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Banks Talk a Good Game But Are Bankrupt When It Comes to Change and Innovation

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You hear all the time about the incredible pace of change in technology and the way that it affects business, but sometimes we kid ourselves about the real speed of that change and the depth of its effects. Retail banking is a perfect example to illustrate this yawning chasm between the illusion and the less attractive reality. In this article, I want to provide a critique of the banking sector and its failure to change fundamentally and to modernize.
Banking is an old sector: the Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena has its roots in the 15th century and the oldest UK banks go back to the 17th century. We often talk about legacy technologies holding companies back, restricting their speed of operations, and hampering their ability to adapt. Well, established banks have legacy technology in spades.
They also have cultural challenges. The old saying has it that something is “safe as the Bank of England” and that is a standard for security. But today we need banks to be more dynamic and represent something more than being a deposit box for our wealth. Consumers are accustomed to the superb customer experiences in entertainment (Spotify), devices (Apple), retail (Amazon), travel (Uber), and much more. Surveys show that they want their banks to be responsive, easy to use, and available across multiple channels. They’d like banks to be secure but also to be advisors, enable flexible movement of assets between accounts, provide useful data analytics, be cloud- and mobile-friendly, and offer deals that are specifically targeted at their interests.
S-l-o-w progress
At their core, banks now must become digital enterprises, but, frankly, it has been slow going. As Deloitte observed, “While many banks are experimenting with digital, most have yet to make consistent, sustained, and bold moves toward thorough, technology-enabled transformation.”
We all know that retail banking has changed significantly. You can see it in the proliferation of apps and the fact that, in pre-pandemic times, the morning and evening commute are peak times for transactions as people arrange their finances while sitting in trains, buses, and subways. Banking has become a virtual, often mobile business, thanks to new tech-literate consumers pushing banks in that direction. But my fear is that the banks aren’t moving nearly fast enough and that’s bad for us as consumers and bad for the banks themselves.
Banks are under pressure to change because challengers don’t have the legacy constraints of incumbents and because PSD2 and open banking regulations are having the intended effect of promoting banking as a service, delivering transparency and greater competition.
Attend any business technology conference and banks will talk about their digital transformations and customer experience breakthroughs, but it’s my opinion that a lot of this work is more window-dressing than platform building. Or, to put it another way, banks are inserting a temporary pacemaker, rather than undergoing the open-heart surgery that they really need. It’s a case of “look over here” in the form of apps and websites, but the underlying platforms remain old and creaking and that means that the banking incumbents are hampered.
To be fair, I have lots of sympathies here. They simply can’t move as fast as the challenger banks that have had the luxury of starting their infrastructure from scratch and sooner or later that will come back and bite them. Look, for example, at cloud platforms where only 10 or 20 percent of infrastructure has been migrated despite promises of cloud-first strategies and the banking data centers where monolithic on-prem hardware still reigns.
You feel that slowness of action in your interactions with banks that communicate only via issued statements, letters notifying you of changes to Ts and Cs, and threats when you go into the red. Inertia is nothing new in banking either. We like to think that technology change happens in the blink of an eye, but in banking contactless Near Field Communication (NFC) took the best part of 20 years to become mainstream.
This is the dirty secret of banks. They see the need to change but remain shackled. Why are the banks so slow? Historically, because it was hard for competitors to gain banking licences and the capital to really challenge, so there was no catalyst or mandate for change. It’s also because change is tough and fear of downtime or a security compromise to critical systems is very real. More recently, because internal wars in organizations set roundheads against cavaliers, the risk-averse against the bold, resulting in impasse and frustration.
But while change is tough, that’s exactly why banks need to power through. Think of Winston Churchill’s wisdom, “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” How? By a combination of a maniacal focus on expunging legacy systems, placing maximum emphasis on superb customer interaction experiences, and digitally enabling anything that moves.
Banking has become a virtual, often mobile business, thanks to new tech-literate consumers pushing banks in that direction. But banks aren’t moving nearly fast enough and that’s bad for us as consumers and bad for the banks themselves. Click To Tweet
Right now, the banks are surviving, not thriving. They’re rabbits blinking into the headlights of approaching traffic, frozen in the moment. But they need to disrupt themselves before others do it to them. Change is painful but not as painful as the alternative. They have to do much more or they will see a decline in their fortunes due to their bankrupt capacity for innovation and their inflexible infrastructures.
For more on how the banking industry is in transition and how to develop a strategy for addressing these pressing challenges, check out this framework for digital banking transformation.
GOOD THING TIPPING IS NOT USED IN JAPAN
He claims to not have spent money except for rent and utilities.
He gets everything via coupons.
71-year-old Hiroto Kiritani is a minor celebrity in his home country of Japan. His ability to live comfortably on coupons without spending any money unless he really has to is legendary, and he has been invited on numerous television shows and events over the years. Kiritani says that he gets by without spending real money except for utilities and rent. But he’s not as frugal as you might think. He just manages to live comfortably on the coupons he receives from companies he invested in over the years.
Kiritani, who used to be a professional shogi (Japanese Chess), got into stock investment when he was 35. He was invited to teach the staff of an investment company called Tokyo Securities Kyowakai about shogi, and was fascinated by the idea of owning parts of various companies. He bought his first stock in 1984 and quickly developed a taste for it, encouraged by the stock bubble of the 1980s.
Unfortunately, in December of 1989 the Nikkei Stock Average crashed and he lost 100 million yen. It was a terrible blow, but it also helped him discover the worth of investor benefits, an alternative to dividends. Basically, as long as the profitability of a company remains above a certain threshold, shareholders qualify for certain benefits offered in the form of coupons and vouchers.
During the troubled time of the Japanese stock exchange crash of 1989, these investor benefits helped Kiritani get by, allowing him to buy food and clothing without spending any real money. The same happened in 2011, after the Great East Japan Earthquake, when the stock market crashed once again. The coupons he earned were more than enough for him to get by, and as word got out about his ability to live almost exclusively on them, he became famous in Japan.
According to Hiroto Kiritani, if a business performance deteriorates, dividends will be reduced, so this system is advantageous for large investors. Minor shareholders are much better off with the investor benefits that more than 40 percent of large Japanese companies offer, as profitability need only remain over a certain threshold.
Moreover, dividends are dependent on the number of shares a person owns in a company, whereas investor benefits are often times the same regardless of the number of shares. So even owning a single share can qualify investors for various benefits.
Kiritani claims that he gets access to everything he needs with coupons alone. One coupon allows him to go to the cinema for free 300 times a year, another offers free gym membership. He can even buy vegetables with coupons. For example one coupon he gets from the ORIX Corporation allows him to choose a variety of food products from a very generous catalog, for free.
Even though he can get all sorts of groceries with his coupons, Hiroto Kiritani says that he prefers to eat out, which, of course, he can do with coupons. He owns stock in over 1,000 Japanese companies and corporations (of which about 900 are preferential stocks), so he basically has all kinds of coupons to use for everything he needs. He has become so good at living on these pieces of paper that he has been invited on several TV shows and has given interviews for magazines about it.
“I only use cash when paying rent or cover costs that are not 100% covered by my coupons. I don’t spend much cash and live on a special treatment, so in the end, I’m saving more and more money,” Kiritani said.
SAP Sapphire reimagined for 2020: The good, bad and ugly of Christian Klein’s keynote

SAP CEO Christian Klein
I haven’t written anything “analytical” for a while. I was preoccupied with some things which I doubt I have to repeat to you – since you were and are too, but they left me with a severe writer’s block. So, trying to ignore the writer’s block and still be productive, I spent a lot of time working on video (CRM Playaz related) and also contemplating what I’m going to do with the CRM Watchlist this year (check the end of this post for that). But Monday, June 15, 2020, SAP CEO Christian Klein gave a keynote speech and, just like that, the writer’s block crumbled and here we are.
What I’m going to go through is only his keynote, not the conference as a whole, since my primary concern is SAP’s direction and normally, that is covered in the CEO’s speech at major conferences. His job is to not just frame the proceedings but speak to the outlook and the direction and execution of that direction for the company for at least the next year. But in this case, because the pandemic forced us into a virtual universe that relies on digital production and viewing, I’m also going to discuss what SAP did to produce their virtual event and particularly the keynote session. There are lessons to be learned and practices to emulate – and the new standards are being set by a lot of the tech companies who have transitioned their live events to digital. Discussing what SAP did in this keynote, good and bad, content and production is what I think is instructive beyond just the norm of “What’s new (or old) in SAP’s direction as set by Christian Klein and SAP’s board.”
