One More Thing You Wish You’d Thought of……Complexity and What to do About it……..Econ Recon: Demand or Supply: Which Side are You On?
- August 23, 2013
- Posted by: Stephen Johnson
- Category: Vistage
August 22, 2013
The Law of Inverse Relevance:
“ The less you intend to do about something, the more you have to keep talking about it.”
Woolsey’s Law:
“People would rather live with a problem they cannot solve than accept a solution they do not understand.”
One More Thing You Wish You’d Thought of
How often has a new product or service made you say (usually ruefully), to yourself “I could have done that…why didn’t I think of it?” Sadly, genius is almost always obvious after the fact. Well here’s one more. A relatively new (1991) convenience is the little corrugated cardboard sleeve we put on our hot coffee to-go cups to enable us to hold them while still scalding hot. Not only is this ubiquitous accessory of relatively recent origin (invented in 1991) but it also turned out to be patentable. Take a moment to learn how a struggling California real estate salesman turned a painful moment at a coffee shop drive through into a new career and a small fortune by inventing the coffee cup sleeve. In an age when we associate innovation with high technology and hard science endeavors requiring significant capital and taking large risks, it’s refreshing to learn that opportunities to “build a better mousetrap” in our basement have not disappeared entirely for the rest of us!
Complexity….and What to Do About It
The late Peter Drucker was usually ahead of the curve. Nearly 50 years ago he identified trends that he predicted would create an increasingly complex world (which they did); and suggested what CEOs could do to cope with it. This two page summary of How Drucker Thought About Complexity may give you some insights into coping with your world.
Econ Recon:
Demand or Supply: Which Side are You On?
If you’ve been paying attention at all over the past five years, much of the debate over economic policy boils down to “demand side” economics versus “supply side” economics. Most business people, if pressed, might have trouble providing a succinct comparison of the two. Dr. Brian Wesbury (a confirmed supply sider) in his latest “Wesbury 101” provides two worthwhile tutorials on these competing schools of economic thought which find their way into the policy debate and ultimately impact the economy we have to deal with. I think you’ll find these offerings worth the 13 minutes it will take to absorb both. Start with Keynesian Fallacies I for a good overview of how a supply sider thinks the economy works and finish with Keynesian Fallacies II in which Wesbury explains how the conventional government measures of the economy can mislead us into not understanding where economic growth really originates. Every well informed executive should understand the fundamental difference between these two concepts, regardless of your political orientation. Think about your own business – what drives your “local” economy: demand or supply? Based upon that insight, how are you positioning your company to thrive no matter how the rest of the economy performs?