Day 35: Speed vs. Resolutions

As a student we used to take day trips from Pretoria to Rosebank to see the foreign films with restricted distribution. The two hour drive meant that we would often see five films back to back in order to get the best from our student savings fuel fund. Today I took a trip on the Gautrain, which now connects the heart of the Campus in Pretoria to the shopping complex in Johannesburg in under 40 minutes. Going to Johannesburg is now easier and faster than going to downtown Pretoria, bringing about a complete reversal of not only the shopping patterns but also the demographics in these centers.

The speed at which we travel has a huge impact on what we see. David Byrne's bicycle diaries expose the cities that most people's auto-capsules obscure. The dirty grittiness and creative resurrection of fringe zones go unnoticed as fly-overs and high speed connections cut off focus attention on the dotted directional dividers of the 'free-way.' The bit-rate of the human mind bombarded at 300km/h in a bombardier body, hurtling through empty tunnels and across elevated fly-overs. At this speed, the resolution of our observation suffers. We don't see individual buildings, people or ideas with the same depth or with the same appreciation. Serendipity stumbles at speed.

Recently the UK debate about high speed rail raised the interesting argument that high speed hubs lead to greater economic concentration. In the UK, London will be the big winner and the rest of England will be reduced to simplified and standardized satellite status. Speed of access, be it through the internet, jet airliners or high speed rail ultimately has a homogenizing effect. Being confronted by the same stimuli, people generally begin to have the same thoughts and expectations.

The tension in business though, is always for greater differentiation. Cementing the just noticeable difference between you and your industry foes, through innovation. In essence, seeing what the competition does not. But how can you see or find these sources of differentiation if you are moving at the same speed or in the same vehicles as they are (or hiring against the same profile for that matter)? How can you build in foot paths and alleyways to deliberately divert attention away from the beaten track? The quality of new year's resolutions in your business plan can benefit from slowing down.