So, this piece will be broken down into three parts. The production, the content and direction of SAP are the first two and while not related directly, the third is an announcement that if you are a fan of the CRM Watchlist, you will want to hear. Sometimes the discussion of the content and the production will be intermingled, but I am going to do my best to deliberately separate the two.
Let’s start with the speech itself. If you’d like to watch the whole thing – which I recommend you do – here is the link to it.
Keynote
This was Christian Klein’s debut as the sole CEO of SAP and all its entities. A big job on a big stage. While I don’t have the numbers of attendees, I’m guessing his virtual stage was a LOT bigger than the normally substantial numbers that SAPPHIRE generates live. I know that for example, PegaWorld generated something like 68,000 “attendees” for CEO Alan Trefler’s speech and normally they pull 15,000-18,000 live attendees. SAP’s SAPPHIRE Reimagined dominated last week’s vendor news, so the numbers I assume were immense. From what I gather, the technical difficulties they had at the beginning of the conference (we were unable to get on except via Twitter) were due to unexpectedly heavy traffic. Which at least anecdotally confirms a vast number of interested parties. I don’t fault SAP for being more popular than they thought they were. Tech glitches now, with stretched bandwidth happen and SAP had us diverted to the alternate Twitter channel pretty quickly. So, ignore the whiners who were looking for something to complain about. Kudos to SAP to finding the “patch” really quickly.
Christian handled himself well – especially given that it was his debut and it was in an unusual environment dominated by green screens and videos, with an unseen audience. He was comfortable, casual, and addressing the hidden audience directly.
He focused on three themes that apparently are SAP’s present and future. They are:
- Sustainability
- Profitability
- Resiliency
Before we get into the particulars, it might make sense to look at the big picture.
The overarching corporate narrative and message for SAP for the last three years has been “Intelligent Enterprise.” It’s an excellent story/message for them because they are truly one of the less than a handful of companies that can lay claim to it and support the claim, handling the operational needs and to a large extent, the analytical needs of both the front and back offices and what rests in between. The others are Oracle and stretching it a little bit, Microsoft. What makes this PARTICULARLY compelling and that aligns well particularly with their focus on resiliency has been SAP’s long-term efforts with supply chain and logistics. Under the tutelage of former SAP leader Hala Zeine, currently CPO at Celonis they were able to build up a very strong digital supply chain solution, one that, to the best of my knowledge, remains top of its class. Due to the pandemic stretching the supply chain to the nth degree and now to the protests sheer mass and scope physically disturbing delivery, the message around resiliency and the SAP’s already existing solutions make them important to the world for both business continuity, but also potentially in saving lives at least indirectly, through the use of their supply chain operations. SAP’s very strength in this area supports business resiliency both in ordinary and extraordinary times and situations – and as norms change, SAP remains aligned to the change, even with their existing efforts.
If I’m to judge things (and I am a judgy New Yorker), I would say that there is a lot to like about SAP’s direction but there was a certain amount of head-scratching tone deafness that showed up in places, even though in other places there was a crystalline sharpness to the that alignment with the world even if we are unclear of where the world is going.
The Themes: The Good, the Bad, the…Missing
The three threads were interwoven with the SAP “Intelligent Enterprise” corporate narrative. They are both strategies for SAP’s approach to the market and signals on the direction that SAP has chosen to go as 2020 evolves.
Sustainability
Early in his speech, Christian Klein set the thematic tone with this: “We can become more resilient and make sustainability profitable, and profitability sustainable.”
NO!! ABSOLUTELY NOT!!
I’ve had this discussion with them in the past. Let me say it again. Equating sustainability’s raison d’etre as profitability is LITERALLY the wrong message to send to EVERYONE IN THE ENTIRE WORLD except the most mercenary and crass business buttheads – which at last look wasn’t an actual target market. The purpose of sustainability’s evolution as a global concern is that it is a GLOBAL CONCERN. We need to do something that not only provides the support of our global economic engine but in the process saves the earth from ecological disaster. The message and focus of sustainability is NOT “support the global economic engine.” It is “save the earth from ecological disaster.” There is NO other message. The economics are implied, but they are not the purpose. Get it? Not…the…purpose.
To SAP’s credit, and to my relief, when Christian Klein dug into sustainability, it was properly positioned for what the value really is – it helps the world be a healthier and better place for all of us. But, when a CEO speaks, and is setting the framework, not just for the speech, but for the direction of his company for the coming period – especially in the midst of dramatic uncertainty – it isn’t wise to undercut your own position right from the start for the sake a glib phrase. I must assume that this SAP 2014 idea “sustainability = profitability” was thrown in there because it sounds cool – and thus would be a good social media soundbite. Sadly, this kind of thinking suborns vision, mission, and strategies. To be fair, this kind of digestible marketing is rampant throughout the industry, in all kinds of formats. Another example, just to give you some context, is the need for some obscure reason, to have your outlook defined by terms that all start with the same letter. Especially C. But even D’s and P’s get some play. Here’s an example. Here’s another example. Another. The last one, The Four Cs of Business Communication is particularly ridiculous because to meet the requirement of the 4 Cs the fourth one is Communication. One of the C’s of communication is communication. I think that makes the point. Intelligent thinking eats glibness for lunch. Peter Drucker didn’t say this. I did. You can tweet it.
Even though this was a faux pas for SAP, I know that they don’t think of sustainability solely in terms of its value to revenue. As far back as 2018, SAP had gotten past that antiquated, and just wrong public message and situated their good work on sustainability especially around reducing the carbon footprint where it categorically and properly belongs – under the aegis of “good for mankind – and the earth.” Look at this commercial they did with Clive Owens in 2018.
That’s the SAP that I want to see. A business that is interested in doing good as well as doing business – and gets the relationship between them. And I don’t mean “sustainability = profitability” when I say that.
Resiliency aka Resilience
The most powerful message was around resiliency, especially as we endure a pandemic and global disruption, was resiliency. SAP’s focus on the supply chain, logistics and the back office during our current crisis has been maybe not sexy, but an important initiative with supply chains stretched to breaking points. I reported on this back in April when SAP released a number of applications for free to not only their customers but to the world in general to help strengthen the supply chain as it was being nearly pulled apart at the time due to panic-driven massively increased demand. Remember the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020? Oh wait…not over yet. But SAP recognized its responsibility not just as a business but as a good corporate citizen and did and continues to do something for the general good.
Like anything else (see later) the key to focusing around these three themes are not the words spoken, but the actions taken. And it’s not just the actions taken but also the purpose driving the actions. It goes to the heart of something I have been saying for the last several months to all businesses:
You will be judged later on what you do now.
Resiliency though is something that SAP can not only interweave in its messaging around intelligent enterprise but something that they can genuinely support the market on. They have the tools and the solutions as well as the experience and history to engage with companies at every level from business continuity to supporting a transition from a traditional to a digital supply chain.
Profitability
I’m going to ignore this completely. It really needs little to no explanation.
The missing
I don’t know if you noticed but I haven’t made a single reference to SAP CX. Odd, wouldn’t you say, since my actual wheelhouse resides in the land of CRM, CX and CE. You know why I haven’t made any references? Because other than a brief arcane reference to C4HANA, THERE WASN’T ANY DISCUSSION OF SAP CX and that is an astounding and glaring oversight that is not just because I am a CRM/CX/CE guy. This complete and incredibly puzzling omission comes five years after their first pivot to customer experience and customer engagement (2015) and then what they called a pivot but was a 360-degree pirouette in 2018 to customer experience and customer engagement. Read this post I wrote in 2018 that covers both the pivot and the pirouette.
To show their commitment and good faith, they finally got rid of the SAP Hybris name and it became SAP CX. Then they went ahead and got industry legend, Bob Stutz, the Godfather of CRM Technology (I get to say that if I want to) as the President of CX, (here is his appearance on CRM Playaz about 45 days ago) and brilliant CX industry analyst Esteban Kolsky to be their CX strategist. That seemed to show that SAP was serious about their pivot/pirouette to the customer and to CX/CE and CRM in general.
Or so I thought.
But that went away if Christian Klein’s keynote is any indicator. There was no sign at all that SAP was committed to their CX practice after former CEO Bill McDermott literally stated for the record that the customer and CX were SAP’s most important initiatives. I know that SAP is going to say to me that “Hey we are still committed to the customer.” I know that. I’m not equating commitment to customers as only realizable to CX solutions. So don’t even go there, please. However, that said, how do you expect to serve the Intelligent Enterprise if CRM, customer experience and customer engagement solutions aren’t a major part of the visible portfolio and platform? That doesn’t seem apparent when there was NO emphasis at all on it.
