This Week in Strategy: Why is Titanic the best storage option? Because it's always syncing!
Hi Strat Pack,
First, a quick update on programming. Because I want to live my truest life and have a hot girl summer, we're going to switch to a bi-weekly publication schedule until Labor Day. A lot goes into these, I love writing them, I love that you read them. But this summer is going to be the summer of a little less pressure on Thursday nights. Thank you for your empathy, sympathy, continued readership, and most importantly thank you for replying to me and letting me know if I should rebrand to "This Fortnight in Strategy" over the summer.
I want to start out with this tidbit from Dense Discovery, a newsletter you should absolutely sign up for. Ubuntu describes an African philosophy of shared humanity. It’s one of those untranslatable words (see below for more) that originates from the Nguni languages of Zulu and Xhosa and can be interpreted as ‘I am because we are.’
Wikipedia has a definition of ubuntu by scholar Michael Onyebuchi Eze that is worth reading in full:
“A person is a person through other people strikes an affirmation of one’s humanity through recognition of an ‘other’ in his or her uniqueness and difference. It is a demand for a creative intersubjective formation in which the ‘other’ becomes a mirror (but only a mirror) for my subjectivity. This idealism suggests to us that humanity is not embedded in my person solely as an individual; my humanity is co-substantively bestowed upon the other and me. Humanity is a quality we owe to each other. We create each other and need to sustain this otherness creation. And if we belong to each other, we participate in our creations: we are because you are, and since you are, definitely I am. The ‘I am’ is not a rigid subject, but a dynamic self-constitution dependent on this otherness creation of relation and distance.”
‘Humanity is a quality we owe to each other.’ What a beautiful thought. What a beautiful vision of the world. It seems very far away from my reality: the world where we couldn't even all wear masks and stay home for two weeks in March last year because of mah riiiiiiiiiights. As our friends from Dense Discovery put it: in a world of absolute individualism, a sense of shared humanity is hard to come by.
Moving on. I think it's ok to talk about planes again? So my question to you, dear reader is: Do we love this or hate this? These double-decker airplane cabin concepts could be the future of flying I'm genuinely unsure. I look at the schematics (especially the first few) and it looks like an airline torture chamber nightmare version of flying. But then I read on and see that this Spanish Inquisition limb removal chair was actually designed by a student who was frustrated with the lack of legroom. And the seat design offers more recline angles than today's economy class, and an adjustable back-rest and deployable neck-rest to offer further comfort. So I'm really torn. What do we think? Let me know in the comments below, and don't forget to like, follow, subscribe!
End on a "good for you" note: Italian artist Salvatore Garau just sold an invisible sculpture for $18,000. The work, titled Io Sono or "I Am," doesn't exist except in the artist's imagination. No, seriously. According to Garau, the sculpture doesn't not exist per se, rather it exists in a vacuum, Newsweek reports. "The vacuum is nothing more than a space full of energy," Garau explained. "And even if we empty it and there is nothing left, according to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, that 'nothing' has a weight. Therefore, it has energy that is condensed and transformed into particles, that is, into us."
In all seriousness though, it's worth checking out this Art Assignment video (what can I say, I'm on a kick): Art You Can't Get To. Made in a world before NFTs, this video earnestly explores the (cerebral) value of art that you cannot access. I highly recommend checking it out.
Alright, stop messing around trying to figure out how you can pull an A$AP Rocky and serve as the CEO of Klarna for one day after joining as investor (caveat emptor: It's an AdWeek article). Let's jump right in.
The one thing to read this week
1) Hank Green has maybe the best explanation of System 1 I've ever seen [TikTok]
OMG Jordan a fucking TikTok? Yes, dear reader, a fucking TikTok. I have one request of you. Watch this TikTok on your phone. Here's a QR code that makes it super simple. It's 100% SFW and totally worth it. It just doesn't have the same effect on your computer.
Absolutely perfect example that the autopilot is in control of almost everything we do.
2) Your fixation with innovation is stopping your company actually innovating [Sifted]
The most effective leaders ask the right questions rather than offer up the ‘right’ answers.
When a company is facing threats from all directions and their industry is changing fast, it can be tempting to jump straight into new innovation projects and investments. There’s no time to lose, right?
But all too often going in all guns blazing without having identified why you’re seeking to make a change is where I see businesses trip up, and where money is often wasted. You need to be sure of the purpose behind the change you’re setting out to make if your efforts are to align with your wider strategy.
Innovation is a people problem
Most companies frame challenges based on what they want to achieve and the business goals they have in mind. But it’s a mistake to impose your company’s needs on the market or to assume that you’ll meet your customers’ needs by default because you already know them.
Innovation comes from listening to internal and external signals and being truly people-centric more than business-centric. It’s not about starting with grand, creative ideas that your team loves and that you all assume the world will love, too.
It is amazing how often companies — even ones that think they are listening to their customers — can get this wrong.
Moving beyond the buzzword
If you’re reading this thinking ‘How do I do this right?’, you won’t be the only one. Here are a few things I encourage you to think about if you want to harness the true power of innovation:
Always start with the why. A lack of contextual thinking and foresight is why so many innovation teams and investments fail.
People first, thing second. Too often that mentality gets flipped. Success comes from marrying the needs of your business with the needs of the market.
Make it an ethos, not a department. Innovation is not a one-time project or an effort that can be outsourced to a single, siloed team. It is constant transformation and requires a distributed approach with input from every person in your organisation.
Lead from within, not from the front. The old industry jokes are there for a reason. Real innovation comes from a culture of learning, creativity, flexibility and resilience that is most effectively led by listeners, not by performers.
