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That file type is blocked by our corporate firewall policies.
I’m going to need you to rename it as *.txt then I’ll switch it
back.
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“Technology changes exponentially; organizations
change logarithmically.”
Scott Brinker described this observation as “Martec’s
Law” five years ago, but I think the same can be said beyond
the world of marketing technology to digital transformation in
general. Scott went on to write:
“I believe these two things are
true:
“1. Technology is changing very rapidly, and those
changes seem to be accelerating.
“2. Changing an organization — how it thinks and behaves — is still
hard and slow.”
"If marketing kept a diary, this
would be it."
- Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer
of MarketingProfs
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I frequently draw cartoons inspired by conversations with others.
This one emerged fully-formed at breakfast with a few people at a
marketing conference in Spain a few days ago. We talked about some
of the universal organizational challenges that hold us back from
actually accomplishing some of the heady exciting ideas that tend
to come up in conferences. One of the guys at the table found
himself unable to actually send his presentation on digital
transformation because of technology limitations.
Recently a Gartner analyst named Graham Waller described the
mindset that makes it hard for organizations to change — and he
advised CIO’s to become “cultural hackers.” Here’s how the WSJ
summarized part of his message:
“The tool that most needs upgrading is not software.
It’s that soft squishy thing, between the ears. It’s the mind, or,
to be more specific, the mindset, the unseen processes that
automatically turn on and off in response to a task or a
situation…
“In the world of digital transformation, there are
two mindsets: The fixed and the growth-oriented.”
It is easy to get excited about the potential that technology
can bring to business. But if we want to pursue digital
transformation, we inevitably have to think about organizational
transformation.
Here are a few related cartoons I’ve drawn over the years:
“Chief
Digital Officer” November 2016
“Digital
Transformation” September 2018
“We’re Going
Digital” April 2012
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Funny and you still hit the point.
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Tom,
You nailed it, again.
I work with SME’s and with most, the pace of change is way slower
than in larger organisations that have the resources to engage new
capabilities as they become common.
I am still regularly showing people how to use basic tools, like
excel pivot tables, and they think it is magic, cannot believe it
has been on their desks for a decade.
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About once a week my printer/scanner spits out a FAX 10 years
ago I would rail on about how bizarre it was that it was still in
use. Now it provides a me a moment of wonder and a laugh. 1980’s
tech that continues to be used – gotta be a tech hall of fame that
it should be inducted into and surely a spot in the record books.
Great cartoons Tom – been there and the irony is classic.
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Still laughing. I have been at that meeting! In addition to not
being able to share, no one could figure out how to project the
presentation on the beautiful hi-def screen in the main boardroom
of this company. Imagine 8 people crowded around a 13” laptop
screen.
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Yes, it’s like that at our company too for “security purposes.”
Whatever. LOL
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That Gray Matter problem has been around since people were
saying steel buckets were better than Wooden buckets.
Just keep pushing until their ears and minds open up.
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Love this article. Forget presentations over Skype/ web meeting,
many meetings still get started with “can someone get the computer
to connect to the projector??”
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I cannot leave a comment because I am still crying for laughter…
As soon as I stop I’ll think of something… then I’ll start laughing
again…
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John
The muddled grey mass between the ears is the single hardest
element to change in any technology uplift
Technology implementation / integration can be achieved pro
grammatically
People can’t be programmed
Changing organizations is like carrying custard in a string
bag
Stick your fingers in the holes, stuff squirts out everywhere
Love your work, love the insights
Peter
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How offen we see Technology department is driving the business .
I am still living in a company IT department said we are not
authorise your new software request because we do not see the
business need ‘REALLY’ I replied
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Brilliant article and cartoon captions that resonate
truth.
Technology evolves faster than our ability to change.
Thank you for the article.
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It seems now one has to work for technology rather than
technology working for an individual/team
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Call us perhaps, the minority opinion. Let’s talk about the
billions of $ in lost productivity, even more in purchased &
redundant software, application hosting fees, wasting valued IT
support resources, missed business opportunities, re-scheduled
meetings and more. Then add, countless hours to let’s make it
“pretty” versions and revisions to get to the “perfect”
presentation. Adding graphics, elaborate charts, using unlicensed
artwork, and funny cartoons does not make bad presentation
messaging content great. Finally, digital transformation is eroding
common communication skills as people hide behind social media,
screens and devices. We see it in the silos being built as people
stay in their social media lanes rather than facing diversity. Get
on a plane, car, bus or a train. Meet people “in person” and build
relationships. Webinars and the like are just business tools, to be
used judiciously. They are great; in the hands of untrained people,
a disaster! Get outside your cube” today. Gather around the meeting
table, physically, not virtually. You will be amazed what
happens.