Harken back to 2018 and a quarterly earnings call with Bill McDermott, then CEO and now CEO of ServiceNow. Here is a summary of it from a post by ZDNet Editor in Chief Larry Dignan:
“SAP CEO Bill McDermott is aligning his company behind a next-gen CRM platform that will take direct aim at Salesforce. Details about this effort are scarce–at least until SAP Sapphire in June, but McDermott’s “we want CRM” mantra raises an interesting question: How vulnerable is Salesforce?
McDermott, speaking on SAP’s first quarter earnings conference call, couldn’t stop talking about CRM. Analysts played along and asked a bevy of CRM questions. In broad strokes, McDermott indicated the following:
- CRM needs to be reinvented in a way that ties back end processes to the front end.
- The cloud enables a company like SAP to be more line of business and front office.
- SAP’s acquisitions of Gigya and Callidus give it a big CRM opportunity.
- Customers are becoming concerned about Salesforce’s pricing and wallet share.”
Ignoring the stupid #4 comment on Salesforce — because the one thing I won’t listen to vendors on is their opinions on their competitors — this is what became the FOCUS of SAPPHIRE 2018 and now it seems to be erased. I know CEOs have to find their own direction. I get that. But to pivot 180 degrees again to something that ignores reality – CRM is the largest business software market in the world – CX and customer engagement only make that customer-facing market even larger – and that SAP has a considerable investment in it, is a major mistake.
If I was SAP, I would immediately deny what I am saying and then send out a justifiable case on their commitment SAP CX and thus to the customer-facing requirements that companies have. I don’t say they aren’t committed. I’m saying they showed no evidence of it in their current and upcoming direction.
The Production: It Matters in a Digital Age
On a recent CRM Playaz episode leading up to PegaWorld, Don Schuerman, CTO of Pegasystems and rather awesome guy, had a really important observation/insight: because of the current global physical and social crisis, when it comes to how businesses have to think about what and how they present to the world, “we are moving from theatrical to cinematic.”
That observation is a definitive one. We are living in a world that currently may be loosening the restrictions but has been through lockdown at home and severe limitations imposed on running any physical business. Digital efforts, while not full blown transformation which requires a lot more than use of more digital tools in volume (a subject for another day), are how we communicate with one another now and for the foreseeable future – and, honestly, beyond that. I don’t think we are going back to the same paradigms and practices that we had – though that’s probably stating the obvious.
What does that mean when a business presents itself to the rest of the world which may be watching and listening but is physically invisible or at most, virtually represented?
For several years, I have been making the point to my clients and to the market as a whole that, in the business technology industry, like it or not, we live in a world defined by the efforts that Salesforce and particularly Marc Benioff have been making. Their efforts are not only driving information to the market and to their constituencies, but they have built an engaging culture and a marketing machine that has been, to say the least, theatrical. Their success at doing it that way sets the bar, whether their competitors like it or not. Consequently, one piece of advice I have consistently told my clients (though not Salesforce since, well…) is “you have to be more theatrical.” And, to the point, some of them were and it made a difference. The use of theatre – the acting, the elaborate, colorful, meaningful imagery, the motion all creates an exciting, if done well, to the point, effort that has emotional impact. Storytelling is part of theatre as much as the costumes, the sets and the actors so to speak. Sometimes it’s just colorful openings to live conferences. One of the best ones I ever saw – done by Adobe in 2018 – was the live conference launch wall video to the Adobe Digital Marketing Summit in Las Vegas. I have a video of it that I took with my phone of 60 seconds of it that’s not great, but it is instructive. Feel free to ask me for it and I’ll send it to you (email me at mail paul-greenberg3@the56group.com). Here’s a screenshot in any case.
But the theatrical depends on the live event even more than it depends on the virtual. Now we need to think cinematically because the triggers and signals at a virtual event are different than at a live one. Plus, it’s been clear for the past few years that video was and is increasingly, the most popular means to consume content. The data is there. Check out the 55 video marketing statistics at biteable.com If you want a strong confirmation of the power of video. Several of them really standout especially given the context we all live in:
- Six out of 10 people would rather watch online videos than television. (Google)
- By 2022, online videos will make up more than 82% of all consumer internet traffic — 15 times higher than it was in 2017. (Cisco)
- 59% of executives say they would rather watch a video than read text. (Wordstream)
- Viewers retain 95% of a message when they watch it in a video, compared to 10% when reading it in text. (Insivia)
- 72% of customers would rather learn about a product or service by way of video. (HubSpot)
- Videos attract 300% more traffic and help to nurture leads. (MarketingSherpa)
- 85% of consumers want to see more video content from brands. (HubSpot)
- 71% of people watch more video than they did a year ago. (HubSpot)
These alone make a great case for video – and the other 47 just enhance it even more. Which is why cinematic is the order of the day.
What SAP did here was hit one out of the park to the point that the cinematics of the keynote literally set the standard for all conferences to come. They did a BRILLIANT job of producing the content they needed to reach the hundreds of thousands who were likely to be either viewing the event live or would be watching in the coming weeks.
Think about it. It was a few actual people, a lot of green screens in a remote environment, with a lot, if not all the shooting of the video being done in excellent bandwidth optimized high definition – from remote locations across the world. Yet, the quality of the cinematics was off the charts superb and the story being told using them with the green screens brilliantly done. I’m not speaking to the content – which is what I address above. I’m speaking to the narrative supported by the cinematics. That is at least so far, given that we are all trying to find our way in this new (hat tip to Phil Fersht) abnormal , which is becoming a new normal – though not there yet. But SAP nailed it. And all their competitors need to watch the keynote and some of the other sessions (not all of them) and learn how to present something.
But…and there is a “but” here…that leads to one of the great conundrums of the direction of SAP. The combination of the brilliance of the cinematics with a head-scratching move that was so severe that I needed to put Neosporin on my scalp.
The Great Conundrum: I can’t HEAR the ocean, but I can SEE the currents
During the keynote I saw what may be one of the greatest case studies I have ever seen in terms of what a case study in this era needs to be. What are the characteristics of producing a great case study, you ask? Okay, maybe you don’t ask, but I’ll tell you anyway.
- It needs to show the use of the vendor’s solutions, tools, services but in an unobtrusive way – with the focus squarely on the customer’s activities.
- If in a video format especially, it CAN’T be a senior executive at the customer’s company talking about the greatness of the vendor.
- If in a video format, it CAN be a day in the life of the company – and ideally – the course of that day (using the vendor’s solutions being implied and explicit where needed) in the company’s customer/company ecosystem.
- It needs to be able to resonate with the lives of those watching or reading it. Meaning, even though it’s a particular customer, the universal nature of the activities needs to be presented in a way that makes the reader/viewer say, “I can see that.” Because in other ways, they do “that.”
It needs to show the value of the products/services but here it veers a bit depending on the type of format. If it’s in readable form, there needs to be some data to show the “provable” value of the solutions/products/services etc. If it’s a video, it needs to show the effectiveness of the solutions/products/services in supporting the frictionless operations of the business and interactions with the customer and the subsequent improvement in the experience of the customer with the case study’s subject company. Graphical data can also be a part of it.
There is more to this, but I’ll leave it at that.
SAP did this with their customer. They showed the customer of their customer’s experience from the consumer side on their mobile device for the most part and showed what happened when the customer/consumer, using that mobile device, made customized choices for what they wanted to buy. Then they showed the workflows, operational requirements, production cycles, supply chain activities, logistics, shipping and delivery and the consumer taking delivery of their product and the follow up and feedback from the customer/consumer to the company etc. The end to end ecosystem in action and SAP’s back and front office platform supporting it.
Fantastic. Truly. One for the ages.
But…again with the buts.
You’ll notice that I left out the customer. The reason was that the customer is the conundrum. The brilliance of the case study was marred by the choice of the customer. The customer was Porsche. And the consumer, who was identified as Christian (again, what the…?) was buying a custom-built Porsche.
This is tone deaf. At a point where in the U.S. alone over 13.3 percent of the workforce (over 21 million) are out of work, the world is plunging into a deep recession and maybe even a depression, your customer choice is something that only the wealthy can consider even in good times? What the….?
Tone-deaf.
Watch the case study. You’ll see what I mean both on the extraordinary quality of the concept and the production and the just wrong choice of customer.
Which is a real shame because the format and execution of the case study shows that SAP is thinking in ecosystems and platforms, it bodes well for their future when it comes to the intelligent enterprise but it also goes to the heart of why they sometimes just don’t gain the traction that this brilliantly innovative company could gain. They trip on their own feet.
