Some of the product we’ve brought to market has only been possible to realize because we are a small and agile team.
Being a big corporation with a lot of resources makes it possible to pursue projects at a scale, we can only dream of. But on the other hand, it also has some clear advantages to be a small, agile team.
Before a new idea can be turned into reality, it often has to travel a long way through chains of command in big corporations. With big teams follows a lot of stakeholders to ensure that new ideas are compatible with the overall mission and strategy. This makes it easy to stop the idea before it ever really catches on.
Our small size, on the other hand, allows us to be much more agile and effective.
Even though we are a small team, we often work on a lot of products and project simultaneously. For this reason, we schedule a meeting every two weeks to ensure everybody is in sync.
In reality, however, the meeting often turns out to be almost redundant. Because we are a small team who interact with each other on a daily basis, we are already pretty aligned and the meetings are just reassuring this fact.
Luckily, this fact often allows us to surprise our partner with how quick decisions can move projects forward fast.
Leading to new products
Without the complicated chain of command, we give ourselves the freedom to pursue ideas and projects which doesn’t fit our current core every now and then.
The sit-stand desk Opløft is an example of such a product, which spurred from a gut feeling. After talking about the idea for a while, we started working on it more seriously – without ever letting the current strategy or a long chain of stakeholders getting in the way.
Of course, this can’t happen too often, as we risk wasting a lot of time and momentum on the more radically new projects. But on the other hand, products like Opløft and our IoT padlocks Ambitlocker has both proven to be solid, commercial project – and during development, they have allowed us to expand our line of competencies as well.
Those inventions had never been born if we weren’t a small and agile team. And allowing ourselves to pursue those ideas is a really important part of what makes it fun to go to work every day.
