The Next Competitive Advantage: ‘Radical Belief!’

Your competitors are more than likely NOT to believe the radical breakthroughs in technological innovation I talk about. Especially the ones that will be here within 20 years.

Here’s a bunch:

Radical life extension technologies that rewire the human body’s metabolism will enable the average 50 year old today (2007) to have the physic and mental stamina of a 35 year old (of today) within 20 years.

The average individual will print-out/synthesize many kinds of consumer gadgets in the comfort of their own home. That’s mobile phones, TV remote controls, motor bike spare parts, and a new out fit for a Saturday night out: tie, shirt, jacket, kilt, sporran, jockstrap and shinny boots.

Most families will be putting their name down for a second Skycar. It will be customisable, most parts will also be instantly produced at home.

Domestic robots will go on strike, as a result of their civil liberties being undermined. The word ‘Slave’ rears its ugly head again. ‘Oh dear’ we shout, as our gardens, houses and washing-up piles up.

DO YOU BELIEVE ANY OF THIS?

But that’s the point. Most of your competitors don’t or wont either!

So it comes down to belief - ‘RADICAL BELIEF.’

If you are ready to both embrace and make these radical ideas work (and zillions of others) then you have one hell of a competitive advantage.

Q.E.D: Radical Belief is the new form of competitive advantage.

‘Sir, stop making those preposterous and fraudulent claims at your investors… If you continue I’ll throw you in Jail.’

Supreme Court Judge, 1913, when Lee D Forest told his shareholders that his company (RCA) would soon be able to transmit voice across the Atlantic.

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‘Bollocks! It’s not even science fiction. It’s fucking madness.’

The UK’s Chief Scientist retort when I told him that an average US Marine core will be able to swarm and run at Olympic sprint speeds for 15 minutes at a time by 2025.

Is Right First Time Innovation a False Economy?

Think about it?

You put all that effort rooting through a design with a fine toothed and conscientious comb (weeks, even months on end), then you make the physical prototype and find a dozen errors: five tolerance clashes, the embeded code makes the LCD flicker, a PCB lug doesn’t align, a catastrophe component failure, and so on.

And don’t any of you seasoned engineers (manager and non-manger) tell me this hasn’t happened to you.

But this is a mere surface issue, underneath belies much deeper consequences.

Right first time enforces an anti-risk culture. If the edict is right first time and you get something wrong, you are going get beaten up not only by the boss, but by your peers as well (it reflects on them, you are now the risk).

So what happens?

You make sure you get it right first time.

And how do you do that?

You don’t take any risks, don’t try anything new, don’t push the envelop.

And what does that mean?

It means nothing new, zero innovation, zero learning, and zero competitive advantage.

And what does that mean?

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'The gulf between what engineers are actually creating today and what ordinary people will believe is significant.'

Joel Gerreau, in Radical Evolution.

‘The Origins of Hyper.’

The original ancient Greek definition of Hyper is a prefix meaning ‘above and beyond.’ However, things have evolved (above and beyond). In physics it can now stand for many (multiple) dimensions. The Internet has also moved the idea on, meaning many interconnections. Some examples:

Hypercube is a cube with more than three planar. It’s possible to catch a glimpse of a hypercube’s geometry in a computer simulation showing its four-dimensional rotating shadow. The shadow is 3D - weird!.

Hyperinnovation in the business context means the multidimensional interconnection and successful introduction of novel ideas (my definition).

Hyperlearning refers not merely to the extraordinary speed, scope and magnitude of learning, but the unprecedented degree of interconnectivity across minds, knowledge, media, experience and technology (you are engaged in n-learning right now!).

Hyperlink is a reference/navigation element in HTML documents that takes the user to another section in the document, or another document on the WWW.

Hyperspace is ten-dimensional space-time based on superstring theory.

Hypertext overcomes some of the limitations of written text, making possible a dynamic organization of information through multiple links and multiple interconnections via hyperlinks.

Five Things You Didn't Know I'm Bad At:

1. Remembering names and long numbers.
2. Singing.
3. Getting up really early.
4. Hiting the target when I pee.
5. Telling jokes.

Five Things You Didn't Know I'm Good At:

1. Dancing, bodypoping and spinning on my head.
2. Cookery.
3. My take on painting modern art.
4. Off the cuff funny quips.
5. Carpentry.

Now don't you o'l feel better for knowing all this!

Churn, baby, churn.

Lower cost Rapid Prototyping (RP) kit is enablng a new design strategy of high-frequency testing and redesign.

Rather than wasting time trying to perfect a design and produce a single prototype to show customers, product designers are using rapid prototyping technology to create simple 'first-concept' models of their ideas.

If the customer wants to change something, they can easily go back to churn out a new one without having lost much time or money in the process.

While this cycle of repetitive failure may be both tiring and demoralizing for both the customer and product designers, it certainly now seems necessary to embrace it and very helpful to be successful in either field.

Beam me up Scotty!

Desktop Factory Price-Performance Breakthrough.

IdeaLab's Desktop Factory (DF) Inc. is launching a 3D Printer at a breakthrough price point of £2,500.

Cathy Lewis, CEO of DF, told me that by 2012 the 3D printer will be in the shops at a price point of £495.

The 3D printer will produce low cost, non-toxic, composite nylon prototypes the size of today' mobile cellphones in just under an hour.

Testimonials for: Hyperinnovation.

Rudi Ruggles, Cap Gemini Ernst & Young: ‘Wonderful… combining cutting edge science and management practices to produce a new management model, one that not only take advantage of, but celebrates the richness of connectivity.’

John Mans, Fellow, Chartered Management Institute: 'Organisational structures developed to meet the stable environmental conditions of the past may well not be able to cope fully with the demands now being made....a clear warning to both individuals and organisations to the complexities of the moder business world....the mix of approaches is well tailored to today’s new circumstances and provide an excellent starting point for managers needing to develop strategies in an interconnected world.’

Imagination is not only more powerful than knowledge, it cannot be measured by the yard.

'In a prosperous long boom, anything is possible, but nothing is certain!'

Kevin Kelly (see blog friends).

What is Hyperinnovation (example 1)?

Think of the latest Nokia cellphone, the N95 (See picture). Is it a video camera or personal assistant; a music centre or communications tool; a games consol or dictaphone; a book or television; a musical instrument or credit card; a remote controller or word processor; a front door key or portal to the world?

Ask Nokia....In fact ask Sony… Ask Apple... Ask Virgin. And they will give you the a similar muse:
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'As bandwidth grows and technology shrinks toward the invisible, both concept and functionality increasingly interconnects and expands toward the multidimensional.'