In Sum…
As tough as I’m being on SAP, I think that despite the major shortcoming, they have begun to define a “sustainable” direction for themselves. Because they have behaved admirably in the course of the crisis both on the pandemic and on taking actions against racism and for diversity (for one example, listen to the opening statement of the Q&A with the SAP Executive Board), their actions during the crisis, support their commitment to sustainability and especially to resilience. These themes only resonate if you can show the actions you are willing to take and the investments you are willing to make. Just saying things doesn’t make you great. They are acting on behalf of the commitments that they make.
The good news this year is that they solidified the intelligent enterprise as their core narrative, and it aligns truly well with their core offerings. They interwove meaningful themes around sustainability, resiliency and profitability – themes that as we uncertainly go back to work – or at least those surviving elements of what work was – necessarily, they are concerns that businesses and their customers have about the lives they live, the world they live in, and the business that they conduct.
All good.
The tone deafness of the customer choice – its bad but not earth shattering.
But the omission of CX as a major part of their thinking and possibly their portfolio is very troubling to me – as it would obviously be.
So, all in all, it’s mixed. I applaud SAP for some of what I heard and remain a fan of the company. I admire its commitments and achievements not only overall but especially during the pandemic/social unrest where they have been responsive with not just the mea culpas that everyone seems to be throwing around concerning systemic racism but with action which is what matters.
But they do need to respond to the puzzling lack of CX as part of their strategic direction. Yet another pivot, or just an oversight that they can fix? I’d love it to be the latter, but I’ll wait to hear.
The WFH Model Is Changing Customer Service for Good
As the dust settled on what most have deemed the “new normal” of working from home, many industries — including customer service — rapidly shifted operations to be remote work-friendly.
At the same time, call volumes increased exponentially: During the last few months, airlines saw a 199 percent increase in customer inquiries, while grocers saw a 39 percent increase.
While the continuity of access to customer service is vital in normal circumstances, the sharp increase in customer demands during the pandemic has made it even more critical.
By overcoming reservations surrounding the idea of working from home in the customer service industry, many companies found real, upfront benefits from utilizing remote teams, including flexible business operations, lower absenteeism and increased productivity.
The implications of the shift to remote customer service teams aren’t limited to short-term benefits of business continuity and keeping representatives safe from COVID-19. There are long-term considerations for the customer service industry as well.
Call centers have been forced into overdrive to change business processes and policies on working from home — such as providing representatives with equipment they can use at home and scheduling staff in a way that ensures customers have access to service 24/7 — while keeping in mind the unique challenges of balancing work life with home life.
Despite the challenges, remote working has accelerated the pace of customer service transformation to digital, expanding opportunities for staff to work from the comfort of their living room (or kitchen!) — and it will occupy a permanent place in the call centers of the future.
Unique Benefits of Remote Working for Customer Service
Before the onset of COVID-19, many call centers around the world operated in an in-person environment because of the normal expectations within the customer service industry. However, with the push to remote working, companies have had to rethink their policies and turn call center support from an in-person job to one that can be done in a safe, home environment.
Many businesses generally have been successful in making this transition, but customer service representatives are in a unique position because of the need for specialized tools to pull up customer information, keep customer satisfaction high, and handle inquiries from a number of channels: telephone, digital and social media.
As it turns out, there are several benefits to having remote customer service teams:
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1. Time Savings and Productivity Gains
Companies and staff alike are saving money and time. Employees are saving money on commuting costs, and remote customer service teams can handle 13 percent more requests each day, according to
a study by Quarterly Journal of Economics.
2. Business Flexibility
The key benefits that make remote working for customer service worthwhile also go well beyond return on investment and meeting key performance indicators.
With remote teams, a business can become more flexible. Representatives working for customer service outsourcers can shift schedules to assist clients depending on volume spikes and where there’s a need. For example, there could be a greater need for representatives to be at the ready on Monday mornings, or Wednesday during lunch may be when call volumes hit a high for the day.
Whether working for an outsourcer or providing in-house customer service, working from home allows representatives to be “on call” in the comfort of their home vs. “always on” at the office, which allows for a better work-life balance too.
3. More Recruiting Options
Business flexibility is coupled with more recruiting options and an expanded talent pool to handle scale. Many job seekers are looking for flexible work as an incentive, with more than 40 percent of millennials saying that the
flexibility to work from anywhere is a priority when evaluating job opportunities.
Many companies, such as Amazon and American Express, boast a significant number of remote work opportunities. By taking location out of the equation, a remote customer service model makes it easier to scale teams, attract high-quality applicants, and increase the likelihood of new hire retention.
4. Improve Employee Retention
When companies see increased retention rates, it usually means they’re reducing absenteeism and increasing staff happiness — and remote work figures largely in these successes.
The
retention rate for remote representatives is 80 percent, versus 24 percent for those who work on site, partly because remote representatives are empowered to have control over their own schedules and create schedules unique to their availability.
5. Potential to Improve Customer Loyalty
More importantly, when representatives are satisfied with their job, it increases the likelihood they will provide excellent customer service.
At the end of the day, the goal for customer service is to ensure customers are satisfied with their experience, which leads to better loyalty. From a business perspective, when staff are engaged and happy with their work, they tend to be more productive, which can help them manage the increased call volumes happening across customer service departments right now.
Once businesses are able to reopen their offices, it might be wise to keep at least some customer service staff remote, as those representatives can fill in the gaps for on-site call centers to ensure there’s no disruption of service.
How Remote Work Forces Customer Service to Change
What will be seen over the next few months — and years — is that representatives will be more technologically savvy, especially as customer demand for 24/7 service grow.
Customers want to talk to a representative on multiple channels, whether it’s through chat on a website, direct message on social media, or through traditional phone calls. So, with the push to remote work allowing for greater usage of technology, teams will be that much more ready — and sufficiently knowledgeable — to use the technology at their fingertips.
Remote work has accelerated technology adoption of tools that allow staff to do their jobs seamlessly and effectively, all while giving a boost to employee morale.
Many companies are now aware that work productivity tools like those from Zoom and Slack bridge the distance between remote staff, and strengthen the relationship between staff and managers — which is a key component of engagement and improved productivity.
As for the technologies that support representatives in their roles, automation tools and dashboards are and will continue to be a necessity for keeping pace with customer demands and helping staff work efficiently. For example, automated chatbots can help customers get answers to simple questions while representatives focus on servicing customers who have more complex issues.
Looking ahead to how remote work will impact the future of customer service, companies can help ensure operations are seamless while addressing considerations such as how to train employees virtually and ensure the flow of information is secure.
There are numerous benefits to switching to remote customer service operations now and keeping these policies alive after COVID-19. Failure to take this transition seriously not only will cause business disruptions, but also will cause companies to be left behind the rest of the industry while changes are happening quickly — and for the better.
The Power of Data to Do Good #TIBCO4Good

Reading Time: 2 minutes
Data is the transformative fuel that is changing the global economy. Partnering with TIBCO has allowed data-savvy businesses to lead in their respective industries and transform their strategies, cultures, and capabilities. But it’s not just businesses that are facing complex data challenges. Many of the world’s most pressing societal, educational, and scientific issues also depend on the ability to harness the power of data in order to gain insights, make smarter decisions, and implement the systems, applications, and processes that create change on a human scale.
TIBCO4Good applies the same technologies, strategies, and leadership deployed for business to the most pressing societal issues we face across the globe. TIBCO4Good is a way to come together as a community and harness data “for good.” Because nearly every complex challenge our planet and societies are facing is rooted in vast streams and reservoirs of data and confounded by the complexity of difficult-to-make decisions.
A great example of this initiative at work can be seen in the recent efforts by TIBCO’s data science team, led by Michael O’Connell, to create a Visual Analytics Hub to bring a data-centric approach to visualizing the deeper implications of the COVID-19 pandemic and build a fact-based understanding of reproduction, growth, and healthcare resources.
TIBCO + Conan Swag for Partners in Health
On a lighter note, as a part of #TIBCO4GOOD, TIBCO has kicked off a new project, inspired by the “Zoombombing” of our newest team member, Conan O’Brien. Conan crashed a recent TIBCO conference call and asked our CEO Dan Streetman, “Could I at least get a TIBCO sweatshirt out of this? We all know you have like fifty in the trunk of your car.”
Well, Conan—and everyone else eying Dan’s snazzy TIBCO jacket—now you too can purchase “TIBCO + Conan” branded apparel at www.tibcoswag.com. TIBCO will donate all proceeds from items purchased, up to a total of $ 50,000 to Partners in Health (PIH), a social justice organization supporting emergency response during the COVID-19 crisis, as highlighted by Conan.
