Comments

Seriously good sh*t!

Posted by g at October 24, 2008 6:33 AM

Love it - well done

Posted by Trevor Gay at October 24, 2008 8:41 AM

These clips struck me as a seminal moment - a passing of the baton from Tom to Seth. Tom is a past guru - a keeper of the faith in analogue or people-based business models - whereas Seth is a new age guru - a prophet for systems-based business models.

I watched these clips with a tinge of sadness for the passing of an old era (the analogue era of sequential processing, silos, people-to-people processing, and vertical communications). Tom represents that world in these clips. I also felt the absolute excitement for the emergence of a new era (the digital era of parallel processing, networks, machine-to-machine processing, and lateral communications) and Seth emphasizes that world here.

The questions raised about the impact of the upcoming US Presidential election and the current financial crisis on business were the most interesting to me. Why? Because they provide the context or backdrop for this rather abrupt "real world shift" from analogue to digital.

The upcoming US elections together with the impact of this upcoming recession will see the old analogue mindset switched off and the new digital capability switched on. Americans now have the "real life circuit-breakers" they need to help them move forward with confidence into a complex and compelling C21st business environment.

In Australia we are going through the same process as we are being forced to switch from analogue to digital - politically it seems we are just a little ahead of all of you in the US, UK, and Europe. Australia, if not all Australians, now has a C21st political agenda. As a consequence, perhaps, Australians will not suffer the depths of the recession that is about to be visited upon Americans.

Australia has the benefit of being a small (largely insignificant) cork boobing in the new global seas of change. But those aboard this cork are turning off the analogue signal. In a couple of years here if you have an analogue TV set then you will not receive a signal at all. If you have a digital TV set (the prices of which are falling each and every day) you will get a high-definition picture, wide screen viewing, instant replays of live TV, pause on live TV, blue-ray DVDs, cinema quality surround sound, free to air or pay TV, etc.

So returning briefly to the 2008 US elections to finish this off. There is only one digital age candidate running - Barrack Obama - and that is why he will win and win easily. Obama is not a Democrat in the analogue sense of that term - Hillary Clinton was that candidate and she lost her chance in the Primaries because of it - Obama is a new age politician who will struggle as JFK struggled to convince his own party and the policy makers in Washington that "change we can believe in" must be more than rhetoric.

Remember JFK was advised by the old policy makers (WWII and Korean War thinkers) to go into Cuba where he was totally humiliated at the Bay of Pigs (his brother Bobby was determined that would never happen again). Later as he prepared for re-election JFK had the same advisers telling him to "pinpoint bomb" Cuba and take out the missile silos. Fortunately RFK (Bobby) cut them out of the loop and avoided the Cuban Missile Crisis turning into an all out nuclear war between the US and the Soviet Union.

Obama will need his own version of RFK to help him impose his "good sense" of the coming digital age on the likes of Pelosi, Reid, etc within the Democratic Party who are still tuned into analogue mindsets. Obama must now prepare himself for the greatest challenge of his life as he takes on the old analogue mindsets within the Democratic Party and within the Washington bureaucracy. If Obama does not win this battle of ideas and ideology against them then they will simply bury him alive.

Mc Cain is not G W Bush and would not continue his policies but he has an analogue mindset - he would bring that old moribund analogue Republican thinking to the White House. He would battle it out with the analogue thinking Democrats on the Hill and he would be supported in that battle by the analogue mindsets within the bureaucracy.

President Mc Cain would be a disaster for America right now but not for any of the reasons that Tom Peters presented in his slightly "unhinged and emotional" endorsement of Obama that I saw as presented on YouTube. I have no doubt that Mc Cain would be a disaster as the next President because he would not know how to embrace the new digital era - not for the reasons presented by Tom Peters.

Seth Godin lays out clearly, eloquently, and simply the challenges ahead of all of us in business as we flick the switch from analogue (Tom's world) to digital (Obama's world).

Whether you agree, or disagree, with what Seth Godin says in these clips is hardly the point - what is important here is that Seth is both "relevant and remarkable" (he has to love me saying that and anyone familiar with his work will know precisely why) when he talks about the digial world of commerce and social networking that is being conducted around us.

Finally, if the 2008 US Presidential election had been Clinton versus Mc Cain then no matter who had won the White House the fact is the analogue mindsets would have continued to dominate American politics for at least the next four years. That is not going to happen. Given there is about to be a big change in Washington with a comfortable election win for Obama then this financial meltdown came at just the right time for the US and the global economy.

