The Awesomeness Manifesto: Beyond Innovation

Beyond “The Generation M Manifesto”, Umair Haque explicates “The Awesomeness Manifesto” and further engages the community with “Wanted: Your Thoughts on Awesomeness”.

He claims  that “awesomeness is the new innovation”.

He explains that innovation as “the ultimate source of advantage”  is a “relic of the industrial era” because:

• “Innovation relies on obsolescence” where “creative destruction” “makes yesterday’s goods and services obsolete”.
• “Innovation dries up our seedcorn” where “entrepreneurial aspects of commerce” focus on “selling the same old toxic, industrial era junk in slightly better ways”.
• “Innovation often isn’t” where “innovation means, naively, what is commercially novel” but “is often value destructive and socially harmful”.

He explains that there is a “better concept, one built for a radically interdependent 21st century”, awesomeness, which has four pillars:

• * “Ethical production” where “awesome stuff is produced ethically”.
• “Insanely great stuff” where “awesomeness puts creativity front and center” and “awesome stuff evokes an emotive reaction because it’s fundamentally new, unexpected, and 1000x better”.
• “Love” because ”love for what we do is the basis of all real value creation”.
• “Thick value” since “adding value” is the “most hackneyed phrase in the corporate lexicon” as “most value is an illusion”.

He summarizes:

What is awesomeness? Awesomeness happens when thick — real, meaningful – value is created by people who love what they do, added to insanely great stuff, and multiplied by communities who are delighted and inspired because they are authentically better off.

Furthermore, “Gen M knows ‘awesomeness’ when we see it — that’s why its part of our vernacular” and “it’s a precise concept, with meaning, depth, and resonance”. “In the 21st century, if you’re merely innovative, prepare to be disrupted by awesomeness”.

Umair’s description of the “industrial era” involves an ecosystem where organizations (enterprises as collectives of individuals) innovate to create advantage and deliver added value that other individuals and organizations in turn use to innovate to create advantage and deliver added value that other individuals and organizations in turn use to propagate this producer-consumer value-chain model where value is extrinsic.

Umair’s description of a “radically interdependent 21st century” involves an ecosystem where organizations (enterprises as collectives of individuals) innovate to be “authentically better off” and deliver “thick — real, meaningful — value” that other individuals and organizations in turn use to innovate to be “authentically better off” and deliver “thick — real, meaningful – value” that other individuals and organizations in turn use to propagate this authentic-meaning value-chain model where value is intrinsic. Organizations in this model are indeed Purposeful Enterprises!

Awesomely Simple “Six Principles of Business Success” & Agility Distilled

Since posting Agility Distilled, many have inquired: How do we put this into Action? Well, rather than elaborate too much, I’ll just offer a great place to start!

John Spence has just written a really great book (as a tool) on how to make it “Awesomely Simple” to run a highly successful business. He distills his vast experience into a foundation for lasting business success, which involves the consistent and disciplined application of six principles.

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The Vivid Vision principle focuses on effectively communicating a clear, vivid, compelling and inspiring vision as well as creating a successful enterprise by giving people the comfort, safety, and confidence to succeed. This principle relates to the Context-aware pattern.

The Best People principle focuses on effectively creating a corporate culture that attracts, grows, and keeps the best people as well as fostering the attitude, passion, creativity, innovation, and driving desire for success and excellence. This principle relates to the People/Team-centric pattern.

The Robust Communication principle focuses on open, honest, robust, and courageous communication that leverages talent, innovation, and extreme customer focus. This principle relates to the Results/value-oriented pattern.

The Sense of Urgency principle focuses on speed and proactivity, which are necessary for survival and success, but can’t be pursued at the expense of disciplined execution and consistent quality. This principle relates to the Results/value-oriented pattern.

The Disciplined Execution principle focuses on building a performance-oriented culture that demands flawless execution and high standards of performance while not tolerating mediocrity but establishing clear, ambitious, yet realistic goals and holding people accountable for meeting those standards and delivering on their commitments. This principle relates to the Results/value-oriented pattern.

The Extreme Customer Focus principle focuses on owning the voice of the customer by creating a strong and trusting bond with customers and listening to what they want while delivering consistent superior customer service, the only differentiator left for fostering loyal and engaged customers. This principle relates to the Results/value-oriented pattern.

If high-quality products and services, strong financial management, and the willingness to embrace change are part of your organizational DNA, you won’t want to miss John’s “Awesomely Simple”!

Agility Distilled: The Essence of Agility

Inspired by “Agility Schmagility … What are we really talking about here?”, consider Agility!

The roots of Agility are in John Boyd’s OODA loop (Observe-Orient-Decide-Act) and Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. Agility is about Responsiveness and the ability to continuously Re-orient as we Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act. Agility is not merely about Speed and focusing on being expeditious! Agility is not merely about Reactiveness and focusing on acting relative to change from the perspective of the moment rather than a longer timeframe! Agility is about Responsiveness and focusing on acting relative to change from the perspective of the moment balanced with a longer timeframe! That is, Agile maturity!

Quintessentially, Agility is a value system that emphasizes people, results, collaboration, and responsiveness.

Applying the many aspects of Agility gives us the Agile Alliance’s & Scrum Alliance’s Manifesto for Agile Software Development & the Principles behind the Agile Manifesto as well as Scrum & eXtreme Programming (XP).

Applying the many aspects of Agility also gives us Agile Product Management (or whatever else).

What is the essence of Agility? Responsiveness and Re-orientation! What are the aspects of this essence?

Consider a Team or Enterprise…

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Results/Value-oriented

To increase a Team’s or Enterprise’s Velocity and Throughput (relative to Demand) and deliver Value — Focus, leverage Feedback or Iterate, and Balance.

This is the Results/Value-oriented pattern: Focus on results, which can only be achieved by iterating and leveraging feedback within context such that people balance competing forces. The essence of Agility involves goals that provide focus on intent, objectives that provide a mission or leadership through commitment, and intuitiveness that fosters self-organization and that fosters decisions based more on implicit guidance and less on explicit guidance. Do you have Goals? Do you have Objectives? How intuitive is your Team or Enterprise?

Context-aware

To increase a Team’s or Enterprise’s Focus — Leverage Leadership through Collaboration (Contribution and Confirmation) with the members of the Team or Enterprise.

This is the Context-aware pattern: Lead within context, which can only be achieved by collaborating with people such that they contribute to and confirm results; leadership is essential for focusing on results. The essence of Agility involves a Vision that provides direction or intent and the ability to re-orient. Do you have a Vision? Can you re-orient (transition from one orientation to another)?

People/Team-centric

To increase a Team’s or Enterprise’s ability to Balance — Support, Enable, and Empower the members of the Team or Enterprise.

This is the People/Team-centric pattern: Empower people who are able to achieve results within context; empowerment is essential for balancing competing forces. The essence of Agility involves mutual-trust, unity, and cohesion, thus, oneness. Do you have such a Community and Culture?

These patterns are interdependent. Without Leadership through Collaboration, we jeopardize Focus; without Empowerment, we jeopardize the ability to Balance; without Iterating, we jeopardize the degree of Feedback; and ultimately we jeopardize Velocity and Value!

Shuhari and the Kata of Agility

Closely related to Shuhari, these are the Kata of Agility. See Mike Rother’s Toyota Kata, Defining Kata, Which Kata?, and Teaching a Kata for more.

Do you have a Vision, Goals, Objectives, and a Community & Culture that is Intuitively Responsive and can Re-orient?

Scrum and XP

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