Risks

Businesses tend to dimensionalize risk in terms of the classic metrics: “I lose market share. I am going to lose revenue. I am going to lose volume. I am going to lose profitability.” Or if you’re thinking about marketing metrics: “My brand is going to decline in regard to loyalty and esteem and that kind of thing.”

For a lot of companies, all that might be true if you fail to consider the benefits of the challenger brand approach. But think of those things as symptoms rather than the real risk. The real risk is, "What happens if I don't challenge myself? What is the risk if I fail to adopt a challenger mindset?”

The risk is that the company will become passive and dependent and continue to operate as it has historically operated while the world is changing around it. The worst-case scenario is that you'll end up like Kodak, or Polaroid. If you don’t challenge yourself, someone else will.

There's a famous saying, “If you don’t like change, you'll like irrelevance a whole lot less.” If you don’t adopt a challenger mindset, you have a higher likelihood of becoming irrelevant faster than anybody else. 

Opportunities

The opportunities are to rewrite the rules of the game or change the game entirely in a way that is going to disproportionately give you the advantage. So rather than being a follower you become the leader in such a way that it gives you a long-term sustainable competitive advantage.

And if you do it well, you'll make your brand and company famous and beloved in the eyes of the consumer and the world at large – you will be the one that gets noticed and talked about favorably for years.