Book Written by Pip Coburn
Book Summary by Chris Mahlmann
In the last year or two, how many times have you heard the word “change”? 1,000? 10,000? Between the political campaigns, the economy, and the world all around us, “change” seems to be as inevitable as death and taxes. The business world is no exception. Things are changing every day, particularly technology and how it impacts our personal and professional lives. Change is also the heart of Pip Coburn’s book, The Change Function: Why Some Technologies Take Off and Others Crash and Burn. The book looks at companies that are technologically-based and examines the shifts, both small and large, these companies must undergo to fully transition into the markets in which we operate today.
Firms in the high-tech industry know how difficult it is to get a product or an idea to break though the clutter of endless innovation. Once that idea finally does stand out from the heap, the firm still needs to get that product adopted and in to people’s hands to recap the rewards of that great idea. In the book, Coburn explains how to move to a system in which you are talking to customers and listening to their concerns, then creating or altering your product to fit those needs, and in turn, fitting current demand instead of inefficiently creating new demand. “Engineers and designers are not responsible for product success, end users are,” he presses. This end-user perspective is part of “The Change Function”, a concept that every business needs to understand, not just those in the high-tech field.
Coburn’s Change Function uses “Moore’s Law” and “Groves Law” as examples of commonly held, but fazed-out beliefs by which many companies still abide. Moore’s Law shows a long term trend that predicts the number of transistors that can economically be placed onto a microchip will double every two years. Grove’s Law is an engineering-focused law that says high-tech firms should focus technological developments that are ten-times better than anything currently available. Both of these ‘laws’ underscore one of the main operational fallacies in the tech world today: developing technology for a problem that doesn’t exist. Coburn bases the premise of the book on the idea that many individuals have a high resistance to new technology. These individuals do not trust new technology and often aren’t interested in the learning curve often associated with new technology. The adaptation that companies need to employ is the idea that instead of stretching the limits of what technology can do, high-tech firms should use what is currently available to help solve customers’ problems. As Coburn puts it, companies should move away from being “techno-centric” to “customer-centric”.
It shouldn’t take a rocket scientist to figure this out, though. If you look at the high-tech marketplace and you look at the products and services that have thrived, you will see that instead of reinventing to wheel, the most successful technological products are the ones that offer an incremental change on the user’s end from existing technologies. DVDs didn’t reinvent the wheel when they replaced VCRs, the iPod isn’t a lot more difficult to operate than a portable CD player, and digital cameras have replaced standard film cameras without changing the basic functionality of the camera. Popular technological advancements have come incrementally, because there is an audience for incremental change. There is no audience for technology that cannot be easily harnessed by the user.
The Change Function is explained as the change in the mindset of your company that no longer uses these outdated laws and theories and instead chooses the new, user-focused mindset. In the book, Coburn decrees that high-tech firms in particular need to listen to their clients in order to customize products to exact user specifications.
The book is a recommended read for leaders and managers of technology-oriented firms, or firms whose business operations depend heavily on technology. The book offers several new and innovative thought processes, many of which are aimed at those electronic-based businesses. Even if your company is not a high-tech firm, there are still some principles and processes that could still apply across all businesses. Overall, The Change Function offers some good advice for businesses that are stuck in the rut of 20th century operations and need to move forward and join the 21st century business community. The world is changing and so is the way we do business.