The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

A MONTH!!!

How about that for making your 2013 awesome?

You see next week is Chinese New Year so the entire country shuts down to allow 1.3 billion people to fire off firecrackers from 12:01am [+1 second] till 11:59pm [+ 59 seconds] for 7 whole fucking days straight.

[Given it’s the year of the snake, I’m assuming 2013 will prove to be a fantastic year for bankers, lawyers and 1970’s BBC television presenters]

Then almost immediately after, I go to the other extreme where I take my Mum to North Polesville so she can [hopefully] see the Northern Lights.

How my birkenstocked toes will cope in –50 is anyone’s guess, but we’ll give it a go.

What this means is that I won’t be writing any more rubbish until March 11th … but before you get the celebrations under way, spare a thought for my poor wife who will have to cope with me 24/7 for over 28 days straight.

So as my last post for Feb, I thought I’d talk about something I’ve been seeing more and more of and that’s what I call, irrational assumption.

Irrational assumption is where people assume a person has a lot of additional values/talents/skills simply because of one defining accomplishment.

God, that makes no sense does it.

Does it?

OK, let me give you an example.

In China, you often hear people characterising anyone that has gone to university as Worldly, sophisticated and successful.

Why?

University doesn’t mean you’re Worldly.

Nor does it mean you’re automatically – or even guaranteed to be – successful or sophisticated.

And in China, where the education system is based more around ‘memory’ than ‘application’ [If only for the sheer volume of people it has to cater for] it arguably means it even less.

Not only that, but with so many people now going to university in China, we have started seeing – from a white collar employment perspective – supply outstrip demand.

Please don’t read into this that I’m saying people who go to university in China aren’t smart or capable of achieving great thing – that is, hopefully quite obviously, not the case at all – I’m just saying that it is wrong to assume that because someone achieves one thing, they must also have/embrace/adopt a whole host of other characteristics.

Of course this situation is not exclusive to University graduates or China … I am continually bombarded by shit that is totally irrelevant, just because a company assumed a person of my age and travel commitments must like golf, wine & BMW’s … but the point is, while adland has to – to a certain extent – segment people into groups, if we continue blindly making additional assumptions to their character, interests and achievements simply because of something else they’ve done/achieved, then we’re going to spend even more millions of our clients dollars alienating, rather than attracting.

Given I’m gone for a whole month, if anyone would like to point out any other irrational assumptions, I’d be very interested.

And can we try and avoid the usual cliché on this blog such as:

+ All planners are twits.

+ All Queen fans are stupid.

+ All Birkenstock wearers are lesbians who like German folk music & hairy underarms.

Cool?

Good.

Thank you.

Thank you for the expertise.

Thank you for the curiosity.

Thank you for the selflessness.

Thank you for the compassion.

Thank you for the persistence.

Thank you for the knowledge.

Thank you for the stubborness.

Thank you for the courage.

Thank you for the hope.

Thank you for the strength.

Thank you for the care.

You were right AB, she really does have the genes of a champion.

I know there’s still a way to go, but I’m so utterly, utterly happy for all of you.

Today is a great day.

It’s a bit like brands that tell the World they’re new, when the fact is we know when something’s new by the simple fact we’ve never seen or heard about them before.

I know that’s not strictly true, but neither is the belief that to make someone pick something up, you just have to print the word ‘NEW’ on the packaging in a size 40, startburst.

Mind you, they could be doing it because their product isn’t really new at all … it’s just a copy of another brand with a slight change to ensure they don’t get sued.

Sadly today, many companies view innovation the same way as Hollywood … which is less about trying – or doing – something never done before and more about ‘imitating’ or ‘perfecting’ something that society either thought was fine as it was or didn’t care enough about it in the first place.

And we all know why that’s the case. The misguided belief that safety in approach results in safety of profit … but even if that was true [which it isn’t] the stock market operates on such fucked up beliefs, that even small and regular profit increases are viewed as failure.

I saw this comment by Bob Bogash – a retired Boeing engineer – that I think sums what I’m trying to say perfectly:

Ages ago I wrote a post asking if we had, as a society, stopped innovating and were just about perfecting.

Not because of a lack of ability, but because of the structure of society/finance we had created.

I got slagged off for that and yet, I still think it remains true. At least in terms of brands and products. [I can’t find it, but this one also conveys my point/concern]

Of course the counter argument is that we have become more effective in maximising revenue returns in what we’ve got – which is true – however as Apple are starting to realise, when you start to only look inwards rather than outwards, the future eventually looks a little less bright.

Anyway, I really am not here today, that was not just some fancy blog post title.

No, honestly I’m not.

This is another of those ‘pre-written’ posts and the only reason I’m telling you this is so you don’t think …

[1] I’ve gone into a massive sulk.

[2] had a heart attack.

… when I don’t reply to any comment you make.

Not that you’d notice anyway.

Or care.

I love his attitude, approach and hunger.

It reminded me of the Harrison Ford interview I posted about a while back.

People who know the value of value.

Who can distinguish respect from popularity.

Who appreciate the need to earn it, not expect it.

Who are true to who they are, not who they are expected to be.

Fortunately for me, being a Forest fan, this is something I am used to so here’s to a good game, even though I wouldn’t know what that means if you gave me 100 years of footage.