ABOUT BRIAN
I’m an adviser to senior executives and boards across many industries on strategy and innovation across value chains and industries to get results. My experience is distinctive because I’ve also worked in leadership roles with strategic and operational responsibility for transformational change. I have discovered from my own experience and working with my best clients what really works and what doesn’t with reforming industry organisations. My writing aims to share these insights and proven approaches with progressive leaders and managers.
Beyond my day job, I write and speak about leadership and innovation with industry or business associations. I am also an Adjunct Professor with the Faculty of Business, Government and Law at the University of Canberra.
One area of interest is how the business community can drive and accelerate innovation with industry associations, so that they perform and create more value for all. You see that some act like industry accelerants, shaping positive trajectories for whole industries, while others act more like industry handbrakes as they serve the interests their own tribe.
I am constantly amazed at the problems encountered by business leaders who attempt innovation with these industry institutions. The degree of difficulty and risk involved is far greater than with transforming a single business, yet leaders make the mistake of leading change as if they have same levers of control.
MY IDEAS
Innovation in how firms collaborate across value chains and industries to reduce costs, grow markets and develop trusted reputations with customers and communities is an area of personal interest. Having worked in this area for over two decades, I believe it matters immensely that modern industries have world class industry institutions.
I have found that industry institutions have an innovation problem. They are not innovating fast enough to stay relevant to most businesses, yet changing them is proving fiendishly hard. Industry organisations are proving immune to the same forces that triggered the restructuring, consolidation and new business models adopted by modern firms over the past two decades.
I wrote about the idea in 2019, in the paper Creating 21st Century Industry Service Organisations: Don’t Tinker – Transform.
The positive response of business leaders to my paper motivated me to begin writing a book that sheds more light on why industry organisations matter in the modern economy, why it’s hard to reform traditional institutions and how to succeed.
My writing is grounded in the experience and knowledge gained by working with many different industries and leaders on strategy and innovation. Since 2005, this work was through my management consulting firm, Inovact Consulting. Previously, I had a leading role in industry reforms to create Australian Pork Ltd, a unique and innovative AUD20m integrated industry service company, becoming the inaugural Chief Executive Officer in 2001.
What others are saying
I have worked with Brian Ramsay on a number of projects that have required understanding and good old streetwise common sense. This coupled with a focused intellect and a professional approach has made tasks and projects easy to complete.
I would strongly recommend Brian as the obvious choice for any organisation or individual struggling to find a solution or a result for a particular project. Brian can turn an idea into reality. He has the drive, the leadership, and the vision, and the excellent communication skills to make things happen and achieve really strong results.