Serendipity is Stupid!

Posted on October 4, 2007 
Filed Under Innovation | 2 Comments

fortunecockies.jpgA long time ago, a friend gave me a plaque which says: “Serendipity - If you love something, set it free. If it comes back, it’s yours…. bla bla bla…” Excuse my French, but this is probably one of the biggest BS advise I have ever heard. It’s nothing more than an excuse to cop out. Let’s face it, there is a reason why the nicest guys don’t normally get the best girls.

I recently read the book The Hands-off Manager: How to Mentor People and Allow Them to Be Successful authored by Steve Chandler and Duane Black. At first glance, it read a lot like one of those “Zen of Management” kind of books. The book talks about Allowing Success vs. Forcing Success, and about finding an inner vision and strengths of your employees rather than”fixing” them to do it your way. Half way through reading the book, I was wondering to myself: Are they talking about Serendipity? You know how I feel about Serendipity! But wait, isn’t all this stuff I wrote in my blog… Drunken Ducks / Wild Duck philosophies and so on…. Aren’t they the same as Serendipity?

Intel: Luck or Management’s Brilliance?

This reminds me of a debate I recently heard in the blog sphere between Dr. Robert Burgelman and a Stanford alumni, about the success of Intel. Is Intel’s dominance in the market today a result of luck? or was it due to brilliant and relentless leadership of Andy Grove. I actually very recently took an Executive Ed class taught by Dr. Burgelman at Stanford. Dr. Burgelman co-authored the book Strategic Management of Technology and Innovation with Clayton Christensen and Steven Wheelwright. There is an interesting case study in the book about how Intel invented the microprocessor and essentially sold the proprietary rights to a Japanese calculator company for $60,000. At the time, they didn’t realize the strategic potential of a general purpose processor, and they looked at the invention as a way to sell more memory chips which was Intel’s main business. Fortunately for Intel, they came to their senses and realized there was a substantial market for general purpose microprocessors. And even more fortunate, the Japanese company who purchased the rights was in financial trouble at this point and eagerly gave the rights back to Intel in exchange for reduced pricing for the chips. This was the story for the 4004 processor which was introduced in 1971, which evolved into the 8080 in 1974, and ultimately the 8088 which won the IBM PC design in 1981. The rest, of course, is well known history.

So, was it a lucky break for Intel? I guess you could argue that this is a classic case of Serendipity. Intel literally “set it free” (sold the rights) and then it came back to them. I struggled with that thought for a evening. And then the next day in Dr. Burgelman’s class, it dawned on me. There was certainly some luck involved. But it also took a lot of strategic intelligence and leadership, for the Intel management team to RECOGNIZE what they have, and then put a whole string of decisive actions to capitalize on that so called “lucky break”.

Case in point, Intel bought the design rights back in 1971. At the time, the 4004’s performance was under par compared to custom designed chips. Even when they evolved into the 8 bit version (8008), it was largely rejected because it was deemed too slow. A full 7-8 years later, the 16 bit 8086 was introduced and the product still did not meet sales forecast for the first two years. Customers were mostly buying sample quantities. At this point, Intel not only invested in continuously evolving the processor design, it also invested in development aides and programming tools to help customers develop applications for the chips. Finally in 1980, they launched a project code named CRUSH. CRUSH is a campaign that emphasized a system approach. They put together SWAT teams of engineering, application developers and sales people who focuses on generating design wins. Finally, in 1981, they won the design for the IBM PC. So, if you consider all that, was that luck? I don’t think so. From the time they bought the proprietary rights back in 1971 to when they won the IBM PC design, it was a long 10 year journey of hard work and disappointments. In the modern days of short term mentality and hyper expectations, I’d argue that most companies would have cancel such a project in half that time.

Some would argue then that once Intel won the IBM design, that it was easy sailing because of their monopoly status. Well, the monopoly thing is not entirely true neither. IBM’s policy is that they require at least two sources for the chip. In order to win the business, Intel actually had to issue second source licenses to companies like AMD and NEC. They handed technical details of the chip design to their competitors all the way through the 286 era, and it wasn’t until the i386 introduction that they stopped the second source agreement. In the same period, they also faced stiff competition from Motorola’s 68000. They were loosing design wins to Motorola in an alarming rate. Intel launched another campaign similar to CRUSH, called CHECKMATE. The campaign completely turned around the win rate and lined up Intel nicely for the 32 bit era. So again, it wasn’t pure luck neither.

So, back to my original point: Serendipity Is Stupid!! You can be the luckiest person on earth or you could be destined for greatness, but if you do not RECOGNIZE that and then ACT on capitalizing on your luck or fate - that only means you are the most tragic person on earth.

