The highlight of the conference was without a doubt the presentation from Jeremy Gutsche, Chief Trend Hunter at TrendHunter.com, who said “Complacency will be the architecture of your demise”. He told a story about Smith Corona, at one time the largest typewriter manufacturer. They saw the rise of the personal computer but essentially said “there will always be people who need a typewriter”. They are now bankrupt.
That made me think. How many times do you hear somebody say “yeah, but people still want to…..”. All the time right? These words by itself is telling. It acknowledges that a change is inevitable, but combined with the refusal to accept it, with the argument that change doesn’t happen overnight. And it’s based on the comfort with the status quo, the fear of the new and perceived risk associated with it. That’s not leadership, that’s complacency.
From now on, whenever somebody says something like “yes, but people still want to…”, please respond with “complacency will be the architecture of you downfall.”