Anyone around the world can shop the site and help support Partners in Health (PIH) as they mobilize high-impact programs to control the spread of COVID-19 and ensure that the most vulnerable receive access to dignified care. Learn more about how PIH is helping with COVID-19 emergency response here.
We’ll be back soon with more updates on new and upcoming TIBCO4Good Initiatives and how you can get involved. For more information on the program and the work that we’re doing, head to https://www.tibco.com/tibco4good.
“Presidency is about a lot more than tweeting from your golf cart” as Trump says “much very good”
“As the death toll in the coronavirus pandemic neared 100,000 Americans this Memorial Day weekend, President Trump derided & insulted perceived enemies & promoted a baseless conspiracy theory, in between rounds of golf.”
Perhaps Howard Stern, of all people, said it best: “The oddity in all of this is the people Trump despises most, love him the most. The people who are voting for Trump for the most part … He’d be disgusted by them.” The tragedy is that they are not disgusted by him in return.
In order to think about why these men support Trump, one must first to grasp how deeply they are betraying their own definition of masculinity by looking more closely at the flaws they should, in principle, find revolting.
Is Trump honorable? This is a man who routinely refused to pay working people their due wages, and then lawyered them into the ground when they objected to being exploited. Trump is a rich downtown bully, the sort most working men usually hate.
Is Trump courageous? Courtiers like Victor Davis Hanson have compared Trump to the great heroes of the past, including George Patton, Ajax, and the Western gunslingers of the American cinema. Trump himself has mused about how he would have been a good general. He even fantasized about how he would have charged into the middle of the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, without a weapon. “You don’t know until you test it,” he said at a meeting with state governors just a couple of weeks after the massacre, “but I really believe I’d run in there, even if I didn’t have a weapon, and I think most of the people in this room would have done that too.” Truly brave people never tell you how brave they are. I have known many combat veterans, and none of them extols his or her own courage. What saved them, they will tell you, was their training and their teamwork. Some—perhaps the bravest—lament that they were not able to do more for their comrades.
But even if we excuse Trump for the occasional hyperbole, the fact of the matter is that Trump is an obvious coward. He has two particular phobias: powerful men and intelligent women.
The attacks from Trump come as the country’s death toll from the virus nears the 100,000 mark and the ensuing economic devastation worsens. As criticism of Trump’s handling of the crisis has mounted, he has turned to his Twitter feed to air grievances and settle scores. He has baselessly accused a stream of perceived opponents of committing crimes, including illegal espionage and election rigging.
[…]
Trump, a president with a penchant for fanning the conspiratorial flames with fabricated allegations, seemed eager for something to use against Scarborough.
In a November 2017 tweet, the president asked when NBC would “terminate low ratings Joe Scarborough based on the ‘unsolved mystery’ that took place in Florida years ago? Investigate!”
Data for Good in the Fight Against COVID-19

Reading Time: 3 minutes
More than any other time in recent memory, we are seeing the private sector step up to make a difference. In response to the coronavirus pandemic, companies have taken action to retain their workforces, extend benefits, and support those who are quarantined. Some have donated money or protective equipment to frontline healthcare workers and local nonprofits. At TIBCO, our response includes all of these elements plus one more: leveraging our core competency in software and data to make predictive tools about the pandemic available to all who need them.
For 20 years, TIBCO has helped solve complex data challenges for companies and organizations globally. I’m a huge believer in the power of the #Data4Good movement, and TIBCO has a history of engaging in social issues through data-driven insight. Our data scientists have tackled problems as diverse as the San Francisco area’s housing crisis to how local authorities in South Africa can prevent the poaching of endangered species. COVID-19 presents our greatest challenge – and opportunity – to use data for good.
Here’s a screenshot of one of our dashboards. It’s part of our suite of data visualizations that provide valuable insights about the progress of COVID-19 to partners:
In March, we dedicated significant resources to gather, analyze, visualize, and publish comprehensive data tools tracking the outbreak and response. Early in the pandemic, our data team built a hub of visual and predictive analytics based on trusted, publicly available sources, along with local and county-level data. It is all available at TIBCO.com/covid19 – a data-fueled and thoughtful exploration of the coronavirus pandemic and what is being done about it.
Our goal is to understand the outbreak in real time at a community level, and assess the effects of non-pharmaceutical social interventions. Our tools offer guidance for resource planning, along with economic and supply chain considerations for healthcare facilities across the world. To be clear, we aren’t a team of epidemiologists. We are data scientists and technologists providing a service that helps empower public health officials through actionable insights and information. In the hands of governments, health institutions, researchers, and others on the frontline of the pandemic, these tools are helping to predict the effects of interventions and track viral recoveries in real time.
This data is critical in planning how and when we reopen our communities and restart our economy.
What’s inspiring to me is how much this exercise has galvanized our team. They’ve always been highly motivated and this event has built even stronger bonds – an important development, especially when we are all home working remotely.
I’m also inspired that we’re not alone. Many companies – big and small – are putting their core capabilities to work in service of pandemic response. In some cases, people, products, and innovation can be businesses’ greatest contribution. For example, Mercedes AMG helped develop breathing aids that were deployed to COVID-19 patients in the UK. Change Healthcare has developed an analytical tool that gives hospitals a centralized place to visualize a range of data types and to model various scenarios impacting clinical, financial, and operational aspects of healthcare organizations.
Providing our online dashboard tools at no cost was an easy decision for us. We invite partners to use our tools at TIBCO.com. We’re making them available to everyone online and are partnering more deeply with governments and institutions responding to this crisis. If you think these tools can help in new ways, let us know. This is a defining moment in our lives, and it is also a defining moment for businesses to step up and lead. I’m inspired by the steps so many have taken – and we’re ready to keep going, together.
Facing the crisis with the human spirit: Science and our good nature

Why is this post up again: The new introduction
This has been my favorite blog post of all time. I think I first wrote it in 2014, then I put it up here on ZDNet in 2015, and it will be my introductory post for my new blog, called “The Science of Business, The Art of Life and Live from NY” (aka SBALLNY), which is coming to a website near you in the next three weeks I’d venture to say.
I’m putting it up once again.
The reason I’m doing it is it goes to human history and the efforts that human beings make in times of innovation and in times of crisis. In the midst of the current global pandemic, it never hurts to remember that we are an infinitely creative, innovative, and a good species. And that while this may be the first in our lifetimes and the first in 100 years, we have managed to survive several pandemics, even those well before the 1918 Spanish Flu, such as the Black Death. Following those, we have continued to flourish as a species and progress as a society. So, this may be unprecedented in our lifetime, but not in history.
While this blog post is focused on a person, one of the world’s greatest (and yet little known) scientists (Roger Bacon) and on a specific time in history (the 13th century), what it focuses in on is why we always can have hope and not despair when horrible events like this devastate the population. The entirety of this tome is centered on one passage (which you will read again very shortly):
The very hallmark of continued human social existence has been that each of us as a human, has an infinite capacity to create something that in some way, incrementally and on occasion profoundly impacts the continued existence of society and the human species. It’s happened frequently enough throughout history, with the right combinations of people and resources, to so far, ensure, at least for now, the continued existence and even flourishing of humanity and the cultures and society associated with it, with all their problems, glitches, denial of opportunities, errors of judgment and action, and even criminality. Despite the bad, we survive as a species and grow. Because the good always outweighs the bad, and over time, even if it doesn’t seem so, overcomes the bad. That tells you something — human beings, as a rule, are good, not evil, despite the cynics who would have you think otherwise. Complaining doesn’t solve problems — finding solutions to the problems solve them.
We’ve done this successfully throughout history and will do it again now. Human beings with all their strange behaviors are as a whole a noble lot. They are better at doing good than they are at doing evil, and history bears that out.
So, let’s take a break and a moment, and let me take you on a journey to the 13th century via the mind of Roger Bacon and through science and through a personal journey that I’ve been on for many decades, which, as I am now 70, have some peace with. I hope that you are willing to read this to the end. It’s very long, so maybe not. Either way. Please read what you can and reflect on the fact that we are good people, and good people will solve bad problems in a good way — said with science and data in mind, as well as emotions.
Introduction to Roger Bacon and the 13th century through my lens
Much as I like to think and act exuberantly in the celebration of the abundance of life, I have days where I recognize that I’m 64 years old. Some of those days, I embrace the fact. Some of those days I just feel it.
When I embrace the fact, I also embrace one of the things that the older among us can claim, that our younger brethren can’t yet. I can contemplate not just the present and my plans for the future, though I do that always, but also the legacy that I’d like to provide as I leave my footprints embedded in time.
