cornell’s e clip.
Hi Rob;
Yes, E-Clips are an excellent way to inspire the people you are trying to connect with, plus, your supporters who have social networks and their own websites can host these E-Clips for you! Great tool idea! Let’s do a Sunflower Model on that………………………..
How can I help?! Cynthia
P.S. Is Spring here yet in Montana!?
cynthia
getting some real life stories with sunflower would be a help of course i have hi tech ones. getting non profits, small mom and pop etc
rob
Dear Rob;
Yes, to contact non-profits, Mom & Pop’s, Small businesses, etc…. you will need to network with the particular blog sites for each of those Assoications (and every industry has an Association!) This will land you leads on all different sectors for your book - 1,000’s of them on-line!
You will have an endless supply. But, first things first! They will have to agree to by your book, set up the Sunflower model for their company and agree to be interviewed for your next book! EASY!
Cynthia
Rob, Glad you’ve connected with Cynthia. I’ve been talking with her for some time and I’m glad she took your book to heart. (I request that anyone looking at starting a company read SMARTUPS before we start talking) She has a good idea for her startup and using the model will help (is helping) her focus on those petals that will lead to success.
I just re-posted this story. It will be highlighted in my next newsletter on Friday.
“Is your company achieving its maximum potential by using “The Sunflower Model”. If you have, we’d like to hear your story.” http://matr.net/article-33805.html
Hello Rob, et. al.,
I’d like to share with you all a few comments about the Sunflower Model and my personal experience with it. I recently prepared a sunflower story board related to ARIZ BioPharma company, a cancer therapy company that is newly founded in Montana, the web site is ARIZBio.com. I can say that I enjoyed putting the ARIZ sunflower story together and will use the story boards and concepts in my fund-raising and business development projects. There were many benefits to organizing corporate concepts in a sunflower story format. First, one must reallly examine basic tenets of a business opportunity (the core competency) and bring them forward in a non-technical presentation. Then in a sequential manner, the model induces a review of a lead product candidate and how this product can drive the business through the corporate or product value proposition. Next, one portrays the basic assumptions that are the foundation of the business plan and the milestones that are targeted therein. In my rendition of the ARIZ Sunflower Model, I came up with the idea to extend the model to include a description of the roots of the Sunflower as well as consider the nutrition, Sun power and water requirements to maximize the growth of the sunflower and even considered new product generations as the seeds of the flower and the multiplication factors that seeds in the flower present.
Rob, I believe that you have a very powerful business tool that can be expanded via new writings about the concept. I did not see anything like this in the MBA program the I completed and so I see the applicability at the fundamental level in academia. In addition, I cannot emphasize enough the potential value to businesses at all levels in using this model to understand their business better, develop improved corporate strategies and be more successful than they might be otherwise without this valuable business model and the discussion and exercise it encourages among corporate managers. It seems to me that an adaptation of this model may serve companies well in presenting themselves via the internet and their web site. I feel that my web site might benefit from the Sunflower Model type of thinking and application in the messages there.
I believe that you should go forward with your idea to work up this model more extensively and get it further embedded in the minds of America’s entrepreneurs and existing business managers.
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This point is my favorite, “You size the project correctly. You structure the project inexpensively and execute the project with a small team. The small team has the authority and the responsibility to succeed.” I have personally seen this work in small software development companies.
Somewhere in the mix, customer service can make or break the project too!
have you read the ages-old lotus sutra? all this is in there and more. go see …
lotus there .. sunflower here?
Hi Rob,
We met at the ranch way back in 1998 or so, I was trying to start a mapping company with another guy from hamilton, Darwin…
A lot has happened since then, and google has long since sewed up all the mapping functions we speculativley discussed at that time.
I accidentally bumped into your name while searching for books and thought I’d contact you.
I am doing an open source project that you may (or may not) find interesting,
I’d be interested in your feedback, positive or negative.
Regards
James Jones
Rob-
Your name was brought up to me by T. Herman. I love what your doing with EA and hope I can rise to adjunct professor status someday (grin)….I started to read sunflower dismissively (a little over tired I guess cause I am not a cynic), about halfway through I concluded the sunflower model had real merit. So, from one entrepreneur to another I suggest you dig into the sunflower a bit more. I just finished reading the “5 dysfunctions of a team” - maybe the 5 D’s are a petal on the sunflower.
Rich Masterson
Assessing the cash flow is another essential element within the organization strategy format, so as to sustain a regular cash flow to meet the essential capital requirements. Probability of monetary crisis and also the methods of crisis management should be mentioned within the structure. The business strategy must consist from the marketing plans and technique leading towards the expansion from the company.
A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants (plants of the division Magnoliophyta, also called angiosperms). The biological function of a flower is to mediate the union of male sperm with female ovum in order to produce seeds. The process begins with pollination, is followed by fertilization, leading to the formation and dispersal of the seeds. For the higher plants, seeds are the next generation, and serve as the primary means by which individuals of a species are dispersed across the landscape. The grouping of flowers on a plant is called the inflorescence.
In addition to serving as the reproductive organs of flowering plants, flowers have long been admired and used by humans, mainly to beautify their environment but also as a source of food.
Further information: Pollination syndrome
Flowering plants usually face selective pressure to optimise the transfer of their pollen, and this is typically reflected in the morphology of the flowers and the behaviour of the plants. Pollen may be transferred between plants via a number of ‘vectors’. Some plants make use of abiotic vectors - namely wind (anemophily) or, much less commonly, water (hydrophily). Others use biotic vectors including insects (entomophily), birds (ornithophily), bats (chiropterophily) or other animals. Some plants make use of multiple vectors, but many are highly specialised.
