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As business considers the challenges that lie ahead it can, with the right advice and help, discover, trial, and adopt new web based tools that increase workflow, improve customer engagement and drive down costs. These new tools, coming in from the edge to the mainstream, can deliver huge downstream benefits and help make change exciting rather than onerous, and free up people to do more with less.

Now is the time to innovate

Economic pressure, a new Government agenda and a general change in the wind are forcing many organisations to rethink how they do things. As the digital infrastructure around us becomes ever more sophisticated, people are finding new ways to design and deliver services in more agile, efficient and user friendly ways. This is an era of innovation, driven by those that have the vision and guile to make things happen. Many of them responding a social, rather than business need.

The signal we are getting from the people we work with is very clear - with so much technology around, how do we know we are making the right choices? It's a valid point. Keeping up with the pace of digital business is beyond many. But technology isn't really the issue. There's a lot of it around and it's getting smarter everyday. It's what people do with that really matters. And that's where it gets interesting.

In our research work we talk with people about their experiences of using technologies business and consumer technologies. The insights we gain into their needs, frustrations, requirements and capabilities are accumulating in our research knowledge bank. Certain themes recur: (ease of) access, (fair) value, (good) usability, relevance and (quality) service. Compare this desire with the experience most of us have of using existing technology. It's generally the polar opposite.

Fat technology - or light and fast

Many organisations are tied in knots by technology that is no longer fit for purpose. Bloated, over-specified enterprise systems, conceived in a different era, and with little involvement of the poor folk who have to use them every day. It's not easy for a business to uncouple from such systems, but if a strategic decision to do so is not taken, frustrated staff simply work around it in any case.

They generally seek out and recommend to others, web based tools and applications that enable them to work in newer, smarter ways. These tools tend to be easier to use than the systems specified by their employer. By working around complicated and cumbersome IT systems they become freer, more connected and more productive.

Employers should not try to crack down on this and force their people back behind the firewall. Instead, they should empower their people to work in the way that best suits them. Encourage this user led innovation and go with it. Enterprises that embrace this shift away from IT specification enjoy many benefits. Staff are happier, productivity increases and costs are reduced.

People are choosing their own preferred tools

The emergence of web based tools that can be adopted by even large enterprises is part of a wider shift from ownership of technology to subscription. It also marks a shift towards people self selecting the technology they find most useful. What this tells us is that people are taking technology into their own hands and completely redesigning the way they work.

This is another step change in the evolution of the web that's being driven by people, not technology. Many enterprises however, adhering to the top down rather than bottom up change approach are too inflexible to grasp the opportunity. This is unsurprising, and will continue until a move away from IT is common place.

Much of the real innovation in people's hands now happens on the edge, and is often a response to a social rather than business need. In trying to meet or improve a social need, these new tools can reveal new and exciting benefits and even entirely new business models. Tools such as Patient Opinion and MyPolice are bringing service providers and the public closer together and delivering improvements and efficiencies that weren't possible by any other means. School of Everything is revolutionising learning and has the power to make massive savings for Local Authorities. And the king of edge innovations - Twitter - which started out as side project - proves that small tools that aim to do one thing brilliantly can be much more effective than a big one that does many things badly.

Even without the credit crunch, oil price rises and global economic gloom, business is in the midst of huge upheaval. The internet is forcing change at a relentless pace and it is disrupting just about about every business type, sector and model one can think of, regardless of organisational size, reputation or brand. Any business that is being run the same way today as it was before the spread of broadband either has it's head in the sand or is heading for a crash. This is as true for the creative industries as it is for our clients.

Challenges and opportunities

The disruption is such that I confidently predict the creative landscape you think of as familiar now will be almost unrecognisable within two years. Some of the biggest names in the business will disappear before then and as yet unheard of upstarts will become the new stars. How will they do this? By being smarter, faster and more agile than their peers.

Small is big

Big business has sometimes levelled criticism at the design sector for being a 'cottage industry'. With so many agencies having less than 10 staff and operating largely as lifestyle businesses, there may be some justification in this. In the current mixed up media scramble however, small can be a distinct advantage because it allows you to be nimble, highly specialised and to collaborate with complementary agencies. Some small businesses are exerting disproportionate influence on major organisations by exploiting a high value niche and delivering the services that clients really need.