Resolution of this economic mess will have less to do with looking back and blaming ourselves and our leaders for the sins of our analogue past and more to do with looking forward and intelligently embracing our digital future.

Richard.

Posted by Richard Lipscombe at October 24, 2008 7:22 PM

Hi Richard – fascinating comments. I understand what you are saying and I disagree. I don’t see it as a ‘handing over’ any batons.

I see this time in the history of the ‘management guru’ as a time when we have the best of both with Seth and Tom … AND not forgetting we are also privileged to have many others including two of my own favourites - the immortal and ageless Professor Charles Handy and Gary Hamel (The Wall Street Journal recently ranked Gary Hamel as the world's most influential business thinker)

Quite often I can’t make up my mind if I want wholemeal or white bread so I buy a ‘best of both’ loaf from my local supermarket. Interestingly enough I now prefer a ‘best of both’ loaf to either white or wholemeal! Yeah, yeah …Call me indecisive or ‘consensus man’ … but there you go.

I think we should just be happy we have such great thinkers as Peters, Godin, Handy, Hamel, et al available to us all, free of charge, through such clips as these and various other web based applications and we should simply celebrate that. It is not a competition or a race as far as I’m concerned and in the words of the famous quote – ‘there’s ALWAYS room at the top’.

I am not at all convinced there is a ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ in anything to do with management these days. Variety and diversity are what we should celebrate – ‘cos that’s what people are – diverse and of rich variety …. And as far as I am concerned management has, is and always will be ONLY ABOUT PEOPLE.

I simply pick the best of Tom Peters, the best of Seth Godin, the best of Richard Lipscombe, the best of g, the best of Judith Ellis etc., and then I bring my own thoughts to the party and come to a conclusion.

The management world in my perception is a wonderful shade of grey rather than black and white. Long live grey …

A cold, windy day yet magnificent Saturday afternoon in Shakespeare’s County …. Autumn (Fall) is a wonderful season!

Richard - Thank you, as always, for making me think :-)

Posted by Trevor Gay at October 25, 2008 11:08 AM

Trevor...outstanding perspective. Being able to access all and pick the best of each at such a great price is really the point. Management may be about "administrating" but leadership is definitely about people and only people!

I see a lot of linkage in the words of Tom Peters and Seth Godin to the words of Deming, Juran, Drucker..et al. Most authors and consultants can tell you "what" needs to be done to manage and lead an organization. In my opinion, Tom Peters is one of the few who knows "how" to get it done, wasn't that the whole point of "In Search of Excellence"?

I wish I could share all of the enthusiasm and conviction that somehow the upcoming election will significantly change anything...regardless of who wins. All of the campaign rhetoric and promises aside, the proposals and policies are more closely aligned to their respective parties platform and agenda than real innovation and original thought. Much was written during the primaries of how little difference there actually were between Senator Clinton's and Senator Obama's position. Funding for existing programs that haven't worked will be increased without a mechanism to insure it's effectiveness and accountability for those who administer it. Taxes will be cut to generate revenue on some and be raised on other individuals and businesses. Businesses Will raise the costs of goods and services to compensate and whatever money the low wage/middle class the tax cuts put in our left pocket will quickly leave out the right due to the lost purchasing power. This isn't pessimism...just a realization to me that real change in politics will not happen until the political system is reformed. Less style, less "looking Presidential", less polling and media "opinion" rather than reporting facts need to be replaced by more parties, campaign finance reform, and real ideas that attack root cause issues. That's real change!

Posted by Dave Wheeler at October 25, 2008 7:24 PM

"I watched these clips with a tinge of sadness for the passing of an old era (the analogue era of sequential processing, silos, people-to-people processing, and vertical communications)."

Dearest Richard, I cannot really believe that you think that era is past??????????? E.g., "silos" past, or even passing, even at Apple or Google--you must be daft!! (There is a lot of wonderous experimentation going on, and I believe that era will pass--but not for decades; and in the meantime we must deeal with the cards on the table. As to me, in the 90s I was being trashed by the media regularly as the "mindless cheerleader for the new economy." I was where Seth is 15 years ago--and I was not wrong, and Seth is not wrong, but I am in the end a pragmatist. My wife is in Colorado sequentially knocking on doors for Obama as we speak--she also made 71 sequential analog phone calls yesterday)

Posted by tom peters at October 31, 2008 8:03 AM