In the course of mulling this over a few weeks ago, while recovering from vocal cord surgery, I began to think about something that often comes up from my storehouse of memories — the work I did many years ago on 13th-century science and culture, and in particular, a medieval friar of the Franciscan Order, Roger Bacon. He’s someone who, when I was writing my varying tomes on the period and the man and science in general, I began to believe — and still do — might have been one of the greatest scientists in the history of our species.
My purpose in writing about this is not to debate with you whether he was or is great. That is both a debate beyond the scope of this post and beyond any contemporary research anyone reading this (or writing this) is likely to have done. It’s also one that, regardless of the outcome, won’t move the chain in human thinking one iota. So, please treat what I’m going to be saying about Roger Bacon and his role instead as both data point and a metaphor for what I’m want to talk about.
Continuing…
All this mulling led me to what I wrote years ago to understand my present behavior. It gave me a little more insight into the legacy that I am trying to leave. But it reminded me of something else, too. Something that perhaps we often forget in the course of our very lucky lives as people who have a shot at helping to transform the world we live in.
Here’s what that is:
The very hallmark of continued human social existence has been that each of us as a human, has an infinite capacity to create something that in some way, incrementally and on occasion profoundly impacts the continued existence of society and the human species. It’s happened frequently enough throughout history, with the right combinations of people and resources, to so far, ensure, at least for now, the continued existence and even flourishing of humanity and the cultures and society associated with it, with all their problems, glitches, denial of opportunities, errors of judgment and action, and even criminality. Despite the bad, we survive as a species and grow. Because the good always outweighs the bad, and over time, even if it doesn’t seem so, overcomes the bad. That tells you something — human beings, as a rule, are good, not evil, despite the cynics who would have you think otherwise. Complaining doesn’t solve problems — finding solutions to the problems solve them.
So, in the following paragraphs, please bear with me and take to heart if you can what Bacon and (if I’m not being too presumptuous) I say about invention, the human spirit, the art of science, and the abilities of every one of us as a human being to transcend and master the course of our own existence in a practical way, not just via some flight of fancy. As you read this post, Bacon’s speech is couched in religious terms (e.g. God the Creator, etc.,) — as well they should be, since he was a Franciscan friar in the 13th century. But the content and the principles should be taken in a secular light.
My voice, on the other hand, is not religious at all. Here we go.
The 13th century: Cultural optimism drives the… horse
Throughout his entire adult life at the core of his very being, Roger Bacon (1214 to 1292) believed that human beings could not only master the laws of nature but to even change them through invention and creation. His approach, though, wasn’t something carved from fantasy but was rooted in a rational science that was both derived from universal principles and supported via experimentation. He’s often called the Father of Experimental Science (a lot more important than the Godfather of CRM).
This idea, completely radical for the 13th century, is now self-evident to us: The verification of hypotheses through observation, experience, methodological rigor, and discovery. You might think, “Bad start, Paul. What’s the big deal about that?” For the 21st century, thanks to Bacon and his successors, it isn’t a big deal. It’s what especially contemporary scientists do. But in the 13th century, this was revolutionary and would, if it gained popular credence, overturn the bulk of so-called scientific approaches at the time. Science was based more on argument and natural philosophy, rather than a rigorous approach that used the actual practical testing of hypothesis to verify or deny the hypothesis.
To super-simplify (again, this post isn’t meant to be highly detailed on areas that I’m not an expert in, but I do know something of the era), the accepted approach to science when the 13th century began was debating and arguing the hypothesis, and the more “rational” argument would win. Experimental science changed that.
What made this so exciting was the 13th century was when civilization began to advance with these kinds of ideas in mind for the first time at scale. They were premised on a broad cultural optimism, which, when articulated, said that each one of us was capable of what was called special revelation — a creative spark that could generate a new idea that could impact the course of things up to and including all civilization.
Though God may have gifted us with that creative spark, the idea that was generated was generated via an individual human being’s thinking process. The advocates of experimental science were effectively saying, “OK, we think that this idea has some merit. Let’s take it, test it, and see if it works and if the results have applicable value.” This concept germinated in a Europe that was undergoing what might have been a renaissance before the Renaissance we know in the 15th century. The flowering of the arts and the sciences and desire to discover were given the scale and, equally as good, funding, in places like the courts of Frederick II of Hohenstaufen, who was the Holy Roman Emperor, and his cousin, Alfonso X, also known as Alfonso el Sabio (the Wise) of Castile. These leaders weren’t just conquerors and heads of state; they were patrons who funded scientists, engineers, artists, philosophers, and others who were generating new ways of looking at the world and creating new tools and products that would make the world more productive.
For example, Frederick II of Hohenstaufen was the sponsor at his court of Salerno, the leading medical school of the 13th century. Alfonso X, not only sponsored original experimentation and research but also was a hands-on researcher himself. His Libros de saber de Astronomia, which were astronomical tables that he and a research team he led compiled, were the industry-standard until Tycho Brae revised them in the 16th century. In conjunction with this research, scientists and engineers at his court invented a mechanical clock to measure time with more precision.
But the inventions weren’t just for a small group in a royal court. There were practical technologies that were created and applied to the larger world — and, were, in the context of their era, far more important to the continuation and evolution of the species that the things that we tend to call “disruptive” or “innovative” today. (On a whole other subject, we throw around the terms “disruptive” and “innovative” far too much for things that are neither). For example, during that time, the leather yoke, far more flexible than the yokes of the past, were used to drive horses, rather than the oxen used in the past to do agricultural work. The results were spectacular. Man, doing the agricultural work produced 45-foot pounds of work per second. Oxen with the rigid yoke produced 288-foot pounds per second; the horse with the flexible leather yoke produced 432-foot pounds per second and could work two hours longer than an ox — work efficiency increase of 65% in the fields.
The other agricultural breakthrough of the period was the widespread adoption of three-field crop rotation, a significant change from the centuries-old, two-field crop rotation. I won’t go into what this is in the interests of space, but if you are interested, check the short and sweet explanation given here. Suffice to say, it protected and even replenished nutrients in the soil rather than just drained them.
A third breakthrough, which added to this agricultural boom, was the introduction of hydraulic power via the waterwheel (which also had a huge industrial impact, too). For example, in Flanders, sandy marshland became fertile cropland, as hundreds of waterwheels irrigated thousands of acres.
The combination of these three breakthroughs, when applied to agriculture, led to grain yields increasing from an 11th century high of 2.5 measures per measure sown to four measures per measure sown, which amounts to a 100% increase in disposable foodstuffs. Talk about disruptive! Many more human beings got to eat more healthily thanks to this technological revolution. I don’t mean to be disrespectful, but compare that to what I’ve heard called “disruptive” over the last few years. (Uber. Better taxis? Groupon. Delivering discount coupons? Not disruptive. Sorry.)
But it wasn’t just the breakthroughs themselves that characterized this era. The 13th century was also a period of self-revelation when the human species began to realize that it was special. It had the power to transform nature, not just react to it, as most animals do. It also celebrated that special capability.
Let me explain it another way.
I would imagine that many of us, given our somewhat privileged existences and the commoditization of international transportation, have been to Europe and seen in one place or other gothic cathedrals — and, if you have any sense of wonder, have been in awe at the size, complexity, and sheer magnificence of the creations. Many of these, the first groups of them, were built in the 13th century by cathedral builders who were often called master masons or architect engineers, with the express purpose of celebrating God and Creation. But one thing that may not be as obvious is that, in almost all these timeless magnificent buildings, if you look at them closely, man is placed at the apex of creation.
Man is central to the creation of the building and the celebration of God and “capital C” Creation. For example, the interior of the Cathedral at Reims was a maze that represented a holy pilgrimage to Jerusalem. When a visitor to the cathedral solves the maze, they arrive at the center of the cathedral. What that visitor finds at the center of these homages to God and Creation are not the names of any disciples nor Jesus or Mary, but rather the names of the master masons that built the cathedral. These architect-engineers saw themselves as central to the creation of this New Jerusalem, this new and refreshed world of invention, celebration, and abundance. God, in this central area, is portrayed on stained glass windows as an architect-engineer with a compass in his hands.
This spirit of creation and invention was infectious among at least a small group of people who had a significant impact on the health and well-being of the world that they lived in. Witness my man Roger Bacon’s inventive mind — and keep in mind this is the 13th century. This is a famous passage of his foresight that comes from his work Opus Tertium:
“Machines of navigation can be constructed without rowers, as great ships for river or ocean which are borne under the guidance of one man at a greater speed than if they were full of men. Also a chariot that can be constructed that will move at incalculable speed without any draught animals…also flying machines may be constructed so that man may sit in the midst of the machine turning a certain instrument by means of which wings artificially constructed would beat the air after the manner of a bird flying. Also a machine of small size may be made for raising and lowering weights of almost infinite amounts — a machine of the utmost utility.
