Right after the last out of the 2014 World Series, Chevy gave a pickup to the most valuable player. The poor guy tasked to present the keys looked like he was about to have a stroke. He struggled to get words out, sweated profusely and started to stutter. When he got to the part where he was supposed to tell all the world about the truck’s impressive features, he blurted out that it had “technology and stuff” then thrust the keys in the MVP’s hand – all on live national TV. Disaster or opportunity? Here is some of the back story. Dan Ammann has been the president of General Motors for about a year. Part of his strategy is to “put the right people in place and let them make decisions.” Oh, the risk! Within hours a member of the empowered Chevy team was being bold. Instead of trying run from the flub, the Chevy manager monitoring social media was tweeting with the hashtag, #TechnologyAndStuff. This was 1:29 a.m. and Jamie Barbour was on it! Before dawn, the U.S. marketing chief for Chevy was firing off emails to his social media, digital marketing and advertising teams so they could start to exploit the “technology and stuff” line. By 7:30 a.m. a new voiceover was being recorded for an ad that would run that evening on an NBA game so it added “and stuff” to the script. The team quickly bought ad time on the late night comedy shows that would air that evening anticipating that the comics would likely fry them for the flub. They were determined to have the upper hand. Before they were done exploiting what could have been a disaster, they had the Chevy pickups like the one the MVP received emblazoned with #TechnologyAndStuff as they took the drivers at a NASCAR event in Texas around the track before the race. A flub turned into a coup: Advertising Age magazine estimates that Chevy got $5 million in free media exposure for their effort. Risky. Yes. Successful. Heck yes. This is risking done well. Kudos to Dan Ammann and the innovative and resourceful Chevy team. *** This is where you can find a video of the now infamous World Series presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMsqSVyXnO8
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We all hear about the importance of organizations being innovative. Seems reasonable. An innovative organization should be able to find ways to do things better, develop more new products and services and be generally more effective. These outcomes can all bolster an organization’s competitive advantage. But research shows that an innovative environment contributes to an organization’s competitive advantage in a way that may not have occurred to you. It makes the organization a more desirable place to work and helps it attract talented contributors. Deloitte has been conducting an annual survey of the millennial generation now for a few years. (Millennials are considered to currently be in their early 30s and younger.) When queried on the importance of working in an innovative environment, they have some noteworthy responses. A huge portion, nearly eight in ten, say that they are influenced by how innovative an organization is when deciding where they want to work. Half tell us that working for an innovative company is “essential” or “very important” to their overall job satisfaction. And just shy of one quarter say they are willing to earn 15% less in return for having a job at an innovative organization. This is huge. We all know that attracting the best people makes a critical contribution to your competitive advantage. We now know that part of attracting them is creating the innovative environment that yields dividends in many forms. If you’re like me, you see roughhousing with the kids as a great way to help them expend some of their boundless energy with the side benefit of some parent/child bonding. But research reveals additional benefits – roughhousing teaches risk-taking to children. A recent article in the Wall Street Journal tells us that many researchers believe the bond established by father/child play and roughhousing surfaces later in a child’s life when “the father serves as a secure base allowing the child to explore and take risks.” The benefits go further according to the article. They include helping the child with emotional intelligence and boundary-setting. It goes on to state, “Many fathers walk a fine line during play between safety and risk, allowing children to get minor injuries without endangering them, says a 2011 study of 32 subjects in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics. Researchers say this can instill emotional intelligence under fire, and an ability to take prudent risks and set limits with peers.” Interesting. Sounds like father/child roughhousing is not to be missed. The article is titled “Roughhousing Lessons from Dad.” It was written by Sue Shellenbarger and is available on the website of the Wall Street Journal. In a recent interview, Michael Crow identified risk-taking as vital. Who is Michael Crow? He has been the president of Arizona State University for twelve years. During his tenure enrollment has increased 38%, research spending has tripled and tuition has been kept in check. What’s his secret in a setting in which many universities are struggling? Crows says that educators and large academic institutions need to be more entrepreneurial and take more risks. He goes on to state that higher education is too risk-averse and needs to be more innovative. Isn’t it refreshing to hear someone from a world that can be bound by tradition and excessively focused on the past talk about the need to move forward boldly? The interview of Crow is titled “Design for a New College.” It was conducted by Douglas Belkin and is available on the website of the Wall Street Journal. |
Jim McCormickFounder and President Research Institute for Risk Intelligence Archives
April 2020
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