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Digits and Ones: Some Excerpts from "Innovations"
By John Gehl and Suzanne Douglas
These items have been excerpted from INNOVATION, by John Gehl
and Suzanne Douglas. For a free trial subscription, send a message to:
innovation-trial@newsscan.com with the word 'subscribe.pl' in subject
line.
Chequeless Society
After waiting for the promised "checkless society" for a quarter of a
century, America will see its arrival before the year 2000, since the
country's biggest check-writer -- Uncle Sam -- will be forced by an
unnoticed provision of the recent budget comprise to abandon paper checks
almost entirely before 1999. All 1 billion government checks, including
Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, will have to be made through
electronic transfers. The rest of the economy is certain to fall quickly in
line. (Janet Novack, "Check-free," Forbes 9 Sep 96 p140)
And the Commencement of E-Money
Representative Mike Castle (R-Del.) notes that the age of electronic money
is no further away than the next round of university graduates. The reason?
The prepaid cards that universities are providing students, which can be
used to pay for food, photocopying and even tickets to sporting events:
"You have a whole group of kids, 18 to 22, who will be very used to not
handling money at all. If the entire college population of the U.S. is
doing this, its members won't easily go back to check writing and more
arcane banking practices." (Forbes ASAP 26 Aug 96 p72)
Organizational Change: Die a Little, Live a Little
At some point a caterpillar (if it knows what's good for itself) has to
decide to die as a caterpillar and become a butterfly; -- and at some point
an organization (if it knows what's good for itself) has to decide to let
its core business die a little, so it can move on to a new phase of life.
Only a transformed, revitalized organization will be able compete
successfully in a dynamic marketplace, and an established company's key to
success in the years ahead will be to leverage its franchise into the
electronic marketplace. However, this won't be easy, because for most
incumbents "e-commerce will require broad changes in organizational approach
and structure, as well as in skills, mindset, human resources, and measures
of economic success. Many will have to cannibalize existing businesses or
channels and risk demotivating the traditional organization while building
the new one." And companies that succeed in creating innovative units will
have to be careful not to stifle the venture by trying to convert it back
into a traditional model in the longer term. "Long-term strategic plans
relying on elaborate management processes are unlikely to prevail against
nimble new entrants unencumbered by past decisions." Butterflies need to be
free. (Lorraine Harrington & Greg Reed, "Electronic Commerce Finally Comes
Of Age," McKinsey Quarterly 1996 No. 2 p68)
Move Over, Paradigm Shift
Forget paradigm shifts, says a new report by Price Waterhouse LLP -- now
we're getting into "isoquantic" shifts. The ability to turn nearly
everything into a series of ones and zeroes "places the world at the crux of
enormous change," says one of the authors. Now that everything can be made
to look like everything else (at least as far as a computer is concerned),
previously disparate industries are rapidly converging. Examples include
the coming distribution of Hollywood films on CD-ROMs, magazine publishing
on the Internet, and the rise of online banking and shopping. (Investor's
Business Daily 2 Jul 96 A8)
Your Next Job Trainer May Be a Computer
The hotel and banking businesses are investing big bucks in computerized
job-training simulation packages that are showing up in high school computer
labs around the country. The systems use interactive software and animated
multimedia technology that's compatible with many of the older computers
found in today's schools, and give the students a taste of what it's like to
operate in the real world of business decision-making. In addition to
business fundamentals, the systems teach basic workplace skills like
courtesy and cooperation, as well as business ethics, such as whether to
accept a big tip for bypassing bank procedures on a loan application. "The
simulations engage students in a way that other approaches don't. This
isn't something that they have already failed at," says a vo-tech instructor
who trains high-school dropouts in New York City. (Wall Street Journal 7
May 96 B1)