Category: Random Walk

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My Personal Purple Cow: Keeping the MBA Fresh (Con’t)

About a week ago, I picked up on a Seth Godin post that hinted the body of knowledge surrounding an MBA was limited. As a result, I posted my thoughts here as well as a number of other posts to help others sort through the question of whether to pursue an MBA. Regardless of where that discussion has gone on the net, what I do agree with is renewing oneself.

I recently completed Seth’s book, "Purple Cow". From the title of this post, I’ve hinted that I’ve taken a lot in. It’s a great book and a very quick read.

For me, I see his book as more of an innovation book than a marketing book, but in the end it could go either way. Perhaps what threw me was that the impression I got from net readers (before reading the book) was that it was a core marketing book. I see it as being an awesome complement to core marketing frameworks. In my mind it would be hard to facilitate an innovation session using the Purple Cow book as it stands though – some additional layer or framework would likely be necessary. Even Seth himself talks about not having a real framework or formula for innovation in the book. I think he’s likely smart enough to be able to come up with one, several, or many though.

Some interesting aspects of the book:

  • Seth motivates the book by comparing the "military industrial complex" to the "TV industrial complex".
  • In the military industrial complex, an increase in creation of weapons created a self-reinforcing cycle of bigger government, more taxes, more jobs, more taxes, etc.
  • Similar kind of buildup occurred with TV advertising, but with the amount of information overload, basically this leads to a decline in the TV industrial complex. As a result, a lot of the things that got built up are unwinding and new things are forming (note to self: may be interesting to explore this in further depth)
  • Skipping a bunch of steps in Seth’s argument for brevity, he basically winds up with the concept of "The Purple Cow". He relates the story of watching a field of cows and getting bored. Had there been a "Purple Cow" in the fields then that would have been something remarkable to grab his attention.
  • A key point he makes in the book is that companies need to make remarkable products (as distinguished from making outrageous products) that can spread word of mouth through the market. Making great products is simply not good enough. It’s bad.

Lots of good takeaways. Lots of good mini-case studies.

It is good to have innovation permeate whatever one does. As a results-oriented management consultant, the guidebook, process, and tactics I use to wedge it in will take some active thinking and doing.

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Offshoring: Far From Home, Close to Home, and In Your Driveway Aspects

As far as business goes and in terms of how life is affected, I often think about macroeconomic history in three areas: 1) the Industrial Revolution, 2) the Information Technology Revolution, and 3) The Offshoring Revolution. Not necessarily the perfect model but a working model that highlights key periods delineating changes in the way things are produced.

Offshoring is a big subject that has ranged from simple areas to more complex areas like the outsourcing of innovation.

In the first two areas of revolution, the output of the United States (in terms of GDP) went up drastically. Some economists and statisticians have estimated a "productivity constant" (which directly relates the GDP to key macroeconomic factors) and have determined that substantial (non-linear) increases in the productivity constant (and hence, the GDP) have occurred due to these first two revolutions. (See the second link in this post for one example of how this was done for the IT Revolution.)

Now as for the offshoring revolution, Mike Nevens (ex-McKinsey blogging at the Sand Hill Group) highlights,

The proximate cause of the offshoring phenomenon and ensuing debate is the addition of 300 to 400 million highly educated workers to the global economy over the span of less than a decade.

That’s the "far from home" aspect. Remember that there are approximately 290 million people in the United States. Keep the numbers in perspective though – the US Department of Labour shows that only 2.5% of all job losses during the first quarter of 2004 were the result of offshoring.

Mike goes on to write:

Offshoring is simply the first step in an inevitable process as companies in highly competitive businesses seek to lower their costs by moving work to where it the value, quality, cost tradeoff is best. We are already seeing the second step: wages are rising in those countries that are the recipients of outsourcing and working conditions are improving as the demand for local workers rises …

That’s the "close to home" aspect. While the offshoring revolution may not yield the non-linear increase in the productivity constant like the other revolutions (the future lies before us), there is a significant shift in deployment of capital coming.

The "in your driveway" aspect is this … Mike continues:

I believe the third step is happening as well, but it is harder to see in the available data. The third step is stagnating or declining wages in the U.S. and other industrial economies.

Mike offers some advice that workers should make investments in education and skill building. They should make investments in areas that are less vulnerable to global market forces.

In any case, everyone needs to keep their eyes open and stay renewed. The offshoring revolution is here.

Continue reading “Offshoring: Far From Home, Close to Home, and In Your Driveway Aspects”

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Initial Impressions on “Blink” for MBAs

I am currently halfway through Malcolm Gladwell’s book, "Blink". I have completed his book, "The Tipping Point" which I gave very high marks. The first story told in the book regarding art and high $$ is very gripping. Excellent storytelling feel to a non-fiction book.

So far net-net I think "Blink" is a good book, but I think I am going to have some problems with it in the end. It should be noted that my perspective may have to do with the fact that I am more familiar with the decision-making bias concepts, books, articles, etc. covered in business schools. I also happen to be more connected with the academic community on the subject matter addressed. These things make me more sensitive to the precise language used in the book (and cases where pre-conditions are not mentioned, where breaking things into smaller windows does not work, etc.). I should also note that there may also be a contrast effect of me having just read "The Tipping Point" which overshadows the more limited scope of "Blink."

