John Hagel
Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
Discussion
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
Hi all, John here. I lead the Silicon Valley based research center for Deloitte— Center for the Edge. Our charter is to identify emerging business opportunities that should be on the CEO's agenda, but are not, and to do the research to persuade them to put it on the agenda. I have nearly 35 years of experience as a management consultant, author, speaker, and entrepreneur, and have helped companies improve performance by applying technology to reshape business strategies. You can find my blog posts at Edge Perspectives. Ask away!
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Erik Torenberg
@eriktorenberg · Former Product Hunt
John - Welcome!
Read Power of Pull YEARS ago - big fan.
What's something you used to fervently believe that you now see as misguided?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@eriktorenberg i used to fervently believe that people were basically rational and would act rationally. Now I understand that people have deep emotions and are very complex beings and if you can't put yourself in their place and see/feel the world as they see/feel it, you will never be able to move them to act in a positive manner
Erik van Mechelen
@decision_ · Novelist
@jhagel @eriktorenberg pure empathy is tricky at best, but a worthwhile (even necessary) endeavor
Daryna Kulya
@darynakulya · Product @ Vidyard | Product Hunt TO
Hi John, great to have you here! Greetings from Deloitte Toronto office :) Since you spend a lot of time both with enterprise clients and startups, what are some things they can learn from each other?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@darynakulya I think that what large enterprises can learn from start-ups is the power of passion, risk-taking and learning in achieving more and more impact. What startups can learn from large enterprises is the consequences of sacrificing passion, risk-taking and learning in favor of scalable efficiency. Of course, large enterprises have deep reservoirs of expertise that can help startups to learn and scale more rapidly, as long as they can find ways to avoid becoming contaminated by the scalable efficiency virus.
Dave Jarrick
@davejarrick · Deloitte - Digital Innovation
John - greetings from Deloitte Los Angeles - can you give a few comments on where enterprises are heading with use of cognitive technologies? Real, Hype, Job disrupter?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@davejarrick Alas, I think that we are still in the earliest stages of deploying this technology and that the early applications are still quite narrow and focused on increasing efficiency of operations, often with the goal of replacing expensive and inefficient humans with more reliable machines. The big opportunity here is to find ways for cognitive technology to enhance the creativity and imagination of human beings and to accelerate/amplify their ability to come up with creative new approaches that can deliver even more value to the marketplace. My deepest hope is that cognitive technologies will become a catalyst to redefine work in ways that tap into the potential we have as human beings and then provide the tools that will help all of us to achieve more of our potential.
Gerald Huff
@geraldhuff · Principal Software Engineer, Tesla Motor
@jhagel @davejarrick This is similar to the IA (intelligence augmentation) vs AI (artificial intelligence) tension as described in John Markoff's Machines of Loving Grace. The difficulty I have with the image of all of these tools basically creating "super powers" for people is that it appears we will be enabling very small teams of super-empowered people to move incredibly quickly and create value for millions of networked customers. WhatsApp/Instagram are the poster children for this model. Given winner-take-all dynamics in many network businesses, we can't hope to have thousands of these kinds of businesses in a given segment. How do we deal with the employment of masses of people in this future? People will have thousands of desires/wants/needs, but if each one can be satisfied by a 100 person company, we're in trouble!
@jhagel hey John! What part of Deloitte are you most excited about that the rest of Big 4 are not doing?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@nivo0o0 You mean other than the Center for the Edge!?! ;-) I would have to say that it is our willingness and initiatives to mobilize larger ecosystems of specialized talent that will help companies to make the transition from the linear practices, organizations and mindsets that have driven success in the past to the exponential practices, organizations and mindsets that will be necessary for survival, much less success, in the decades ahead. We are at the leading edge of driving companies to the edge so that they can increase their competitive edge . . .
Lejla Bajgoric
@lejlahunts · Intern, Product Hunt
Hi there!
What's the greatest lessons you've learned about people throughout your 35 years as a management consultant?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@lejlahunts - see the answer to Erik above. I would add that I have also learned that we all want to be part of something bigger than ourselves, we all want to make a difference and that also all have great fears and we are generally reluctant to share our fears with others unless we have deep trust-based relationships with them
Lejla Bajgoric
@lejlahunts · Intern, Product Hunt
One more: I'm an Organizational Studies student at the Univ. of Michigan. The majority of students in my program go into consulting; what piece of advice do you think everyone hoping to enter that line of work should know?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@lejlahunts There is a general perception that the key to success is ultimately intellectual problem solving while, over the years, I have become more and more convinced that the key to success in consulting is the ability to build deep trust-based relationships which in turn hinges on emotional and social intelligence - my advice would be to focus on cultivating the latter
Nicki Friis
@nickifriisw · Ideanote
What do you see as "the new wave" of agile strategic thinking?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@nickifriisw I have been very interested in something called strategies of trajectory rather than strategies of position or core competence which used to reign in the strategy field. In particular, I have become a big advocate of "zoom out, zoom in" approaches to strategy - I shared some of my thoughts here https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/b...
Anna Smith
@annasmithclt
@jhagel @nickifriisw zoom-in, zoom-out - creativity!! (Making new connections)
Emily Hodgins
@ems_hodge · Community and Marketing, Product Hunt
Hi John thanks so much for joining us today! What has most surprised you about consulting CEO's over the years? Are there any consistent mistakes people make that you find yourself often trying to lead them to right direction on?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@ems_hodge I fear that CEOs have responded to mounting performance pressure by becoming increasingly focused on short-term results and ensuring predictability and reliability. My belief is that the key to success in business today is to have a clear and compelling long-term view of where the relevant markets are heading and the implications for your company, and then coupling that with a very tight focus on 2-3 business initiatives that can be pursued over a 6-12 month period to accelerate movement towards that longer term destination. And then regularly reflecting on results and refining both long-term view and short term actions
Melissa Joy Kong
@melissajoykong · Content, Product Hunt
John! An honor to have you here.
Can you speak more about the process of persuasion? What are the most effective ways to get a CEO/executive team to put something on their agenda that they don't currently see the value in/priority of?
What are the least effective ways?
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John Hagel
@jhagel · Chairman, Deloitte Center for the Edge
@melissajoykong Ultimately persuasion is about getting people to experience a different approach and to be able to put it into a context that matters to the individual/leadership team. From my experience, some of the most effective techniques are visits to places where new things are being pursued (or at least videos of people in those places), tying new initiatives clearly and convincingly to metrics that matter to the individuals/organization and being able to draw connections between the initiatives and and the personal agendas of the individuals involved.
The least effective ways? Powerpoint slide decks and thick reports with lots of data and powerful analytics.