Focus on practising innovation rather than doing innovation. Worry less about implementing processes (think innovation jams and hackathons) and more on the different ways you’re enabling change and growth to cultivate a mindset based on iteration and putting the customer first.
If you take anything away from this, it’s to think about filling those balloons. Innovation will only excite and drive your workforce when it’s visible, supported, prominent and has some life to it.
3) Department of Quick Hits
A great piece from Steven Soderbergh about why all movie posters look the same [Lee Grunnell - Twitter]
The blandness of TikTok’s biggest stars [Vox - The Goods] Or, how algorithms reward mediocrity. We’re now at the stage of TikTok fame where its influence on the realm of traditional entertainment is undeniable. TikTok stars are making real headway in Hollywood, and vice versa — like, even Anthony Hopkins has a TikTok. That also means we’re at the stage of the relationship where we can finally start to suss out its effects: Namely, that pop culture is being increasingly determined by algorithms (not a new thing, but no platform’s algorithm is more powerful at surfacing tailored content than TikTok’s). This also tends to mean that what we’re seeing is the lowest common denominator of what human beings want to look at, appealing to our most base impulses and exploiting existing biases toward thinness, whiteness, and wealth.
The result is, well, mediocre.
On The Dangers of Tracking [Bob Hoffman - LinkedIn] This entire article is really worth a read. But here we go.
Is the free internet reliant on advertising? Yes. Is it reliant on tracking? No.
Advertising’s traditional job has been to impart information to people. Today, however, certain types of advertising have become equally concerned with collecting information about people. I do not believe it is an exaggeration to say that a good deal of online advertising can be viewed as spyware that only looks like advertising.
Most researchers estimate that about five display ads out of 10,000 get clicked on. But almost every one of those 10,000 ads is capable of harvesting information about the person the ad is served to.
By the near unanimous opinion of people inside and outside the advertising business, the past decade has been a terrible misadventure for the ad industry.
Advertising has gotten worse, not better. It has gotten less effective, not more. The ad industry is less trusted than ever.
Rather than creating advertising that is “more relevant, more timely and more likable” we are creating advertising that is more annoying, more disliked, and more avoided.
There is a clear line connecting online tracking by advertisers and political radicalization and destabilization.
As we move about the web, trackers relentlessly gather information about where we go, what we look at, and what we interact with.
This information is then fed into algorithms which are formulas that are derived from our behavior and to some extent describe our personality. The purpose of these algorithms is primarily to keep visitors “inside the corral” of the publisher or the platform. The more time I spend in their corral, the more money the platform can realize from selling ad space.
To do this, the platforms feed me ever more “engaging” content. Experience has taught the algorithms that the more juicy the material, the more likely they are to keep me in the corral.
Consequently, the algorithms feed me incrementally more lurid notions of my own predispositions and drive me deeper into rabbit holes where I may encounter people whose notions are more extreme versions of my own.
Online advertising supports many good things that we enjoy and appreciate about the web. It gives us free entertainment and free information. It allows us to befriend people we would otherwise never meet. It would take so little for the online ad industry to do so much good for itself and for the public.
Ending tracking, ending surveillance, ending spying on the public is not a panacea for all the problems of the digital world. But it is a great place to start. We need to get rid of tracking – not advertising – to help make the web what it ought to be.
4) Department of Great Work
Guys. I really wanted to like the new post-Richardson Motel 6 Work. It comes from a good insight. It's shot well. It's got the "we'll leave the light on for you" guy (I think). But it just didn't quite click. Bummer.
Mastercard Looks To Protect Wildlife Facing Extinction In Campaign From McCann XBC [Shoot Online] Many Critically Endangered species may go extinct by the time these cards expire. Mastercard, in partnership with Conservation International, is turning the card expiration date into a tool to create awareness about the importance of protecting wildlife. Really really clever. MasterCard is killing it recently. From McCann XBC
Nike Japan - New Girl [Vimeo] Japan is currently ranked 123 of the 151 countries on the gender equality index. It's still frowned upon to speak up in meetings (we're looking at you, Yoshiro Mori), to step into a sumo ring (multiple locations denied us to shoot there because women would be in the sacred ring), to come back to sports after you've had a baby ('you're a mom now') and the gender pay gap index is enormous. Whereas the only question should be to a newborn: Hey girl, what do you want to do? Here's to all girls. Moms. Sportswomen. Bosses. And anyone who wants to step into the sumo ring. To anyone willing to change their minds. Unfortunately based on the YouTube popularity count, not that many people want to change their minds. Powerful message, well executed. From Wieden + Kennedy Japan
Spotify's Pride Campaign Encourages Queer Musicians and Fans to Take Up the Space They Deserve [AdWeek] Spotify is empowering LGBTQ+ artists and fans to show up as their authentic selves in its 2021 Pride rallying cry: “Claim Your Space.” Through this global campaign commemorating Pride Month, Spotify will elevate and partner with queer artists such as Hayley Kiyoko, Fancy Hagood and Big Freedia to create several month-long activations with digital and in-person components. A nice departure from the rainbow washing we've seen this week. Done in house.
Diet Coke’s glistening, hazy, very 80s campaign by Droga5 radiates self-confidence [It's Nice That] Applying nostalgia through a shrewdly modern lens, the latest Diet Coke campaign by Droga5 might be one of the brand’s most beautiful yet. Just Because was born from a brief to “celebrate self-confidence” CCO David Kolbusz tells us, but they “didn’t want to do it in a finger-waggy way… no audience likes to be lectured on how to live their lives”. It's just gorgeous. From Droga5 London.
As always, the full archive is available here. Was this email forwarded to you? Want to start getting this on a weekly basis? All I need is your email, everything else is optional. Thanks for sticking around as always. See you next week!