Relating back to my little “Drunken Ducks Theory of Innovation”. I guess the point is: Yes, there are a lot of “accidentalness” in any one’s life or business. And yes, you have to give the Wild Ducks enough freedom to exercise their creative juices in order to see true breakthrough innovations (i.e. Allowing instead of Forcing success). But may be the most important thing of all, is your leadership and your ability to RECOGNIZE the strategic potentials of some of these inventions which often seems so mundane or crazy in the beginning. And Recognizing is of course only half the game. Looking at the Intel’s example, it took steadfast conviction and commitment to Protect and Cultivate a disruptive idea, until it reaches full potential and changes the world.

So, in conclusion: That’s why they pay us the big bucks! :)

I am sure this offends many of my friends who truly believes in Serendipity… Let’s hear it.

Web 0.01

Posted on September 11, 2007 
Filed Under Web Stuff | Leave a Comment

This circa 1964 video is a pretty funny yet amazing depiction of the Web, from more than 40 years ago!

“Communal Service Agency”… LOL! That must have been one of the earliest name for ISP?

How to Stuff a Wild Duck

Posted on September 9, 2007 
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In my last post, I talked about IBM’s Wild Duck culture. Thanks to Craig McCormick Ed.D., an ex-IBMer, who allowed me to repost this vintage IBM poster from his web site.

The text says:

“We are convinced that any business needs its wild ducks. And in IBM we try not to tame them.” T.J. Watson, Jr.

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends upon the unreasonable man.” G.B. Shaw

IBM Poster - How to Stuff a Wild Duck

Click the thumbnail to see the poster.

Check out Craig’s web site too. He even has the lyrics from an IBM song book.

IBM: “Don’t Tame the Wild Ducks”

Posted on September 8, 2007 
Filed Under Innovation, Innovation Quotes | Leave a Comment

It turns out I’m in good company when it comes to applying the Duck metaphor against management concepts. When I was going over the notes I took while attending Dr. Robert Burgelman’s class during the AeA/Stanford Exec Institute, I found I wrote down his words: “IBM loves Wild Ducks.”

With some quick Googling, I discovered this apparently famous quote from IBM’s Ex-Chairman, Thomas Watson Jr., dating back to 1963 (I’m obviously too young to have known about this. ;) ):

“…You can make wild ducks tame, but you can never make tame ducks wild again. One might also add that the duck who is tamed will never go anywhere any more. We are convinced that any business needs its wild ducks. And in IBM we try not to tame them.”

In fact, as far as I can tell from Googling, the Wild Duck philosophy is well engrained into the IBM culture (at least in the early days).

So, to my wife who gave me that weird look this morning about my choice of metaphor, there you go. :)

BTW, I found this inspiring archive of Thomas Watson Jr. writings and quotes. Check it out: IBM’s “Tom Watson Jr. Quoted” web site.

The Drunken Ducks Theory of Innovation

Posted on September 6, 2007 
Filed Under Innovation | 1 Comment

Let me first say that this blog is not about the art of getting drunk, or deriving pleasure from alcoholic beverages. In fact, I don’t drink - at all! My college buddies used to call me “Two Beer” and I was known to start playing Moonlight Sonata on the piano after drinking that same amount. The amazing thing is, I can’t actually play that tune even if my life depends on it.

Anyway, my Drunken Ducks adventure started a few years ago when I attended a Porsche racing course. During the two day event, they broke up the students into teams of five. We went through the various driving drills together and at the end of the course, they have a team competition. We needed to find a name for the team and Drunken Ducks came up - mostly due to the way we drove! LOL!

The other teams were getting seriously competitive, giving themselves and everybody around them lots of pressure. True to our namesake, our team was more intent on having a good time and care less about the competition. And predictably (or ironically), who won the competition? The Drunken Ducks!

So the moral of that story, is that success can often not be forced. The journey is often more important than the destination. If the journey goes right, you will end up at the right place. Anyway, that’s the theory or the cliché.

In recent years, I spent a lot of time studying the art of technology entrepreneurship and managing innovation. I moved to the Silicon Valley and even did the IPO thing in 2001. Currently I manage Advanced Technology Research teams for a very large telecom company and they pay me based on my ability to “maintain a healthy stream of innovation”.

I am starting to realize that the phrase “managing innovation” may be somewhat of an oxymoron. Modern studies are indicating that while managed or directed research may yield incremental results. Most breakthrough innovations are a result of “flukes”. (i.e. Stumbled upon like a Drunken Duck!) So, rather than paying a too much attention to manage innovations and driving research teams by well defined objectives, it may be equally (if not more) important to listen, observe, recognize and nourish.

Thus, a Drunken Duck Theory of Innovation is to ensure a “happy” environment for innovators to innovate, to be able to observe and recognize the strategic implications of a breakthrough idea when you stumble on one, and to provide an incubation environment for those strategic ideas to flourish.

Drunken Ducks are the fastest and happiest ducks. And here is a picture to prove it! :)

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