Pi-shaped Talent

As I wade through the workplace, transitioning from agency planning work to consultant work there are interesting shifts that are taking place in the sort of work that I do. And also in the way that work happens. More complex work - with a fine balance of 'analysis', 'logic', 'creativity' and 'ambiguity'. Geographically spread out work. Talent hot groups. Being a part of many such groups at the same time...Some you lead; in some you learn. In most you collaborate and build upon each others work. Multi-tasking, learning, forgetting...

And all this work requires a very different sort of talent than needed in the past! Eduardo Braniff in this Adage.com article describes beautifully these pi-shaped talent that's needed in this creative collaborative economy.

Pi, the Greek letter, describes talent that is broad in its interests and expert in two areas, if not more. As a decimal representation, pi never ends or repeats which, when used to describe talent, means no two "pi talents" are alike. And, as a circular constant, it is inherently about well-rounded talent. Though a constant mathematically, the only thing constant about "pi talent" is the rate at which their attention changes and ambitions evolve.

Excellent article. Do read it and share view-points...

Image Vs. Algorithm

I was there at the Mandrem beach in North Goa sipping Caipirinha a fortnight back. There was a debate with a friend about the origins of the cocktail Caipirinha. She fished out the blackberry, got to Google and that settled the debate.

On a languid summer afternoon near the warm beach, search was still as effective!! Later that week, I dwelled upon a little more on search and its growing impact on the business of brands!

Born Sep 15, 1997, the day google.com was registered; Google is still an 11 year old. But the new kid on the block is changing the brandscape like no other tech development in the new millennium.

Thanks to search, the consumers today can easily peep behind the image and the make-believe façade of brands. Search can pull the cover off a million dollar marketing hype, the hidden brand agendas and uncover the real truth behind carefully orchestrated celebrity brand endorsements.

And so what if the consumers can’t recall the brand name(aided or otherwise), some of them increasingly say – “we can search what we want, why then do brands keep repeating the same old story?”

Is 'Brand Image'(as we have known) finally giving way to the power of the Search algorithm??

A creation of the packaged goods and advertising industries, “brand image” was pre-supposed to be a key ingredient and driver of purchase intent across many categories.

But in reality many people paid/ still pay more for things because they don't know better. A lot of brand behaviour is driven by habit, lack of sufficient information and sheer inertia which may be wrongly attributed or labeled as brand loyalty!

In contrast, the Google page rank algorithm, the by-product of the quest of the "perfect search engine," defined by co-founder Larry Page as something that, "understands exactly what you mean and gives you back exactly what you want" democratises the brand world. And under a second provides access to information around not just the brand but a whole list of related keywords.

Do a Google on Tata Sky and you get not just the official web-site, but all the new DTH packages, a comparison between Tata Sky, Dish TV and Big TV, the Wikipedia entry on Tata Sky, how to order Tata Sky online at sify.com, discussion forums on indiabroadband.net and mouthshut.com, a Business Standard entry on the DTH industry losses in 2008-09. And we are still on page 1. One can troll 3.23 million entries for Tata Sky in under 0.05 seconds!!

A consumer can start his search at Tata Sky or DTH and end up ordering Big TV. Almost always, a bit wiser, a lot informed and without ever having to remember any ad, the tagline or the TVC.

If you have related thoughts on how search is altering brands and our buying habits, do ping!! Happy New Year...

What's your Digital Quotient(DQ)?

Finally, we have our internal planner group-id/water cooler up and running! Last Thursday, I had asked to compile a list of Questions to check the DQ(digital quotient) of the planner group/ the agency executive...

Here's the compiled version...

1. Have you ever led an alternate digital life, such as Second Life? And for the moment ignore the duration of time spent!

2. Have you ever gamed online?

3. Have you ever used, supported or developed any alternate digital community space (such as Cydia/ Installer/ Applications on the iphone)?

4. When was the last time you actually experienced a completely new technological platform?

5. Do you actively seed/ leech from torrent sites? If so what do you seek?

6. Have you ever used your 'digital' world to guide you when you travelled abroad (locations, language translations, eateries, etc)?

7. To what extent have you shifted your bill payments/ ticketing/ movie bookings, etc online?

8. Has the digital world enabled you to work for profit with people whom you've only ever interacted with online?

9. Have you shifted a large part of your high-value purchases online?

10. Have you actively explored the various internet browsers on offer? If so, do you have a personal opinion on the same?

11. Do you read blogs? Which ones?

12. Do you have a personal blog? What's it about?

13. Do you participate in at least one social network? Which one?

14. Have you ever uploaded a video online? What did you use to do it?

15. What's your favorite search engine. Why?

16. Have you ever used an online classified service like craigslist?

17. Besides making phone calls—how else do you use your mobile phone?

18. Have you ever registered a domain name?

19. Do you use social bookmarks or tagging?

20. Do you use a feed reader of some sort? Which one? Why?

And once again these Qs make me realise am still a struggling Digital Immigrant:-)
( And I feel we missed some Qs for the mobile). We need to make a mind-shift from the PC to the mobile real soon...

P.S. DQ image source - derryquay.com

The Secret of the Web by Seth Godin

Came across this nice post by Seth Godin, which I am reproducing here...

"The secret of the web is Patience.

Google was a very good search engine for two years before you started using it.

The iPod was a dud.

I wrote Unleashing the Ideavirus 8 years ago. A few authors tried similar ideas but it didn't work right away. So they gave up. Boingboing is one of the most popular blogs in the world because they never gave up.

The irony of the web is that the tactics work really quickly. You friend someone on Facebook and two minutes later, they friend you back. Bang.

But the strategy still takes forever. The strategy is the hard part, not the tactics.

I discovered a lucky secret the hard way about thirty years ago: you can outlast the other guys if you try. If you stick at stuff that bores them, it accrues. Drip, drip, drip you win.

It still takes ten years to become a success, web or no web.
The frustrating part is that you see your tactics fail right away. The good news is that over time, you get the satisfaction of watching those tactics succeed right away.

The trap: Show up at a new social network, invest two hours, be really aggressive with people, make some noise and then leave in disgust.

The trap: Use all your money to build a fancy website and leave no money or patience for the hundred revisions you'll need to do.

The trap: read the tech blogs and fall in love with the bleeding-edge hip sites and lose focus on the long-term players that deliver real value.

The trap: sprint all day and run out of energy before the marathon even starts.

The media wants overnight successes (so they have someone to tear down). Ignore them. Ignore the early adopter critics that never have enough to play with. Ignore your investors that want proven tactics and predictable instant results. Listen instead to your real customers, to your vision and make something for the long haul. Because that's how long it's going to take, guys."

Some good advice there...And oh, I spotted the book -'A Masterclass in Brand Planning: the timeless works of Stephen King' at Crossword. At Rs. 2500+, I am still toying about buying it though:-(