Its been three days and I feel like I’ve been at the Kellogg Institute a month. I have fallen prey to the British Civil Servants’ art of the understatement. I was told it was intensive, advised to complete the reading before arrival and given due notice about the inordinate amount of food, a subject entirely blogworthy in itself!
My day starts at five, to complete the reading before class at 8:30am, which goes through ‘til about 9:30pm – a couple of hours to socialize, bed and then it starts all over again. I realized this morning that I hadn’t breathed outdoor oxygen for two days…
It’s a truly international group of scholars which makes for hilarious lunchtime conversation and some real incites into the global business landscape. Most of the scholars are senior executives from Global Corporates. We have the Swedish boys from Ericsson, (known collectively as the Three Marketeers), folks from Exxon Mobile, Siemens, CapGemini, Randy from McCaine Foods, (who reliably informs me that McDonalds is the largest seller of apples on the planet – who knew?), Baxters Healthcare and of course the Brits. They’re all experts in their own fields, real ‘people people’, and so everyone talks to each other. If this were a sales master class I expect I would meet everyone, know no one and pay excess baggage on the weight of business cards alone.
There is an amazing professor here called Dipak Jain. He’s a small Indian man with a softly spoken voice and a humble disposition. He teaches through stories with only a piece of white chalk and the knowledge he carries in his head. This professor is so compelling, that after each lecture, he’s followed down the corridor by his students like a Rock Star.
He opened his first lecture with the line, “the future of competition is collaboration.” I was captivated. Our business model is based upon growing an ecosystem of small businesses, all working in partnership as a virtual organism that can change shape and substance according to the needs of our collective customers. He spoke of the significance of nurturing talented and skilled people, the economic and social benefits of corporate, social responsibility – not just as a vehicle for recognition but as a means of growing a business environment that is self-perpetuating. Market segmentation is now so refined it has been reduced to a segmentation of one. If businesses reach out to one customer, they can change that customer’s world.
After the lecture I waited in line with the rest of the groupies with a burning question. “I believe that SME informal networks are one of the best kept secrets in the economy – that they have real power for economic growth and social change. In this evolving environment, do you see a renaissance for small businesses?”
He smiled, leaned in close and whispered in my ear, “The small business will save the world…”
3 comments
Comment by Jonny posted on
Thanks to the internet, small businesses and individuals such as myself are gaining more trust from consumers - especially with large corporations increasingly being shown to not care about their customers.
And I think collaboration is now a selling point - you can be open about who you collaborate with and be upfront about why your collaborating, rather than pretending everything is done in-house - it is a refreshing movement and I think the tide has already started to turn.
Comment by Jonny posted on
Thanks to the internet, small businesses and individuals such as myself are gaining more trust from consumers - especially with large corporations increasingly being shown to not care about their customers.
And I think collaboration is now a selling point - you can be open about who you collaborate with and be upfront about why your collaborating, rather than pretending everything is done in-house - it is a refreshing movement and I think the tide has already started to turn.
Comment by Jonny posted on
Thanks to the internet, small businesses and individuals such as myself are gaining more trust from consumers - especially with large corporations increasingly being shown to not care about their customers.
And I think collaboration is now a selling point - you can be open about who you collaborate with and be upfront about why your collaborating, rather than pretending everything is done in-house - it is a refreshing movement and I think the tide has already started to turn.