The Elegance Of Steve Jobs

I'd really like to talk about something other than Steve Jobs this week, but its kind of the only thing everyone is talking about so, here goes...

I once read a book about elegance in design.  One theme stuck with me - the idea of how nature repeats patterns.  The veins in a leaf are the same pattern as a branch on a tree. The whole tree is really that same pattern as the branch repeated over and over...even down into its root system.  Repeating patterns is how nature works. It is what creates elegance.
Humans are part of nature and companies are made up of humans.  So it's "natural" that this pattern could show up in the world of business as well.  I've always thought Apple was a good example of this pattern and its one of the reasons they have elegance in what they do.
From what I've been told, Mr. Jobs may be difficult to work with etc., but he is also a singularly focused individual.  That singular focus repeats itself in the simplicity of Apple hardware design, user interface, retail store design and even product offerings - one choice of iPhone (for now). The sum of that repeated pattern is what creates Apple's elegance.  And, since the company is such a personality driven organization, the genesis of the pattern starts in Steve Jobs' mind.
The opposite therefore is also true.  Schizophrenic thought leadership leads to schizophrenic decision making which leads to schizophrenic product design, product offerings, retail presentation, etc., etc.
It is so simple yet so true.  And, that too is the elegance of nature at work.
So for me, the question about Apple's future is not about their ability to innovate.  The question is: can they continue the pattern that has led to their elegance now that the seed of that pattern has stepped aside?

Be Your Own Disruption

August 15-19th.  Wow, what a week.  Google enters the hardware business and HP exists.  And, there are rumors that BlackBerry will get into the music business in coming months.  I always knew it was hard to see into the future, but its getting just as hard to see the present.
In a previous blog entry I questioned if there actually is a tablet market or just a iPad market. "Is There Really A Tablet Market?"  Well, with HP's quick exist out of the tablet game the carcasses are starting to pile up pretty deep outside the walls of Fortress iPad.  With nine million iPads being purchased every quarter, the competition has put a scratch on the iPad's empire.  Now, with HP's exit out of the hardware business, perhaps there is validity in Steve Job's musings about the "post PC" era.
How did we get here?
The Harvard Business Review offers up some interesting thoughts: HP's Decade-Long Departure. It goes something like this - HP, and many other PC makers, were at the top of their game and started "consolidating" and "leveraging" which is what you do when you occupy the throne of status quo.  Meanwhile Apple was paying serious attention to "mobility".  Rather than creating off the shelf patchwork mobile products and leaning on the equity of its strong brand, Apple created a real complete solution.  Enter the iPod and enter the beginning of the end of the world as we knew it.  Rather than improving and maximizing the current category they disrupted and created a new space.
The best thought in the article is when it is suggested that right now you can be sure that Apple is contemplating the "Post iPhone" era.
We should all be contemplating the demise of our own products and brands.  The best hedge against the unpredictable future is to be your own disruption.  The disruption is coming...it might as well be you.
As Dwight D Eisenhower said, "Plans are worthless.  Planning is everything."

Looking Differently At The Things We Never See.

I've stated it before - one of the most important things a marketer should do is always look around and try and figure out "what's going on".  In fact it should be a natural ability.  Marketers are observers.
The other thing marketers need to be is brave.  Look at things differently.  Do things differently. And, openly embrace experimentation.  Without these traits it's difficult to create bold ideas and bold ideas is what we do...hopefully.  As Lee Clow said in a recent tweet,  "A passive message only invites people to pass you by".  
Recently I decided to exercise my inner observe, explore and experiment.  
In my recent travels I've had time on my hands and rather than looking up or forward like everyone else, I allowed myself to look down at artwork that most of us never have the time to see.  Manhole covers.  There are some brilliant designs below us.  Worthy of our attention.  I began photographing them in a way that might make art out of the art.  And now, I've created a new blog in an effort to experiment with the idea of creating a movement around something as insignificant as a manhole cover.  Art Under Us.
But this is what we do.  We look differently at the things most people never see.  
Visit Art Under Us.  Pass it on.  Go off and observe something small and amazing and submit your own photo.  
This is what we do.

Two Thoughts On Leadership And Followship

I've been thinking about leadership lately and what it really means.  I tend to break things down to simple core ideas because I usually find the raw, unspun truth there.  It's easy to acknowledge that leadership is the act of leading.  Duh.  To be a leader you have to have followers.  Duh again.  But think about it... a follower is someone who follows and patterns themselves after their leader.  As every parent knows, kids do what you do, not what you say.

Business Leadership
I think most business leaders today do not spend enough time thinking about the act of "followship".  Our idea of leadership is more inclined to be similar to dictatorship.  We want to tell people what to do and have them do it.  We want to have rules for the leadership that are different than the rules for everyone else. Our idea of leadership includes entitlement.  We may think a leader's job is to set a course, but we often forget it is also to set an example of behavior.  Actually its not even a job because it will happen regardless - it is a core responsibility.
Make no mistake, the rules that apply to a leader will apply to the followers.  Followers will find a way of following.  Followship happens.

Market Leadership
I see a lot of businesses and brands that seem have a strategy that focuses on refined model of following the market leader in hopes of someday overtaking the leader.  As I say - followship happens.  It is a bizarre concept to think you can follow your way to becoming the market leader.  Following just re enforces the activities of the leader in the consumers' eyes - thus galvanizing your position as #2 or #3.  No one has followed their way into market leadership.
There is only one way to the goal of market leadership and that is through disruption.  True disruption doesn't mean an improvement on the current category attributes, it means innovation to such an extent that a new category ( or sub category) is created thus making you...voila...the leader.

Followship happens.  Leadership...well that's up to you.