Think again

The internet cannot be thought of as simply another medium that needs to be factored in to the marketing mix. Digital communication is unlike anything else, it creates an entirely different ecology and its influence is so profound that it enables new ways of operating for business and customers alike. Succeeding in this territory is not simply a matter of developing a new skill set for design businesses - it requires a new mind set.

Jump in

New enterprises emerge almost weekly that are not just variations to the existing order but are a fundamental rethink of a business sector or product category. What characterises those that succeed is an ability to see things differently, the will to defy convention and the gumption to take risks. They can do this because they have understood and embraced the new ecology. They know that people's expectations and relationships to products, services and brands, has changed forever. They also know how to exploit the gaps left open by those that are too big or too slow to adapt.

Sink or swim

Digital communication technology reduces the cost of experimentation. The barriers to entry for any product, service or system delivered online is therefore also reduced. As this realisation permeates further and further into the business world it will accelerate the pace at which 'business as usual' becomes a thing of the past.

What is brand experience?

The implication for the UK's creative industries are significant. Clients are already demanding solutions that challenge the norm. Understanding that something big is happening, clients are moving marketing communication budgets away from traditional media in favour of online. Advertising budgets are heading that way too at the expense of big ticket media such as TV and press. And what will happen to the practice of branding when value is controlled entirely by customer experience?

Get it

If the UK design industry is to really help clients in uncertain times, adapting to this shifting landscape is a must. UK design agencies need to know how changing client and consumer habits affect their specialism and ability to add value. This is true whatever sub-category of the sector you're in, from packaging to POS and from Flash game development to intranet design.

Get on

Great designers are problem solvers that create elegant solutions to the toughest challenges. To ensure you can thrive through the bumpy times ahead and come out stronger for it, the challenge is to see things differently, defy convention and take risks.

Working with outsiders

In the old days even we tried to control too much - and I know we’re not alone in that. We were wary of outside help, used freelance staff sparingly and when we did, imposed our way on them. The internet has changed all that and we now actively seek out people that work with us from the place they choose.

Gaining from dispersed expertise

Our team has expanded to include specialist people in many locations. We’re tapping into their knowledge, commitment and willingness to collaborate around a shared vision. This way of working is not the tele-worker model predicted years ago where big business ‘allowed’ its staff to do the odd day from home. This is people based, granular knowledge working that will replace the current big business command and control structures. Put simply, this is the way to work for our times.

Giving clients better service

As client demand for additional integrated services increases, we are able to expand to meet their needs without the growing pains of the old order. Over 30% of the people we now rely on – people that are critical to delivering for our clients – work in a place that they choose. By encouraging a porous business based on open collaboration we give clients access to a broader pool of talent and expertise, allowing us to deliver a range and quality of service that is disproportionate to our size.

For more on the future of business and collaboration check out wikinomics by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams.

Touch and go

We met the inventors of Elektex (TM) over a kitchen table in a flat in Dalston back in 1996. While we struggled to fully grasp the technology, we sensed it was going to be big when the rest of the world caught up, and so, as well as developing the brand and trade mark, we ploughed as much cash as we could into the fledgling venture.

At that time the company consisted of two young inventors in sandals and full time jobs with a burning passion to bring this amazing technology to life.

In May 2006 Eleksen floated on the AIM market.

Trusting instinct

In 2001, along with James Kirkham and Will Pyne, two young bucks almost straight out of art college, we incubated Holler, a new media business. The pair, armed with unnerving self belief and prodigious talent, have developed Holler into one of the most highly regarded digital design and strategy businesses in the UK.

Holler are now one of the most respected agencies in the UK. Check them out.

Healthy outlook

Our latest venture is distinctly low tech, but very high fibre.

Active Kids is a ground breaking approach to sports activity classes for school age kids that sets totally new standards. Based on leading edge thinking in physical education, these classes for 3-11 year olds are available in weekly sessions and holiday programmes and are always full to capacity.

We're helping them go national. So watch out for Active Kids in your area as this brilliant young business rolls out across the UK.

Check out the website to get your little ones off to a flying start.