After spending two years and 82,000 meeting hours trying to develop a new formulation platform, Indianapolis techno-aggregator Quality 1.1 found itself hopelessly mired between two strategies: Advancing pre-productive platforms or reassembling multi-factored transitions.
So, as often happens with companies in such situations, some top executives recommended going back to the drawing board. It was quickly discovered, however, that a custodian had thrown thrown the drawing board away.
“We hadn’t used it since 2006,” says CEO Lola Aspereldo. “It hadn’t been necessary because we were doing everything so right.” Indeed, from 2007 to 2018 the company had grown from three employees occupying a table at a mid-city Arby’s to over 18,000 staffers in 17 countries.
The annual profit reached four billion dollars two years ago and the company was counting on the new platform to elevate it to the ten billion mark.
“It’s not easy to admit you have to go back to the drawing board,” says Aspereldo. “But when you do have to admit it, you should at least be able find it.”
The custodian, who’d only been hired a month earlier, most likely assumed it was a throwback to the pre techno-aggregating era. Quality 1.1 says he will keep his job and that it will not press charges.
“Meanwhile, we’ve ordered a new drawing board,” Aspereldo says.
It will take two years to build and deliver – likely meaning the ten billion dollar profit is still a ways off.
