Looking Large Stimulating the Long Term View of the Big Picture

As we at Wisdom Works travel and work this summer, we are looking forward to both time for renewal and new experiences that bring forth new ideas and ways of thinking. Leadership conversations regarding sustainability are happening around the world and we are excited to be involved.

One of the qualities worldcentric leaders need is interest in and awareness of trends outside their immediate reality. We often hear about taking the ‘Long Term View’ or keeping the ‘Big Picture’ in mind. There are many quality books and speakers declaring their vision of the future and their observations of the dynamics that influence our lives and our work.

If you have some time this summer, we encourage you to read one of our 3 current favorites:
The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century, Thomas Friedman, Farrar, Straus and Giroux (April 5, 2005)
A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future, Daniel Pink, Riverhead Trade; Rep Upd edition (March 7, 2006)
Megatrends 2010: The Rise of Conscious Capitalism, Patricia Aburdene, Hampton Roads Publishing Company (September 2005)

These books are our favorites because we have found the ideas and perspectives shared here are helping us make sense of our work and our lives. We are seeing strong connections between the experiences of our corporate clients and the influences articulated by these three authors.

I will offer here a very brief outline of these books to entice you to dive more deeply into them. We encourage you to keep these ideas in mind as you enjoy your summer. Notice the places where you see evidence that supports or contradicts these trends. We invite you to let us know what you observe. In September, we’ll all be sharing our journeys with you and describing what inspired and challenged our notions of the present and future reality.

The World is Flat describes ten "flatteners" that have leveled the global playing field:

• #1: Collapse of Berlin Wall-11/9: Friedman attributes the collapse of the Berlin Wall as the starting point for leveling the global playing field. The event not only symbolized the end of the Cold war, it allowed people from the other side of the wall to join the economic mainstream. (11/09/1989)
• #2: Netscape: Netscape and the Web broadened the audience for the Internet from its roots as a communications medium used primarily by scientists (8/9/1995)
• #3: Workflow software: The ability of machines to talk to other machines with no humans involved. Friedman believes these first three forces have become a “crude foundation of a whole new global platform for collaboration.”
• #4: Open sourcing: Communities uploading and collaborating on online projects. Examples include open source software, blogs, and Wikipedia. Friedman considers this phenomenon "the most disruptive force of all".
• #5: Outsourcing: Friedman argues that outsourcing has allowed companies to split service and manufacturing activities into components, with each component performed in the most efficient, cost-effective way.
• #6: Offshoring: Offshoring, the manufacturing equivalent of outsourcing.
• #7: Supply chaining: Friedman compares the modern retail supply chain to a river, and points to Wal-Mart as the best example of a company using technology to streamline item sales, distribution, and shipping.
• #8: Insourcing: Friedman uses UPS as a prime example for insourcing, in which the company's employees perform services--beyond shipping--on behalf of another company. For example, UPS itself repairs Toshiba computers on behalf of Toshiba. The work is done at the UPS hub, by UPS employees.
• #9: In-forming: Google and other search engines are the prime example. "Never before in the history of the planet have so many people-on their own-had the ability to find so much information about so many things and about so many other people", writes Friedman.
• #10: "The Steroids": Personal digital equipment like mobile phones, iPods, personal digital assistants, instant messaging, and voice over IP or VOIP

In addition to the information about the individual ten flatteners, Thomas Friedman also discusses how the flatteners relate. He suggests three levels of convergence which influenced globalization.
CONVERGENCE I: Around the year 2000, each flattener enhanced all of the other flatteners.
CONVERGENCE II: Horizontal collaboration and the ten flatteners reinforced each other in order to add innovation
CONVERGENCE III: The opening of new markets and countries converged new ideas with the flatteners and enhanced global collaboration. This brought new shape to politics and economics.

In A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink describes three prevailing trends in business and the economy:
Abundance (Our market economy has generated so much wealth and so many options that nothing is scarce. According to Wikipedia, consumers can choose between 32 brands of toothpaste in the US alone!)
Asia (The drive for profit has led to the outsourcing of nearly everything. Lower wages and operating costs shifted manufacturing to Asia over a decade ago. Now many businesses are testing the limits of what can be shifted to India, website development and customer service centers are just the beginning.)
Automation (Computerization, robots, and processes are speeding up our world, making many tasks seem easy or invisible, and challenging the limits of what people are good for!)
Think about the product or service your business offers:

Can a computer do it faster? Is what I'm offering in demand in an age of abundance? Can someone overseas do it cheaper?

Dan Pink posits that the old assumptions of the skills needed to succeed are no longer valid. He suggests that creativity is the competitive difference that can differentiate commodities. He outlines six emerging qualities as the new essentials:

1. Design - Moving beyond pure function to highlight the aesthetic and engage the senses.
2. Story – Adding heart and narrative to the sales ‘argument’ for products and services.
3. Symphony – Combining invention and big picture thinking with a detail focus.
4. Empathy - Going beyond logic and engaging emotion and intuition.
5. Play - Bringing humor and light-heartedness to business and products.
6. Meaning – Recognizing feelings and values to products and creating a purposeful connection.

Patricia Aburdene’s Megatrends 2010 are related to The Rise of Conscious Capitalism:

1. The Rise of Spirituality – people want more meaning, more people report a belief in God, and there is a larger source of energy for people who are connected to their purpose.
2. The Dawn of Conscious Capitalism - defined as the movement that believes profit is a natural outgrowth of a healthy enterprise. Conscious Capitalism strives to reintegrate ethics, values and spirit into business.
3. The Wave of Conscious Solutions – More and more businesses are using meditation, yoga, and other consciousness changing ideas to facilitate the well-being of their workers.
4. Spirituality in Business – There has been an emergence of faith at work, "Spirit at Work" awards, and employee-based religious networks.
5. Leading from the Middle –Middle managers have much more moral authority than CEO’s. It is derived from their ability to creatively influence results, their focus on a smaller playing field; and the way they live their values on the front lines.
6. Values-Driven Consumers - The LOHAS consumers are willing to pay more for products and services that are more aligned with their values. This includes concerns such as the health of the Earth and fair trade.
7. The Boom in SRI – Socially Responsible Investing means using a values screen on investment. Between 2001 – 2003, while overall investments were down 4%, SRI fund investments went up 7%. 9-10% of investments in mutual funds now use some type of SRI screen.

Keep these trends in mind over the next 60 days and send us your thoughts. We look forward to the dialogue!

* Top photo from: http://www.collaboratemarketing.com/photos/uncategorized/binocs1_2.jpg

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