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Ah! But many large organisations have security teams with mantra
of “That looks useful. Turn it off!”
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This will always be a problem while we have perfectly
intelligent people walking around with smart phones that appear to
be smarter than they. How many executives take the time to
familiarize themselves with the awesome power they hold in the palm
of their hands in the form of a smartphone?
Anyone here old enough to remember when fax machine were first
introduced into the office? If yes, them you’ll recall that it had
to be kept in the boss’s office and only he/she could use it.
Actually, the secretary!
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I’ve always found technology changes to improve the way we do
things and make them easier; companies change to negate that and
(especially IT departments) try to make things more difficult or
stay the same by banning all access to the new technologies.
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When I started in the industry, computer design programs were
just coming on the scene and the hardest part of my job was getting
the Older engineers and draftsmen to leave the drafting board. But
I knew computers were going to make things so much faster in the
future.
Here I am, now in the future, and we are even slower than we
used to be, because of all the processes that have taken over.
And I am not really seeing the benefits we are supposed to be
seeing. I am beginning to wonder if those older guys, way back
when, were actually correct.
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I remember working back in the 1990s for a company where you had
two computers. One for employee use that was so locked down you
could barely use it and one to do actual work. Technology is
supposed to help a company’s employees do their work not hinder
them.
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I have even used Two Way Translator App running on my phone on
to a Zoom Meeting to communicate for someone based in China. I
succeeded!
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It’s true but it’s a tooling issue before anything. I had an
interview with a web radio a year or so ago. It required google
hangout. Never used this before. I tried it, it said “not supported
on your system”. The guy told me “you have to upgrade your
browser”. I replaced my browser (firefox), I lost support for the
sound as firefox developers decided that LTS distros probably all
use pulseaudio by now (mistake on their side, but it was not
exactly the best moment to try to recompile firefox). I tried to
install chrome, library dependencies issues. Finally I managed to
get it to work with a slightly outdated chromium version!
The fun thing is that another guy interviewed at the same time
had comparable issues with a very recent distro, where chrome was
crashing all the time (so I was not the only one delaying the
interview).
The problem with such fast-moving technology is that it tends to
forget compatibility with tools which still work and are 1)
necessary for people to do their daily job, and 2) are often
exclusive between versions. So in the end sometimes you have to
completely destroy your work tool just to support one such thing.
At the end when you’ve spent valuable time fixing your tool a few
times, you end up being extremely cautious about such quickly
changing stuff that kill your ability to do your daily job and are
never reused because next time it a new tool-of-the-day will be
required with the same set of problems.
We definitely need to improve support for these tools in a way
that respects users’ existing environments. Often it’s considered
that 90% compatibility is enough, but this means that 10% of the
people you want to communicate with will fail to use your tools.
When you meet with 10 people it becomes a big problem every single
time you engage down this route.
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Fax still give revenue to our NGo’s… Although it is an old
school method….
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Hahaha! Me too. My boss bought us “shadow” systems so we could
do real work outside the firewall. Thank goodness for his
discretionary budget.
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This is very true! “Why simply when we can complicate things”, a
common phrase we hear with our clients’ users!
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Great cartoons and spot-on commentary… now, have you written an
article on how to overcome such hardcore resistance? I could sure
use it.
And is there any marketing acumen that one can just mainline
into an artery? At one point in my career I may have elevated my
knowledge into the “novice” level… but that was pre-internet. The
learning curve is much steeper now, and my fields of interest (what
I wish to market) lie in completely new territories.
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Loved this cartoon! So true, feels like when I am talking to
some clients! I heard a lovely line on TV the other day. “I could
fax to you, the trouble is I’m living in the 21st century!”
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We were doing video conferencing 20 years ago over yahoo to a
guy in Moscow working under a single bare bulb. Last week we had
trouble doing one with a major brand. Change is happening so fast,
its hard for it to change stuff… 🙂
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