No obituary for Dodos

The wheels of destiny

Yesterday I got out of  the train at the Central railway station, after an overnight journey, The red shirted porters jumped in the compartment looking for  passengers with heavy luggage. But, except a few most of the passengers didn't even notice the porters - as luggage with wheels has become the norm.
I felt sad for the thousands of porters around the world, who have been made irrelevant with just a small technical addition made by some design engineer - 2 tiny wheels! 

The wheels on the box go round and round ... 

Knock-Out punch out of the blue
While KravMaga sparring, sometimes I get hit by a kick or punch which came out of the blue, I used to feel stupid for not noticing that coming.
That's what happens to many business too. A small technical tweak in the product can wipe away thousands of jobs. like a sweeping plague.
Billboard artists and wall painting artists became irrelevant overnight when digital printing was introduced.

Movie publicity cut-outs were a craze till 90s!

Talented wall painting artists are rare now 

No obituary for Dodos
When I entered advertising industry in the 90s, the Art Directors were Prima-donnas. That was until the Apple McIntosh entered the industry and within 2 years hijacked graphic design out of the Art-Director's fiefdom.

Steve Jobs's McIntosh separated Graphics from Art

In their place stepped in the yuppy  "Cats with Mouse" who rewrote the grammar of communication graphics. The Art Directors who smirked at these 'insensitive' machines became Dodos quickly, and spent the days drowning their sorrows in whiskey, nostalgically rambling about the 'good old days'. to whoever bothered to listen to them.

1980s advertising Art-Director who said PCs cant replace him

Two sides to the coin

The Innovation also will create job somewhere else while killing jobs in one area.
After Zoom car came in I don't engage a driver when travelling.  I just click my app, get in driver's seat and follow the GPS directions, even if the town is strange and the local language doesn't make sense.
The local cab drivers who are losing revenue to self-driven rental cars are probably getting new business from aggregators like Ola.

Change focal length

Only Businesses and Individuals who are agile and adaptive will survive these technology knock-out blows.

Classic case is the mobile industry - the largest peddler of Information, Communication & Entertainment in a single device. Mobile brands like Nokia or Blackberry which did not foresee or adapt this technology trend are Dodos now.

One small tip to get this ability to adapt and survive is - Don't focus on your product /Service in isolation. Change the focal length to see the industry as a whole and assess in which direction is it moving.
Do a stock taking to ask the uncomfortable question "Will I still be relevant in the future?"

..........................................................................................................................

SreeRam spent 3 decades in advertising and leading MarCom initiatives for product and service companies in Chennai. He can be connected on - nathansmedia@gmail.com