Ideas and Random Theories

White Elephants of the World

Idea for a tv series: hour long documentary where the host visits the white elephants of the modern world. Great show for the History/Discovery network. Many white elephants have a long sorted history which makes them so fascinating. Just and idea.

In the race to become a 'Generalist'

Why the 'specialist' will no longer be in as great of demand

I was speaking to a girl in my class a few months back and we were talking about education and knowledge. I said to her, "I love learning, you can teach me about anything and I'll try to understand it". Her reply, "oh, well, I only want to learn what I need to know, and that's it". It's interesting to see that knowledge acquisition isn't a universal theme! The point I was trying to get across to her is that there is value in all things that we are taught, though it the information gleaned my not be apparent short term, there will ultimately be some for it.

But even from her I learned something. That maybe it's time for 'Generalists', for my whole lifetime it's been drummed into me that success comes in the form of becoming a great specialist. You need to really focus and hone your skills in one field, do it well and you'll be successful. But the fact of the matter is the world has changed. And thanks to the overabundance of specialists, I think what the world is really lacking are 'Generalists' - people who can see the big picture and connect the dots. Lets face it you can now outsource everything to the developing world from shipping your video game production off to Russia, or using highly skilled architects in India - the value of skills is becoming commoditized. In reality the value of our economy will be based on creativity and innovation, not the execution.

It's the 'Generalists' that have been able to see the future, who have been able to invent new things - because they are aware of various other fields. Do you think a computer guru in the early 90's could have seen the MP3 revolution.

Your in Competition with Everyone and with Nobody.

Why companies have to realize that the world has changed

The reality of today's economy is that your now competing with everyone - and I mean everyone. Those who don't see it are doomed to failure. A visit to a music retail store is all I need to remind me of the fact that there is no such thing as a protected industry. Yet so many companies think that somehow they are immune to a massive shift in the economy. Unless your a patent holder who manufactures something we all need, or you have a commodity that few others have, there is no such thing as a monopoly anymore.

The Big 3 North American auto makers, seem slow to realize this. They somehow believe that it's still the 1970's where protective laws and building products with a limited life span are the ways to produce cars. The reality is you need to be 100% consumer focused. You have to exceed the consumers needs. These are fundamentally basic concepts, but it's surprising how few people seem to try to execute their organization on this level.

The real failure of companies, particularly in Canada is in not embracing innovation and 'new'. It seems like when an organization gets a winning product they become paralyzed with fear of moving forward. I see it all around me, where companies begin to earn a level of success they bring in a work force of left brain bean counters. The focus becomes on how to create an effective organization, and not how to compete and move forward. Add into the mix people becoming protective of their job security and status, and no wonder why so many companies quickly get themselves in trouble.

The real threat for most companies is internal forces, more so then external pressures. It's often the very work force that has been brought in to move a product or service that prevents the company from moving forward. People become complacent and highly protective of their positions.

For example I met with the CBC graphics department one time, and I was speaking with a few people and I mentioned that I love the graphics used for the opening of the National, along with the general look and feel of the network - their jaws dropped. How dare I say I liked it. For those who don't know, the CBC out sourced the graphic production to Razorfish out of New York. They did a phenomenal job. The CBC graphics didn't like me saying that, because it was an affront to their positions, their skills. Yet the irony is that by going with an outside firm, may have helped increase the in house graphic standards. By going to an expert they raised the bar, and showed their internal department new ways of presenting the information. And this is the core of what is wrong with the current business model.

We need to embrace 'NEW' and not be threatened by it. I often said to my father that I have no interest in working for the same company for 30 years. In fact I don't really know how anyone can do it. The reality is organizations should always be in a state of flux. That by having an entrenched work force is more likely to limit ideas then produce new ones.

I mentioned to someone the other day that Canadian Tire (a store known for it's auto parts) once sold Amiga computers. They didn't believe me. But Canadian Tire, a highly successful company has always realized their competing with everyone. Therefore they have always embraced stocking what consumers want, even if it goes outside their product mix. And they continue to do so.

This brings me to Apple. When you realize that your in competition with everyone you can reposition yourself to be in competition with nobody. To do so you need to put yourself so far forward, that everyone is continually playing catch-up.

They seem to ignore all the people you'd expect a company to listen to - the number crunchers. I'm sure when the iPod was proposed, people within the company said it was too expensive, that they should add more features (like radio) to the player, and that it would never catch on. But clearly the people in product development know what people want, and went with their gut instinct. And look today they own the portable music, market. Now they are moving into the portable video market. Neither of the products are new, nor are they really that innovative. The reason for Apple's success lies in the fact that they create very intuitive products that are highly specialized at doing one thing very well.

Gone are the days of the isolated consumer, who had no choice but to deal with your company because you controlled a geographic region. The consumer today have almost too many avenues of choice, especially when it comes to merchandise. Using the internet, you can become as well informed as any salesman on understanding a particular product.

It's funny to see so many in the retail sector try to protect their own industry, by excluding things they don't understand or don't know about. This head in the sand mentality is actually fairly prevalent.

I really think some places have the mentality that if you ignore it, that it (the threat) will go away. When I was in college I used to get really annoyed with lots of the teachers who were from the old school of thought - that the digital revolution wouldn't be that big of a deal. The worst teachers were ones who focused on photography. They had this level of elitism, that film was the only option for taking pictures. This elitism, I noticed extended to the specialized retailers who would only stock film cameras, long after digital had become a mainstay of general public.

It seemed that those involved in the industry could only use one benchmark to determine product value - quality. But by ignoring other factors, like speed, value, convenience - they ended up missing the boat. The reality is digital may not have the quality that standard film affords, many of the other elements of digital out way traditional techniques.

A Wiki World

I'll say it, even knowing I've been shot down by teachers for promoting it. But I truly believe that Wiki will be the future of collaborative work. It will be the way organizations do business internally. That using more Wiki is more inline with creating a flat hierarchy over the current system of individual responsibilities. And this goes for every department. For those who don't know what Wiki is - check out: Wikipedia - a free online dictionary where anyone - including you - can go online and change the content.

The power is in the fact that if anyone has a new idea or sees an error they can quickly come along and add to or delete the content.