Nevertheless, subconscious decision-making and biases play a key role in business (and everyday life for that matter). I support Gladwell’s general thrust towards trying to improve one’s subconscious decision-making process. What I have more of a problem with (and I can’t seem to remove the anchor) is that the intro of the book seems to overweigh subconscious judgements as opposed to bringing things into balance. It is somewhat captured in Gladwell’s quote,

"The power of knowing, in that first two seconds, is not a gift given to a fortunate few. It is an ability that we can all cultivate for ourselves."

The use of the term "knowing" is too strong of a word. I think I understand what he is trying to convey here (and strong language like this is sometimes necessary to sell books), but I think using language like this can be misinterpreted. Gladwell could have used softer language to the effect of "harnessing the subconscious to support the decision-making process" – but "knowing"? He clearly cites some experiments where the body may know before the mind, but this sentence should have been qualified with the pre-conditions under which "knowing" holds.

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Pretty Good Example Of Who The MBA Is Designed For

Apparently quite a few people still visiting my site to investigate what the MBA is all about.

The London Business School website has a pretty good one-page summary of who the MBA is targeted at. Different schools vary on the exact demographics mix both pre- and post-MBA, but I think it’s helpful to point out the vertical move and career switch aspects (I personally feel that intentional, dramatic career switch is the most common reason). I am less in agreement on how helpful business school training is for entrepreneurial start-up situations (having participated in this type of environment), but the experience also varies by school.

Business Week and some of the other magazines used to run pre-MBA salary versus post-MBA salary numbers. Sometime you can also get this information from the schools. Some of the schools also go one step further to show the payback, ROI, etc. analyses.

List of MBA bloggers is also here (mostly current MBA students as opposed to alums). May be useful for people to tap into that source of info.

Update (3/19/05): 2004 survey info from Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC®) which provides additional information supporting my comments on career switching (switching industries or job functions).

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MBA vs. Books? What About EMBA?

Seth Godin is still getting heat for on ongoing post festival in the past week surrounding the body of knowledge in MBA program. He’s drives the point forward a bit more using more MBA-esque language. That’s an interesting way of looking at it, and I made a similarly-veined comment over at Luca9200’s blog on how the MBA vs. EMBA might be looked at (as trading off experience for classroom). I don’t know if Seth is tired of the email he’s getting, but I wouldn’t have the energy to keep up. Just pass me the books one at a time so I can keep my MBA fresh. I just completed one book here.

Update: Related posts here and here.

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Keeping the MBA Fresh with “The Tipping Point”

I finally had a chance to complete Malcolm Gladwell’s book, "The Tipping Point." It is an excellent book. My favorite chapter (by far) was the one that covers social analysis and leverage points surrounding swinging the tide of suicide and smoking. If you only have time to read one chapter from that book (and provided that you get some working knowledge of the terms "maven", "connector", "salesmen", and "context"), that is the chapter that touched me most, and one I would recommend to read.

Some things one may have a different perspective on after having read this chapter include understanding:

  • how one can help today’s youth if the hypothesis is correct that children and adolescents are more influenced by peers than family
  • what purpose an 800 toll-free support number on the box of a bar of Ivory soap might serve (we all know how to use soap, right?) – note: topic actually covered in the Afterword section
  • the role of genetics and how it may impact where and when you may need to monitor things in children and adolescents

After reading the book and thinking about my feelings on my favorite chapter, I pleasantly found an Q&A session on BusinessWeek.  There you can find the following exchange:

Q: You
spend quite a bit of time in the book talking about how these insights
might really help with a very pressing social need, the whole smoking
issue. I’m curious as to whether anyone has taken you up on that.
A: To be honest, no. When I was writing the book, that was my
favorite chapter, one of the more original parts of the book. I thought
I’d made a contribution. But I haven’t really gotten a lot of feedback
or response from that part of the book. I don’t know why that is.

Maybe it’s sufficiently at odds with the kinds of strategies people
have been following to address this issue. Perhaps I should have been a
bit more diplomatic in my assessment of this issue. It has been a
disappointment, actually.

During my vintage of the MBA degree (late 90s), "The Tipping Point" was not available as it was released in 2000. Without having done a lot of research, I suspect that it may be used in some business schools now (in the process of trying to confirm with some people in my network). It probably makes sense to cover in marketing contexts, but I could see it being covered in organizational behavior classes or special courses on innovation and sales & marketing.

As Malcolm himself admits in other contexts, he is a story writer, not a scientist. While I find his book full of some very interesting statistical information and insight about the scientific method used to reveal some of the patterns, biases, and leverage points that are invisible to the casual observer, in some chapters I had the sense (not confirmed) that a biased path of confirming evidence had been laid out. This is great from a storytelling and persuasion perspective. I speculate that it may make the contents harder to defend from a proven theory point of view.

That said, I’m not a stickler for theory when it comes to something as good as the content of Malcolm’s book. Always remember core business theory. Recognize when things fly in the face of theory. When things conflict with core theory, recognize this and make a contextual choice. But when something new, like Malcolm’s book, is introduced that augments the way we think, I say make a conscience effort to continually renew oneself.

Steve Shu

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On Too Much Choice

I just noticed that Virginia Postrel is talking about "consumers and too much choice" in her latest post and Forbes column. The jam scenario is the same thing that my wife referred to a few weeks ago in the first post of a series of Marketing posts related to consumer choice, expanding choice, restricting choice, etc. and teasing apart the different forces at a more granular level for business advantage.

Update (3/18/05): Virginia Postrel references my wife’s posts. How circular this blogging thing can get!

Steve Shu

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