This blog is credited to Seth Godin who asked 60 great minds to help him define the answer to this question, “What Matters in 2010?”. There is far too much for me to cover in one blog and it would do a great dis-service to show a laundry list. You simply must read it for yourself. Download http://tinyurl.com/ybjfhpq. Below is one of the contributions in this collection. This is written by Chris Meyer, co-author of Blur, the Speed of Change in the Connected Economy.
Re-capitalism
Capitalism is not immutable. It has changed before and will again. Remember industrialism? Darwin wrote about the Finches of the Galapagos Islands, observing that the shape of each population’s beaks matched the form of hte particular flower that provided their food. Think of businesses as the individuals of the capitalist species. The shape of companies will evolve as the world changes around them.
What changes? Two big ones. The world’s growth will no longer come from the high income economies (they consume 77% of the world’s GDP today–only 32% by 2050). Second, just as industrial technology changed the society of the United States in the twentieth century, information technology will be the basis of the emerging “digital native” economies in the 21st century. Like finches, businesses will change their shape to make their living in this new low income, high growth, locally connected, information-intensive environment.
How? They will learn to price and market goods whose marginal cost is zero. They will learn to profit from giving value away. They will prefer collaboration to competition. They will assume responsibility for the newly measurable “externalities” they impose on their societies.
If you live or operate in the developed world, you’ve got a problem. You have a lot to un-learn and no short term incentive to do it. But better not ignore the competitor with the strange looking beak.