Machines may be also made for going in sea or river down to the bed without bodily danger…and there are countless other things that can be constructed such as bridges over rivers without pillars or any such support.”
What’s utterly fascinating is, in his Letter Concerning the Marvelous Power of Art and Nature and the Nullity of Magic, Bacon claims to have seen all of them, except the flying machine, which, of course, shows up 300 years later in Da Vinci’s Notebooks. Is that the case? I don’t know, and I doubt anyone ever will. But what makes this incredible regardless is that even if he didn’t see them as a realized work, each of these imagined (or real) inventions has a practical purpose aimed at the betterment of the lot of humans on the planet at that time and in the future. In other words, he was applying a scientific method to providing practical invention (i.e. of real applicable value to the advance of society). Utility in the service of knowledge is essential. There has to be some actual purpose to the creation of knowledge and for its verification. It isn’t created for its own sake.
But, you might argue, what about brand new fresh ideas? Aren’t they sometimes valuable and yet unique and new so their application isn’t so apparent?
The answer to this is well put indirectly by the poet Charles Simic in a recent New York Review of Books article entitled The Prisoner of History:
“I live between two worlds, the one I see with my eyes open and the one I see with my eyes closed. Unlike other people, I regard the two as equals and trust my eyes as much as I trust my imagination.”
In other words, of course, we have to continually try to imagine the new, but it has to be in context — the context of the world as it is and as we imagine it to be with the realization of those new ideas. The key is “realization,” or the practical application of verified ideas to solving a problem or advancing something in the real world.
This could easily characterize Roger Bacon or any of the visionary thinkers of the 13th century. Or any of us, regardless of era, who want to make what we imagine we can do real — rather than just continue to imagine it. This is vision and imagination applied to real-world problems and needs.
All this — agricultural advances, cathedral building, Roger Bacon’s vision — reflected a broad cultural optimism. This optimism — a transformation of thinking about the place of humanity and individuals in the grandest scheme of all, the evolution of life, and the universe — drove a 13th-century technological revolution that increased the capacity of the human species to grow more safely and to utilize its gift more actively in a way that was unmatched until the Renaissance.
Roger Bacon’s contribution to this was the creation and initial application of a scientific method to the evolution of science.
Roger Bacon
Roger Bacon labored through life as an almost heretical Franciscan friar, was persecuted by his own order, and died in 1292 at age 78 despite being imprisoned for a while by his own order. I’m not going to go into the politics of that or the life of Bacon per se, but instead, focus on what he said and saw. Because what he did reflects what each of us as an individual can do in his or her life. Personally, it affects how at least I’m thinking about what I might leave behind, even as I continue to concern myself, as most of us do, with my present and future. I think it’s important because I also think we underestimate exactly who we are and what we are capable of because we get caught up in the minutiae of our everyday existence. We often forget not just the nobility of our own capacity but the actual tools and practices that are there to effect those proficiencies and possibilities.
We are armed with:
- The knowledge of what the human species is
- Who we are as individuals
- The existence of a philosophical framework that gives us some context to work within
- The ability to reason
- Tools and practices
Having all this makes us responsible at some point in our life to choose a way to use all this amazing potential and engage with the world to realize that potential and benefit more than just ourselves. We are each at different levels in our journey to figure this out and each at different degrees of commitment to trying to benefit others, rather than just intend to.
I’ve reached the age where, at least for me, I know what I want to do and how I want to do it and am beginning to consider what kind of memory it will leave when my time on Earth ends. It’s a bit frightening, to be honest, because I don’t want to consider it, but considering it I am.
In that consideration, Roger Bacon has been a paradigm for me, because of how he thinks about knowledge, science, and execution.
I’ll explain.
The first principle of knowledge in the mind of Bacon was virtue. That is, translated into 21st-century lingo, we have to be good human beings. Bacon understood that there is a clarity that goodness provides that allows one to understand truths — not necessarily or only big universal truths but scientific truths. A good person, because their intent is good, is prone to knowledge, because they are emotionally connected to doing good things. His way of putting it:
“For it is not possible that the soul should rest in the light of truth, while it is stained with sins…Virtue therefore clarifies the mind so that man may comprehend more easily not only moral but scientific truths.” — From the 1268 Opus Majus.
But it goes further than that. None of us, and, I fervently believe this, are devoid of the potential for creativity. We all have an infinite capacity to create and for applying that creativity in beneficial ways — what Bacon calls “special revelation” or what the incredibly underrated philosopher Philo Judaeus calls “a miniature heaven” in his On Creation of the Cosmos According to Moses.
In Bacon’s Opus Tertium:
“…Therefore, this way, which precedes special revelation is the wisdom of philosophy and this wisdom alone is in the power of man, yet supplemented by some divine enlightenment which in this part is common to all, because God is the intelligence active in all our souls in all cognition.”
Bacon is saying what I said: Each of us has that divine spark, the potential to create, but it also is a potential that has to be realized by the individual. God will not do it for you. God grants you the capability and the broad opportunity to act on it. You are responsible to realize your potential and then put it into action in a way that is beneficial. Again, Opus Tertium:
“As God wishes all men to be saved and no man to perish and his goodness is infinite, He always leaves some way possible for man through which he may be urged to seek his own salvation…For this reason, the goodness of God ordained that revelation should be given the world so that the human race may be saved. But this way, which precedes revelation, is given to man so that if he does not wish to follow it, nor seek a fuller truth, he may be justly damned at the end.”
Putting it simply, it would be a horrible waste of each of our lives if we don’t apply this gift in a way that benefits each of and all of us.
I know that this may be arcane for some of you (though, those that it is arcane for probably have stopped reading), waxing too philosophical for others, and maybe you think this is self-indulgent, which, admittedly, it might be. But, aside for what I’m wrestling with as I enter the last third, what Roger Bacon established in the 13th century — via his philosophical framework and the creation of experimental science and what the application of practical science led to with the technological breakthroughs and conjoined cultural optimism of the era — is one of the reasons we can continue to claim innovation and disruption and technological breakthrough and scientific achievement in the 21st century.
So, with that in mind, I’m going to go through one more thing (there is so much more that I’m leaving out) about Roger Bacon concerning experimental science, and then I will close this out with some of why this impacts me so much and how it has impacted what we all do so that we can see things in perspective or — in the context of the biggest picture — the continuation of the human species for the sake of its own growth.
Roger Bacon and the Integritas Sapientiae
Roger Bacon’s approach to experimental science was driven by a framework and a methodology grounded in a deeply rooted philosophy that was verifiable through research and testing — or disproven as such.
In Bacon’s case, the philosophy was defined by the concept of God as the Creator of all things in an orderly fashion. What that implied was that all things were related in some way via the laws that governed them. That meant that, while God created the heavens, Earth, man and woman, the trees, and the fruit that grew on them, all of which were different in visible ways and fashioned for different reasons — they were related to each by the universal laws of creation and the Creator and governed by those same laws.
To Bacon, this translated to eight definable branches of science; the laws of each of them were discoverable with a single, universal method. The sciences (for those of you interested) were:
- Common principles of natural sciences and philosophy
- Optics
- Astronomy
- Barology (the science of weight and its relation to gravity)
- Alchemy (actually chemistry not magic)
- Agriculture
- Medicine
- Experimental science
Bacon called these sciences the integrated sciences. Each of the eight had a unique position in the pantheon of science, but at the same time, all eight played a central role in the body of principle and practice that gave the human species hegemony over nature — the ability to alter it to their benefit.
What do I mean by this? (Hey, don’t shoot the messenger).
For example, to understand agriculture, you had to know botany, soil testing, animal husbandry, and horticulture. Your knowledge as an agricultural scientist had to span the interactions between climate, vegetation, and animal populations. This allowed you to figure out how to improve the conditions that would benefit organic life. Think about the example earlier of the leather yoke, horses, waterwheels, and three-crop rotation that disrupted all previous models for growing food and improved the lives of people everywhere by providing more food. This was a systematic, practical, applicable science.
Science had timely prudence too. For example, Bacon was a strong advocate of military research because of the imminent threat of the Mongol Empire and Genghis Khan — who he saw as the Anti-Christ. By 1241, they had reached the Danube in Europe, so researching war weapons became paramount. Based on both the Opus Majus and, another of his works, De Secretus Operibus, there is evidence that he invented gunpowder (according to arguments made by several scholars). He didn’t envision it as needed for bombs or bullets, per se, but he did see it as something that would defeat the Anti-Christ, Genghis Khan.