Cleistogamous flowers are self pollinated, after which they may or may not open. Many Viola and some Salvia species are known to have these types of flowers.
The flowers of plants that make use of biotic pollen vectors commonly have glands called nectaries that act as an incentive for animals to visit the flower. Some flowers have patterns, called nectar guides, that show pollinators where to look for nectar. Flowers also attract pollinators by scent and color. Still other flowers use mimicry to attract pollinators. Some species of orchids, for example, produce flowers resembling female bees in color, shape, and scent. Flowers are also specialized in shape and have an arrangement of the stamens that ensures that pollen grains are transferred to the bodies of the pollinator when it lands in search of its attractant (such as nectar, pollen, or a mate). In pursuing this attractant from many flowers of the same species, the pollinator transfers pollen to the stigmas—arranged with equally pointed precision—of all of the flowers it visits.
Anemophilous flowers use the wind to move pollen from one flower to the next. Examples include grasses, birch trees, ragweed and maples. They have no need to attract pollinators and therefore tend not to be “showy” flowers. Male and female reproductive organs are generally found in separate flowers, the male flowers having a number of long filaments terminating in exposed stamens, and the female flowers having long, feather-like stigmas. Whereas the pollen of animal-pollinated flowers tends to be large-grained, sticky, and rich in protein (another “reward” for pollinators), anemophilous flower pollen is usually small-grained, very light, and of little nutritional value to animals.
Morphology
Flowering plants are heterosporangiate, producing two types of reproductive spores. The pollen (male spores) and ovules (female spores) are produced in different organs, but the typical flower is a bisporangiate strobilus in that it contains both organs.
A flower is regarded as a modified stem with shortened internodes and bearing, at its nodes, structures that may be highly modified leaves.[1] In essence, a flower structure forms on a modified shoot or axis with an apical meristem that does not grow continuously (growth is determinate). Flowers may be attached to the plant in a few ways. If the flower has no stem but forms in the axil of a leaf, it is called sessile. When one flower is produced, the stem holding the flower is called a peduncle. If the peduncle ends with groups of flowers, each stem that holds a flower is called a pedicel. The flowering stem forms a terminal end which is called the torus or receptacle. The parts of a flower are arranged in whorls on the torus. The four main parts or whorls (starting from the base of the flower or lowest node and working upwards) are as follows:
Diagram showing the main parts of a mature flower
An example of a “perfect flower”, this Crateva religiosa flower has both stamens (outer ring) and a pistil (center).
Calyx: the outer whorl of sepals; typically these are green, but are petal-like in some species.
Corolla: the whorl of petals, which are usually thin, soft and colored to attract animals that help the process of pollination. The coloration may extend into the ultraviolet, which is visible to the compound eyes of insects, but not to the eyes of birds.
Androecium (from Greek andros oikia: man’s house): one or two whorls of stamens, each a filament topped by an anther where pollen is produced. Pollen contains the male gametes.
Gynoecium (from Greek gynaikos oikia: woman’s house): one or more pistils. The female reproductive organ is the carpel: this contains an ovary with ovules (which contain female gametes). A pistil may consist of a number of carpels merged together, in which case there is only one pistil to each flower, or of a single individual carpel (the flower is then called apocarpous). The sticky tip of the pistil, the stigma, is the receptor of pollen. The supportive stalk, the style becomes the pathway for pollen tubes to grow from pollen grains adhering to the stigma, to the ovules, carrying the reproductive material.
In modern times, people have sought ways to cultivate, buy, wear, or otherwise be around flowers and blooming plants, partly because of their agreeable appearance and smell. Around the world, people use flowers for a wide range of events and functions that, cumulatively, encompass one’s lifetime:
For new births or Christenings
As a corsage or boutonniere to be worn at social functions or for holidays
As tokens of love or esteem
For wedding flowers for the bridal party, and decorations for the hall
As brightening decorations within the home
As a gift of remembrance for bon voyage parties, welcome home parties, and “thinking of you” gifts
For funeral flowers and expressions of sympathy for the grieving
For worshiping goddesses. in Hindu culture it is very common to bring flowers as a gift to temples.
People therefore grow flowers around their homes, dedicate entire parts of their living space to flower gardens, pick wildflowers, or buy flowers from florists who depend on an entire network of commercial growers and shippers to support their trade.
Flowers provide less food than other major plants parts (seeds, fruits, roots, stems and leaves) but they provide several important foods and spices. Flower vegetables include broccoli, cauliflower and artichoke. The most expensive spice, saffron, consists of dried stigmas of a crocus. Other flower spices are cloves and capers. Hops flowers are used to flavor beer. Marigold flowers are fed to chickens to give their egg yolks a golden yellow color, which consumers find more desirable. Dandelion flowers are often made into wine. Bee Pollen, pollen collected from bees, is considered a health food by some people. Honey consists of bee-processed flower nectar and is often named for the type of flower, e.g. orange blossom honey, clover honey and tupelo honey.
Hundreds of fresh flowers are edible but few are widely marketed as food. They are often used to add color and flavor to salads. Squash flowers are dipped in breadcrumbs and fried. Edible flowers include nasturtium, chrysanthemum, carnation, cattail, honeysuckle, chicory, cornflower, Canna, and sunflower. Some edible flowers are sometimes candied such as daisy and rose (you may also come across a candied pansy).
Flowers can also be made into herbal teas. Dried flowers such as chrysanthemum, rose, jasmine, camomile are infused into tea both for their fragrance and medical properties. Sometimes, they are also mixed with tea leaves for the added fragrance.