---
id: "action-retain-legacy-models"
type: "action-item"
source_timestamps: ["¶14"]
tags: ["portfolio-management", "risk-mitigation"]
related: ["concept-business-model-portfolio", "claim-single-model-is-ceiling"]
action: "Keep functioning legacy business models while adding new ones to create a diversified portfolio."
outcome: "Monetization of the same customer across multiple use cases without alienating the existing base."
speakers: ["Donna Henrike Bohrer", "Karolin Frankenberger", "Joakim Wincent"]
sources: ["commercial"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-commercial"
originDay: 5
articleStem: "hbr-tier2-09-customer-workarounds"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2026/05/what-customer-workarounds-can-reveal-about-your-business-model"
sourceTitle: "What Customer Workarounds Can Reveal About Your Business Model"
---
# Retain and Build Upon Legacy Models

**Action:** When introducing a new business model to close a void, do not automatically replace the legacy model. If the legacy model still works for a segment, keep it and build a diversified [[concept-business-model-portfolio]] around it.

**Expected outcome:** Monetization of the same customer across multiple use cases without alienating the existing base.

This is Step 2 of [[framework-strategic-steps-void]] and the pragmatic hedge against [[claim-single-model-is-ceiling]]: additive, not substitutive. It also partially answers the cannibalization critique (see [[counter-portfolio-complexity]]).

**Related:** [[concept-business-model-portfolio]] · [[framework-strategic-steps-void]] · [[claim-independent-growth-strategies]]