don't blow your s.m.a.c. stack

Thornton May Part 1

Don’t Blow Your S.M.A.C. Stack [2 April 2014]

thorntonamay@aol.com Twitter: @deanitla

www.linkedin.com/pub/thornton-may/0/4b2/a22/

I would like to begin…

…by saying “Thank You”

A Special Session

For a Special Audience

On a Critically Important Topic

At a Unique Moment in Economic History

Honored to be With You…

     I  was  “here”    last  year…  

Thank  you  for  having  me  back  

What  do  you  Remember…  

…from  my  remarks    last  year?  

Here’s  my  “high  level”  plan    

for  this  year’s  “speech”  

I  Promise…  

www.aiim.org/infochaos�  

Do  YOU  understand  the  business    challenge  of  the  next  10  years?  

This  ebook  from  AIIM  President  John  Mancini  explains.  

to  speak    more  meaningfully    

&  memorably  

I am a

Futurist!

2014+

Not just ANY Futurist…

I am an Empirical Futurist…

Francis Bacon [1561-1626]

I collect data…

I Collect Data…

…by listening to People…

I Collect Data…

…by observing what People do…

Workplace  Ethnography  

I  juxtapose  “What  I  Hear”  

With  “What  I  See”  

My data “reeks

of human juices”

My Preferred Process…

For converting my research data into

YOUR actionable insights…

In  a  Perfect  World…  

Claude Lorrain, Landscape with Aeneas at Delos [1672]

Socratic Exchanges… Would be a Series of…  

In that perfect world, we would…

Via a series of time-boxed exercises:

Collaboratively create local data

Compare local data with global research

Collectively ‘map’ the future world of information management

The Plan for our brief time together

Share with you the

Exercises designed to precipitate

Insights which embody the

Ideas which lead to the

Practices which will define information management excellence in the years to come

Shibe Park, akaConnie Mack Stadium,

in Philadelphia,

Today I Will Be Making

7 points…

Along  the  way  there  will  be:    

Take-­‐Aways  AcKon  Items  

Models/Frameworks  Exercises  Stories  Lessons  

&  Sub-­‐Points  

What Happens to Many People

At Technology Lectures

Session Roadmap This is not a ‘lecture’.

Your immediate Future Involves Several Quick Exercises…

In  two  [2]  minutes  please  discuss    

and  be  prepared  to  list    THE  two  [2]  

 greatest  changes    ImpacKng  your  career    

in  the  next  two  [2]  years  ?  

2 x 2 x 2 Exercise

thorntonamay@aol.com  @deanitla  

Report Backs

What Patterns/Trends [if any]

do you perceive in your responses?

What is the ‘big

picture’?

Emily Grenader Crowd Painting (Times Square) [2009] http://emilygrenader.com/crowds02.php

Everybody is talking

about “Change”

HBO Rome

But haven’t people always been talking about “Change”?

20th Century Fox Cleopatra [1963]

always  been    talking  about    “Change”?  

But    haven’t  people  

This is not our first “go” with change

Point    One  

Prometheus Ted Talk 2023 [28 February 2012] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpYUW0ekPSA

This  is  NOT  Humanity’s  First  “Go”  at  

Fundamental  Change  

Fire. 100,000 B.C. – stone tools.

4,000 B.C. – the wheel.

20th century – the automobile, television, nuclear, spacecraft,

internet.

21st century – biotech, nanotech, fusion and fision and M-theory.

And that was just the first decade.

9th Century A.D. – gunpowder, bit of a game changer that one. 19th century – Eureka, the light bulb!

Speaking  Historically…  

There  have  been  quite  a  few…   “New  Ages”  

David  ChrisKan  divides  the  totality  of  history  

Big  History  into  eight  threshold  moments   David Christian, Deep History [February 2011]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqc9zX04DXs

Threshold 1 Big Bang

Threshold 2 The Stars Light Up

Threshold 3 New Chemical Elements

Threshold 4 Earth & the Solar System

Threshold 5 Life on Earth

Threshold 6 Appearance of Our Species

Threshold 7 Agriculture

Threshold 8 The Modern Revolution

David  ChrisKan  divides  the  totality  of  history  Big  History  

into  eight  threshold  moments  

David Christian, Deep History [February 2011] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqc9zX04DXs

Big  History’s  Eight  “Threshold  Moments”  

http://www.csusmhistory.org/faulk006/thresholds/

What  is  the    single  most  important    

change  management  lesson  you  have  learned    

so  far  in  your  career?  3

Minute Exercise  

Report Backs

What Patterns/Trends [if any]

do you perceive in your responses?

This is not our first

“New Age”

Point    Two  

3 minute exercise

What [if anything] is

REALLY different about THIS

“New Age”?

Deep Thinking

Report Backs

What Patterns/Trends [if any]

do you perceive in your responses?

Nobody Likes the Status Quo

Points  of  Agreement  

Mental    Models  

The Mind of Society

Mental    Models   People seem sort of “angry”

32

Point    Three  

We are living in a

Confusing Time

For every age, there is a defining technology

Point    Four  

The Age we are entering has…

FOUR [4] Defining technologies

Point    Five  

41

The Major Waves of Disruptive Technology Change

People Agree on the General Shape of the Future

Analy&cs  Big  Data  

Social  Media  

Mobility  

Cloud  

For  the  1st  Kme    in  a  very  long  Kme…  

“Social media's moment will pass – but when?,” New Scientist [18 February 2012]. http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21328523.300-social-medias-moment-will-pass--but-when.html

Technology of the Age

"WHEN it's steam engine time, people will invent steam engines.“

Major innovations occur

not when an inventor is struck by a bolt from the blue,

but when the scientific & social conditions are ripe.

