RSA Group Reflections September 2024
Dear friends
I recently stumbled across a piece of cognitive science that offers an intriguing lens on how we think about the future of RSA Group. It’s called Survivorship Bias.
During World War II, Royal Air Force decision makers wanted to improve the defensive ability of their fighter planes. They analysed the aircraft returning from battle and marked out the areas where they had taken a lot of fire in red on a model – the idea being to reinforce these zones of vulnerability in newly manufactured aircraft. This seemed like a reasonable line of thinking until a visiting mathematician pointed out a fundamental flaw. The planes they were analysing, he said, were those returning successfully from battle. Therefore, all the areas that the RAF had highlighted in red on their model plane were in fact not zones areas of weakness. Quite the opposite! (Visit this link for a more detailed overview of the idea – wikipedia. org/wiki/Survivorship_bias)
The crucial idea behind Survivorship Bias is that when we look back we have a tendency to analyse the data we know and recognise from our story of the past as if it was the entire data set. But, of course, when you think about it carefully, our understanding of history obscures as much as it reveals, and there are many important data points in what has happened that we miss out on entirely.
As RSA Group celebrates its 40th birthday, this is an important insight to bear in mind.
We have achieved significant success in over four decades of business and made a major contribution to the growth and development of the South African fresh produce industry as a whole. Our Value Proposition has been, and continues to be, compelling for South African producers, while our service levels have proved equally compelling for buyers at all levels. Even so, this doesn’t necessarily mean we have a full understanding of all our strengths and weaknesses. Indeed, it’s probably safe to say that it would be impossible to have a truly objective understanding of our past – and that there are surely a few areas of blind-sightedness that we could benefit from understanding and addressing.
Which is why, as proud as we are of our 40th birthday and our many achievements over the years, we are also trying to ensure that we balance a celebration of our successes with a strong focus on how we intend to go about fulfilling our vision in the coming four decades.
Even with the restricted vision of Survivorship Bias at play, I have no doubt that we will need to embrace significant changes to retain our position of industry leadership. Or, put another way: we cannot dogmatically stick to the things that we believe have made us successful in the past if we want to thrive in the future. To be properly future-fit, we need to keep on looking, as honestly and carefully as possible, for areas of weakness we may not even fully recognise exist.
The South African fresh produce industry is evolving at a fast pace, and our business has to evolve accordingly to stay competitive. For example: we have to ensure that we have a sufficient range of voices and insights permeating the group to be able to take advantage of emerging opportunities. Similarly, we must ensure that we are taking up an industry-leading role when it comes to digital evolution. RSA Group can ill afford to be playing catch-up in this crucial area of business, where new modes of operation – to say nothing of competitors – are emerging all the time.
To get our evolution right, we must have a relevant vision, supported by a rock solid Value Proposition. But we also have to have the wisdom to be able to look back with objective, balanced eyes.
What are our areas of weakness in the way we do business? What have we been getting wrong as much as we’ve been getting right?
These are crucial questions for all of us to ask, and hopefully find answers to. Let’s bear this mind as we celebrate our achievements, and sharpen our focus on the opportunities that lie ahead.
Best wishes,
Jaco Oosthuizen