Breaking into an industry dominated by established players often requires more than offering a product of high quality or lower prices. It is also emerging that it may demand challenging long-held assumptions, questioning accepted business practices, and being willing to disrupt the status quo.
This is an experience and a nugget shared by the Chief Executive Officer of StarOil, Kwame Tieku, who argues that businesses seeking to compete with entrenched market leaders must sometimes reject industry orthodoxy rather than conform to it.
According to him, competing on price or efficiency alone is rarely enough in markets where customer perceptions have been shaped over many years by dominant players.
Disruption Begins by Challenging Assumptions
Kwame Tieku explained that many industries develop unwritten rules that gradually become accepted as facts, even when they no longer reflect market realities.
In his view, businesses seeking to grow must be prepared to question those assumptions publicly and encourage customers to think differently.
He noted that simply introducing a cheaper product may not change consumer behaviour if buyers have been conditioned to believe that lower prices automatically mean lower quality. Instead, businesses may need to reshape the conversation by challenging narratives that have long benefited incumbent firms.
Standing for Something Means Standing Against Something
Drawing on business leadership principles, the CEO of StarOil argued that memorable brands are rarely built by trying to please everyone. Rather, they emerge by taking clear positions on issues that matter to customers, even if doing so attracts criticism from competitors and industry insiders.
He suggested that businesses that avoid difficult conversations in an attempt to remain universally acceptable often struggle to distinguish themselves in crowded markets.
By contrast, organisations willing to question accepted norms can spark public debate, attract attention and build stronger customer loyalty.
Resistance Often Comes With Innovation
Kwame Tieku acknowledged that challenging industry conventions is rarely comfortable. Businesses that disrupt existing models should expect criticism, opposition, and, in some cases, strained relationships with established players who benefit from the status quo.
He argued that such resistance should not necessarily be viewed as evidence that a strategy is wrong but may instead indicate that long-standing market structures are being challenged.
Competition Is About More Than Price
While operational efficiency, customer service, and competitive pricing remain essential, he believes sustainable growth also depends on having the courage to rethink conventional business models and communicate those ideas confidently.
For entrepreneurs, his reflections offer a broader lesson: markets are not transformed solely by companies that produce better products, but often by those willing to question accepted wisdom, rethink industry norms and encourage customers to see familiar markets through a different lens.
He therefore emphasized that in increasingly competitive industries, success may depend not only on doing business better, but also on having the confidence to challenge the rules that everyone else has quietly accepted.