The  Technology  Landscape    is  Changing  

John Martin, The Great Day of His Wrath (1851-53).

EVERY organization has to progress through a “wilderness moment”

Regarding    The  SMAC  

Stack  

“When you know what you’re doing

is not the right thing

AND

You don’t know

what the right thing to do is yet H. James Dallas. COO Medtronics

[6 November 2013]

A Wilderness Moment is…

Leaders  Acknowledge  “Uncertainty”  

March 9, 2012 GE's Immelt: Global Economy In 'New Era' Of Instability

An era of great head scratching….

Things  may  be  “blurry”  but  not  “unforecastable”  

While the “future” may not be “Knowable”

with decimal-point-precision

It is forecastable to the extent that Directionally-non-toxic preparations

can be begun

Hypothesis  

Some Change Is Forecastable

Point  Six    

x

Does  Anyone  Recognize  

 this  PainKng?  

At Eternity’s Gate May 1890

Hint:  A  Complicated  Dutchman  

x

Vincent Van Gogh, The Outskirts of Paris [1886].

Some  Change  is  Forecastable  

Alan  Wurtzel,    son  of  the  founder,    20  year  employee,    

CEO  &  Board  Member    of  Circuit  City    

defines  strategy  as:  

“The  art  &  science  of  harmonizing    the  resources,  strengths,  and  capaciKes    

of  the  organizaKon    to  the  external  environment.  

From 1983 to 1993 Circuit City was…

the best performing Fortune 500 Services company stock on the NYSE

In 2008 the company filed for bankruptcy.

In early 2009 creditors liquidated all assets.

Circuit  City  

What happened?

Did  Senior  Management  Become  Stupid?  

A  Rich  &  Deep  Set  of  Scholarship    Abributes  Enterprise  Demise  to  Management  Incompetence  

resources, strengths,

& capacities of the

organization

Strategic  Success  requires    

Two  KNOWs  

Deep & brutally honest understanding of the

external environment.”

If YOU were asked to choose the movie, TV show or work of literature

which comes closest to capturing the

Essence of the external environment

facing your enterprise today

What movie/TV show/book would you pick?

90 Second exercise

Report Backs

What Patterns/Trends [if any]

do you perceive in your responses?

The Picture in Our Heads There is an island in the ocean where in 1914 a few Englishmen, Frenchmen, and Germans lived. No cable reaches that island, and the British mail steamer

comes in but once in sixty days.

In September it had not yet come, and the islanders were still talking about the

latest newspaper which told about the approaching trial of Madame Caillaux

for the shooting of Gaston Calmette.

It was, therefore, with more than usual eagerness that the whole colony assembled at the quay

on a day in mid-September to hear from the captain what the verdict had been.

The Picture in Our Heads

Public Opinion [1922]

They learned that for over six weeks now

those of them who were English and those of them who were

French had been fighting on behalf of the sanctity of treaties against

those of them who were Germans.

For six strange weeks they had acted as if they were friends,

when in fact they were enemies.

The Picture in Our Heads

There was a moment when the picture of Europe

on which men were conducting their business

as usual,

did not in any way correspond to the Europe which was about to

make a jumble of their lives.

did not in any way

correspond to the Europe which was about to

make a jumble of their lives.

The Picture in Our Heads

There was a time for each man when he was still adjusted

to an environment that no longer existed.

SMAC STACK Mastery is Achievable

Point    Seven  

[2] Wisdom begins by knowing that you don’t know

[3] Excellence (ἀρετή- arete)

is teachable & learnable

Observation

A subset of institutions

are on the path to S.M.A.C. Stack Mastery

Howard Payne [Dennis Hopper ] in Speed [1994]

“What do you do? What do you do?”

taunting police officer Jack Travern [Keanu Reeves]

hbp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug2hLQv6WeY  

Patterns of Behavior of Institutions well along the “Path to Mastery”

Q4 2013/Q1 014 Research

Thornton May, Computerworld [10 February 2014] http://goo.gl/OZXHpk

Step 1: Decide to do something. Step 2: Craft a narrative. Step 3: Access Type 1 smartness. Step 4: Inventory S.M.A.C. resources. Step 5: Assess readiness. Step 6: Centrally manage S.M.A.C. resources. Step 7: Create S.M.A.C. capability. Step 8: Obtain the support of senior management. Step 9: Act on insight. Step 10: Link to behavior.

ObservaKon  

Your  Choice  

Success is a matter of will. The first step to greatness is to decide to be great.

Napoleon

William Dietrich, Napoleon’s Pyramids [NY: HarperCollins, 2007], 131.

82

How an organization thinks about S.M.A.C.… Critical Finding

…will materially impact the value an organization extracts from S.M.A.C.

Remember "light bulb" jokes? My favorite was, "How many shrinks does it take to change a light bulb?” “One, but the light bulb must want to change."

See things as they are

and act appropriately

Aristotle’s  “Golden  Mean”  

AcKon  Item  

Don’t try to control what you

can’t control.

Seek to be in control only

of what you are able.

Stoic  Philosopher  Epictetus  

AcKon  Item  

This is Not our 1st “Go” with Change This is not our 1st “New Age” We are living in a Confusing Time Every age has a defining technology Our Age has 4 Defining Technologies Some change is forecastable S.M.A.C. Stack Mastery is achievable

To  Recap…  

Seven Points

2 x 2 x 2 Change Exercise Change Management Lessons Exercise Essence of External Environment Exercise Stories Exercises

To  Recap…  

Four Exercises

President Nixon: ‘You dress kind of strange, don’t you?’

White House Oval Office December 21, 1970  

Elvis: ‘You have your show and I have mine.’