This great achievement, the beginnings of a rigorous method for experimental science, was first proposed in both his greatest work, Opus Majus (translates to Great or Big Work, ironically), and in his less well known, Communia Naturalium. While its true value wasn’t realized until the 17th century really, its seeds were planted in the 13th century’s cultural optimism.
There is so much more to Bacon’s experiments. There is some evidence that he invented a telescope and a compound microscope hundreds of years before the accepted dates of their invention. He did what can be seen as seminal work in optics and light and radiation. I could go on. But, to close this out, I want to focus on something I think even more important: His passion for finding the truth in things, in laws, in natural law, in the universe, and in life, and the lessons that I’ve learned at least in the search that he has helped guide me on for my life.
Roger Bacon, on truth and humility
Bacon understood that truth wasn’t only the property of the renowned — all humans were possessors of truth and thus deserved the respect of their peers. Without that humility, not only weren’t you acting like a human being, according to what God provided to you, but you also were denying yourself the opportunity for learning some of the truths that are being made available to you.
Look at these passages in Opus Majus:
- “The wiser men are, the more humbly will they submit to learn from others; they do not disdain the simplicity of those who teach them.”
- “Just as man’s conduct towards God is regulated by the reverence required, so is his conduct toward his neighbor regulated by justice and peace and his duty to himself by integrity of life.”
- “It comes to pass that he who ceases to be a man by the loss of his goodness is turned into a beast.”
Lessons learned
So, what does all this rambling on about Roger Bacon mean, at least to me? Let’s bring it in.
Since I found out about Roger Bacon and was drawn to him, he has been a guidepost for my life — a hero that framed much of what I’ve done with my life. He’s given me guidance in how to be what I hope is a good person, a practical foresighted thinker, and someone who will accomplish something of value on the planet to be remembered by.
Guideposts
- The universe is governed by a natural law that affects all things regardless of apparent differences.
- It is the continuous discovery of that universal natural law and how it works that drives and sustains the human species, whether or not it’s a conscious goal.
- Each human being on this planet, each of us, regardless of life’s station, has been granted an infinite capacity to create and is a possessor of truths that each of us can learn from. Titles and positions don’t matter.
- With that creative capacity, comes the responsibility to actively seek to use it practically to benefit others — either the species as a whole or groups or individuals. We are granted the gift; doing something with it is up to us.
- We each can gain more and greater knowledge if our purpose for gaining it is good (virtuous). That means that we are best served as people if we are driven to do good for more than ourselves.
- There is a rigorous method of going about applying that creative gift — proving what you think, regardless of where you apply it. Bacon’s desire to prove what he supposed and the method he developed can be appropriated by how we produce content, develop technology, and do anything else with our lives. For example, when I write, I am always able to defend what I say. I’ve counseled those of my younger brethren — who tend to be strong-willed and opinionated — that they can write whatever they want, but they need to be prepared to defend whatever they say, which, to be blunt, many times they can’t. You have to be able to show that what you say is defensible by its truths. If it isn’t or you can’t verify the argument, then don’t say it.
Our lives today were nourished in the wellsprings of prior centuries and the prior achievements of our forebears. On the one hand, we should respect that past, but we should never live in it. Because if there is one other thing we learned, it is that our wonderful species is constantly evolving and changing, and we have to both drive that change for the species to continue and respect that change as it occurs.
Roger Bacon was a major influence in teaching me all these things. I don’t know if any of this resonated with you. I don’t know if this was an exercise in sheer self-indulgence. I do know that the impact on me has been to make me think about what I do and who it impacts, act in a fashion that supports reason and truth as best as the flawed creature I am knows how, and at the same time, provides me with a moral compass. I hope that when I finally go, my epitaph does not read, “He was No. 1 in CRM” or “He was the Godfather of CRM,” but instead, it says, “He was a good person” or “He did good.” Then, I’ve fulfilled my life’s purpose and what has been my dream and direction for many years.
News
- Let’s not let the hopeful news get Lost — post No. 3 — will be up later this week. But it will be up.
- If you are interested in joining the hit event The CRM Playaz Present: Playaz Place Bar and Not Grill Happy Hour any time in the next 38 weeks, here is a link to register. Warning: We are sold out (don’t worry its a free ticket) for April 15 and April 22 and selling out (almost gone) for April 29. There are some seats taken through May 13, but all May dates still remain. If you are interested, the Happy Hour is 3:30pm ET every Wednesday. Bring a glass of a drinkable liquid with you. You will be asked about it.
- Also, every Thursday at 3pm ET, The CRM Playaz will do our regular show on industry doings. This week, we have Bob Stutz, President of SAP CX and one of the CRM industry’s great pioneers.
- At 3pm ET on Friday, we solve your problem of missing sports with our new how CRM Playaz: Sports Edition – Excuse the Intrusion. Watch for announcements.
Picking Up Good Vibrations: The Rise of Bone Conduction Technology
Posted by Tom Hansford, Content Specialist
If you have your ear to the ground of modern technology, you may have heard of bone conduction headphones. The gadgets are gaining popularity in Japan and look set to take the world by storm.
Even though the technology is fairly new, bone conduction has been around for centuries. In fact, it’s first credited to Ludwig van Beethoven, the 18th century composer. Beethoven was completely deaf, so he engineered a special rod which connected his piano to his jawbone. When he clamped down on the device, he was able to hear the sound of his celestial symphonies. Or so the story goes.
Traditional headphones create sound vibrations by pushing air, whereas bone conduction headphones send vibrations directly to your inner ear bone, bypassing the eardrum. With a global rise in hearing disorders, the demand for bone conduction headphones has increased rapidly in recent years.
Even if you’re lucky enough to have perfect hearing, there are still lots of reasons to try bone conduction headphones. Wearers enjoy greater awareness of their surroundings, making outside activities like cycling and running far safer. They also provide a unique listening experience which many people prefer. But the most compelling reason to choose bone conduction headphones is simple: they give your precious eardrums a well-deserved break.
Nightclubs, bars, alarms, sirens – our modern world is loud. A daily blasting via bass-laden headphones is the last thing your eardrums need. In fact, the World Health Organization has warned that 1.1 billion people are at risk of hearing loss*, making bone conduction more important than ever before. However, the technology has tended to be big and cumbersome, preventing it from gaining popularity – until now.
BoCo, a Japanese startup, has developed bone conduction headphones small enough to be worn like earbuds. BoCo’s earsopen headphones clip to the earlobes, making them stylish and discreet, whilst keeping the ear canals free to hear outside sounds. BoCo CEO, Hataaki Sha, states:
“We are hoping to enrich the quality of life not only for those people with auditory disorder now, but also those people at risk of hearing loss around the globe by delivering sound that does not require the tympanic membrane (eardrum).”
The earsopen product gained worldwide attention after featuring on popular crowdfunding site, Culture Convenience Club. Today, the headphones are stocked in around 1000 stores in Japan, becoming an instant hit with consumers. But Mr Sha believes this is just the beginning, and is planning for rapid growth all over the world:
“We aim to increase sales by five times in the next fiscal year and increase the overseas ratio to 70%.”
BoCo aren’t stopping at headphones. The company’s docodemoSPEAKER is a small Bluetooth device that uses bone conduction technology to amplify sound, turning almost any physical object into a speaker. You can place the palm-sized speaker onto a kitchen worktop, office desk or chest of drawers and it will pump out the music of your choice, vibrating the object rather than the air.
According to the developer, the sleek, modern speaker works particularly well when listening to acoustic bass notes. BoCo has also developed an accompanying bath capsule, which makes the docodemoSPEAKER completely waterproof. This means you can drop it into a full bathtub and literally immerse yourself in the music.
Having established itself in the Japanese market, Mr Sha is taking BoCo global. So, when choosing a business management platform, he was drawn to the flexibility of the cloud:
“It was impossible to build and operate a mission critical information system in the cloud 10 years ago. Many companies spent a huge amount of time and money introducing on-premise ERP to make management visible, but it quickly becomes rigid.”
BoCo partnered with NetSuite because it wanted to integrate all its core processes into a single cloud platform that can scale as the business expands into new markets, with Mr Sha adding:
“Cloud ERP is an indispensable trick to strengthen competitiveness.”
Now NetSuite is implemented, BoCo is all set for world domination. And remember, you heard it here first.
*https://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2015/ear-care/en/
by NetSuite filed under
‘Good Times’ Star Ja’net DuBois Passes Away
