Lin Yue: An Outsider’s Take on Data-Driven Innovation

Goldman Sachs Executive Director Lin Yue is a first-generation
immigrant to the UK. She shares how her experiences in a foreign
country have shaped how she applies data to business challenges

This week’s Business of Data podcast is unlike previous ones.
Where we usually hear from data leaders, in this episode we hear
from a business stakeholder who uses data heavily in her role at
Goldman Sachs.


Lin Yue works as an Executive Director of UK Institutional
Business at Goldman Sachs Asset Management. As a first-generation
professional working in the UK, she believes her cross-cultural
experiences have helped her develop a unique perspective on
solving business issues with data.


Citing a Harvard Business Review study, Yue says that almost half
of the companies in the Fortune 500 were founded by immigrants or
their children. Yue says this ‘outsider mindset’ helps people see
situations as easily changeable and not ‘set in stone’.


“There’s value in being an outsider!” she argues: “If you think
about what's driving innovation around the world, very rarely do
we hear of a brand-new idea. Innovation is what you get when you
look at things from a different perspective.”
Understanding Global Markets with Data

Yue goes highlights some of the major growth disruptors she helps
investors navigate with data, such as generational gaps between
consumers, and how they influence the way organizations perceive
their markets.


“Millennials and Gen Z are coming into society’s highest income
years,” she notes. “Their consumer behavior will be different to
previous generations’. They're willing to try more things and
they're much more focused on the sharing economy and on having
experiences.”


“Look at China,” she adds. “Its 400 million millennials are the
largest generation, whose aggregate income has exceeded the
previous generation’s average. [Three quarters] of consumption in
the country will be driven by them by 2025. But companies are not
adapting to these behavior and consumption patterns because they
think those millennials are still too young and that they don’t
have money. That is all very out of date because this group is
defining the consumer landscape.”


“Let’s use [luxury fashion brand] Burberry as an example,” she
continues. “In the West, its typical first-time buyer is probably
in their late 40s or 50s. Whereas, in China, that first-time
buyer is in their 30s. So, if a company doesn’t understand
something like this, it would already be failing in that market.”


For this reason, Yue says it’s vital that global enterprises make
use of company and third-party data to understand the markets
they operate in. These insights should then be used to optimize
their business strategies in each of these regions.


“Companies usually join a new market and use the same product or
service [they offer] in other markets,” she concludes. “They
believe one product is enough. But maybe, because it knows it
isn’t the dominant culture across the world, Chinese companies
tend to start by adjusting the offering for each market. It’s a
difference in mindset regarding the way data’s used.”
Key Takeaways


There’s value in being an outsider. Innovation
happens when people bring fresh perspectives to old problems


Let data lead. Applying data to business
problems can help companies optimize their strategies to market
conditions


Follow China’s example. Using data to tailor
products and services for different markets can drive better
company performance