The Dilemma: You’ve built a successful business over decades—trusted brand, loyal customers, proven processes. But now, digital natives are eating your lunch. Customer expectations are shifting. New regulations loom. And your team keeps saying, “We’ve always done it this way.”

This is the innovation paradox: how do you evolve without eroding what made you successful in the first place?

Having advised family-owned enterprises, regional conglomerates, and legacy brands across Lebanon and the wider MENA region, I’ve seen this tension firsthand. The answer isn’t to abandon your core—it’s to extend it thoughtfully.

Why Innovation Fails in Traditional Businesses

Most innovation efforts in established MENA firms stall because they’re treated as side projects—not strategic imperatives. Common pitfalls include:

• Lip service without investment: “We support innovation!”—but budgets go to maintaining the status quo.
• Fear of cannibalization: Protecting today’s revenue at the cost of tomorrow’s relevance.
• Cultural inertia: Hierarchical structures that punish risk-taking and reward conformity.
• Misaligned incentives: Teams rewarded for efficiency, not experimentation.

The Dual-Engine Model for Sustainable Innovation

The most successful traditional businesses run on two parallel engines:

• Engine 1: Core Optimization — refining what you already do exceptionally well
• Engine 2: Future Creation — exploring new models, technologies, and markets

Neither replaces the other. They fuel each other.

A Practical Framework for Balanced Innovation

Step 1: Clarify Your Core (Don’t Assume)

Before innovating, define what’s truly sacred:

• What do customers only get from you?
• What capabilities are truly hard to replicate?
• What values must never be compromised?

Example: A Beirut-based food manufacturer might realize its core isn’t “packaged goods”—it’s “trusted recipes passed through generations.” That insight opens doors to innovation in e-commerce, experiential retail, or culinary education—without losing authenticity.

Step 2: Create a Protected Innovation Zone

Innovation can’t thrive in the same environment as core operations. Establish separation:

• Dedicated team with different KPIs (e.g., learning velocity vs. quarterly profit)
• Separate budget with multi-year runway
• Direct reporting line to leadership (bypassing operational bottlenecks)
• Permission to fail fast and share lessons

Step 3: Start with Adjacent Opportunities

Don’t leap into the unknown. Begin where your core strengths intersect with emerging needs:

• Product Adjacency: New formats or uses for existing offerings
• Customer Adjacency: Serving existing customers in new ways
• Channel Adjacency: Reaching customers through digital or hybrid models
• Geographic Adjacency: Expanding to culturally similar markets

Step 4: Embed Customer Co-Creation

In MENA, trust is your innovation accelerator. Involve loyal customers early:

• Launch private beta groups for new concepts
• Host “idea dinners” with top clients
• Use WhatsApp or Instagram communities for real-time feedback
• Reward advocates who test and refine with you

Overcoming Cultural Barriers

In many MENA organizations, innovation is stifled not by lack of ideas—but by unspoken norms. Counter them deliberately:

Cultural Barrier	Countermeasure
“If it’s not broken, don’t fix it.”	Reframe innovation as “anticipating what’s next” — not fixing, but preparing.
Fear of public failure	Celebrate “intelligent failures” in internal forums; share learnings, not just wins.
Top-down decision-making	Create “reverse mentoring” programs where junior staff educate leaders on trends.
Resistance to external ideas	Partner with startups, universities, or accelerators to bring fresh perspectives in.

Measuring Innovation That Matters

Forget vanity metrics like “number of ideas submitted.” Track what drives real progress:

• Experiment velocity: How many tests are you running per quarter?
• Customer validation rate: % of pilots with strong user adoption
• Revenue from new offerings: % of total revenue from innovations launched in last 3 years
• Employee innovation participation: % of staff involved in innovation initiatives

"Innovation isn’t about becoming someone else. It’s about becoming more of who you’re meant to be—just faster, smarter, and more relevant."

Final Thought

Traditional businesses in the MENA region possess immense advantages: deep customer trust, cultural fluency, and operational resilience. The challenge isn’t a lack of potential—it’s the courage to evolve while staying true.

Start small. Protect your core. Experiment boldly. And remember: the goal isn’t to become a startup—it’s to become a future-proof enterprise.