There is a long-standing trend in the global marketplace when it comes to the qualities of top executives. They are often rewarded for their willingness to definitively say yes or no to big financial and technological decisions. This is a quality that may have served you well in your career as well. However, when it comes to new technology, there may be more than one answer.
Although executives, managers and boards of directors often assume that the purpose of the new technology is to replace the old, that’s not the way it works. The hottest new breakthrough technologies do not necessarily replace older ones. Instead, they often coexist side by side because the old technology has its own unique profile of functional strengths that the new technology never fully replaces.
How many times have you greeted a new innovation with an either/or assumption? Either you use the old or the new. But this is not an either/or world we live in; it’s a both/and world. It’s a world of paper and paperless, online and in-person, old media and new media.
Yes, No, or Some of Both
In my latest book, The Anticipatory Organization: Turn Disruption and Change into Opportunity and Advantage, I reinforce the major competitive edge that comes from the ability to accurately anticipate the future. This is a skill that can be learned, and I’d like to introduce you to the Both/And Principle, which will help your forecasts be more accurate.
First, a bit of history. In the mid-1980s, I began to notice that top executives, managers, business publications, and the media were all making the same false assumptions about the future of technological change. Every time a new product category was introduced, they assumed that the older category would quickly vanish. This is a sign of Either/Or Thinking.
Either/Or Assumption #1:
Thanks to digital communications, all offices will be 100 percent paperless.
For example, in the late 1980s, when email and other electronic communications were introduced, many futurists predicted that, by the late 1990s, offices would be completely paperless. It’s now 2018, and we are still talking about that possibility, but in most organizations, it hasn’t actually happened.
Paper is inexpensive and portable and can be folded and tucked in a pocket or purse. It is an inexpensive display medium that does not need power. So instead of asking, “How can I eliminate all paper?” a better question has been, “What is the best use for paper and the best use for digital?”
Either/Or Assumption #2:
Web-based stores will render retail stores completely obsolete.
In the mid-1990s, around the time that Netscape, Yahoo!, e-Bay, and many other web-based businesses started rapidly growing, many futurists and the media predicted that bookstores, auto dealerships, shopping malls, and retail stores in general would soon be obsolete.
The logic was that a physical store can only hold a few hundred thousand items, while a virtual store gives you access to millions of items or titles 24/7.
So why do retail stores continue to survive, and why are many even thriving? The answer is that physical shopping is experiential, not just transactional. Brick-and-mortar stores and malls are social gathering places that create a sense of community, which technology can’t fully replace. In addition, many products are difficult to buy without physically seeing them and trying them out. Others require a knowledgeable person to help you make a decision. Why did Apple open an Apple Store? If you have been there, you know why.
Either/Or Assumption #3:
Smartphones Will Replace Computers
Not that long ago, business publications were having a debate about the future of computing. They asked the question: With our smartphones and tablets becoming our main personal computers, won’t this make desktops and laptops obsolete? The answer is still “no.”
The reality is we still have the equivalent of mainframe computers, we just use them differently than 20 – or even 5 – years ago. If you have a smartphone and/or tablet, you are already using your laptop differently, and perhaps much less, but you are still using both.
Introducing Both/And Thinking
While others were predicting the end of desktop computers, printed paper, and retail stores, I did not fall into the trap of those bad predictions because I had developed a series of research-based guiding principles that would help avoid such mistakes. One of the most powerful I call the Both/And Principle.
The premise is simple: Your technology works well for you, but you discover a new app, gadget, or thought process that could significantly transform business. You don’t want to part with what’s been working for you, but you also don’t want to be left behind.
The Both/And Principle lets you keep your legacy systems and try the new technology or processes. Integrating them this way is one of the best ways to approach change and transformation.
It is a powerful corrective measure to either/or thinking, meaning that the future will only be either one way or the other. Both/And recognizes the folly of assuming that the “new” will totally supplant the old. Both/And recognizes that they can be integrated. Once you try it, you will see Both/And can accelerate your team’s performance because you haven’t settled for one or the other.
Powerful Both/And Duos
Digital has its powerful strengths; it’s here to stay, but so is paper. Imagine your work or home life without one or the other of these duos:
- Brick-and-mortar retailers and Internet retailers
- Office phones on your desk and cell phones
- Paper mail and email
- Nautical charts and GPS-based e-charts
- Full service and self-service
- Copper and fiber optics
- Traditional media and the web
- Gasoline engines and hybrid engines
- Digital music playlists and live concerts
- Social media and face-to-face meetings
A key success strategy is to integrate the old and the new based on the strengths of each. In fact, the hottest breakthrough technologies tend to coexist and integrate to create new value with their predecessors rather than completely co-opting them. Why? The old tech has its own unique profile of functional strengths.
In the case of paper, it’s inexpensive, portable, erasable, foldable, and readable, and, best of all, it doesn’t disappear if the computer goes down! In the case of retail stores, it’s partly experiential; online ordering only taps into one of our five senses (seeing).
Case Study: Amazon.com and Kohl’s
In August of 2017, Kohl’s announced it would sell Amazon products in its retail stores. But that was just the beginning of this Both/And business maneuver. Kohl’s department stores and Amazon.com have been piloting a retail model that even more perfectly demonstrates an integration of the old and new.
Since September of 2017, the two have been running a pilot program where Amazon.compurchases can be “sent back” by returning them to a Kohl’s Customer Service Desk. Customers who bought a product online can now skip the post office and instead return items at select Kohl’s stores in Chicago and Los Angeles and, more recently, at Kohl’s stores in its home state of Wisconsin.
Consumers enjoy the convenience, and, according to Business Insider, total visits to Kohl’s stores with Amazon’s return program have outperformed other stores by about 8.5 percent. It has also reported an increase in new visitors.
Both/And and You
What are some examples of Both/And thinking that could benefit you? What are some technology capabilities you feel your business cannot live without? What are some of the newest technologies that you believe will disrupt and transform your business? What would happen if you combined the two?
The first step is to anticipate changes and move into position to use them to your advantage. Start with my newest book, The Anticipatory Organization: Turn Disruption and Change into Opportunity and Advantage, now available at Amazon.com.
Ready to see the future and plan with greater confidence? Have a look at my Anticipatory Organization System at www.AnticipatoryOrganization.com
Byline: Daniel Burrus is considered one of the world’s leading technology forecasters and innovation experts. He is the CEO of Burrus Research, a research and consulting firm that monitors global advances in technology driven trends to help clients profit from technological, social and business forces that are converging to create enormous, untapped opportunities.
He is a strategic advisor to executives helping them to develop game-changing strategies based on his proven methodologies for capitalizing on technology innovations. He is the author of seven books, including The New York Times bestseller Flash Foresight, and his latest book The Anticipatory Organization.
To Order FREE book: Visit https://www.anticipatoryorganization.com/get-the-book
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