MechChem Africa February 2017

⎪ Products and industry news ⎪

Tracking industrial trends

In this new quarterly column, Gary i. Crawford – Strategic Partner of Mettle Strategic Creativity and an international strategist and stalwart of industrial marketing with experience from beers to stainless steel – talks about increasing integration in engineering, the creative value of interactions across disciplines and the value of breaking out of the ‘silo’ mindset. Blurring the lines and the new renaissance

T here was a time when the world consisted of discrete compart- ments. As a ‘tradesperson’, one was expected to be an expert in a particular discipline. Even the question- ing of the Renaissance of the 14 th to 17 th centuries failed to convince the masses of the need to be proficient in more than one field. The term, ‘calling,’ comes to mind. True Renaissance men were few and far between. These cultured men who were knowledgeable, educated and proficient in a wide range of fields are exemplified by Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo who, in today’s terminology, thought ‘out of the box’. Inart, this newwayof thinking resulted in the development of perspective in oil painting. And, in the less lofty world of construction, the re- cycled knowledge of how to make concrete. Plus,

... encouraging concepts from different disciplines to be brought together in ‘constructs’ never before contemplated. More than anyone else, we can thank Steve Jobs for facilitating the ease of use of laptops, enabling communications and helping todispel the long-heldbelief in the sanctity of functional silos. First came the Apple ll (1977), the world’s first mass-market personal com- puter. Home, offices and schools around theworldwould never be the same. Then, the all-in-one iMac computer in 1998 – marketed as being Internet-ready out of the box. In 1991, the high-end, business- friendly PowerBook laptop line was launched; followed by the iBook in 1999, with Wi-Fi technology; the iPod in 2001; and the iPhone in 2007. By 2010, Steve Jobs was confident the worldwas ready to embrace a newtype of device, a tablet computer. He was right. The touch-sensitive iPad was an instant success after its introduction, with15mil- lion of the devices sold in the launch year. The phenomenal Apple success story was not, however, without its hiccups. Apple’s handheld PDA, the Newton, went on sale in 1993, at the time that ex Pepsi-Cola’s John Sculley usurped control of Apple. The Newton could take notes, storecontacts,managecalendarsandsend a fax. With it, Apple didn’t just set out to create anewdevice. Itwanted to invent an entirely new class of computer, one that could slip into pockets and go out into the world. In fact, the pocket size was a core design requirement. At the time, it was extremely difficult to get component manufacturers to build any sort of custom parts. Trying to pull off a design referred to as ‘the Batman concept’, a sleek black pocketable unit, proved difficult. Famed positioning strategists, Jack Trout and Al Ries, with whom I was inter- acting at the time, called the Newton “the

of course, Gutenberg’s introduction of metalmovable type toEurope, which sped the dissemination of ideas from the late 15 th century. While it is true that many so-called professionals adoptedavocations –activi- ties that someone engages in as a hobby outside their main occupation or voca- tion – it wasn’t until very recently that the ‘silo’ mind-set was challenged. Tertiary education generallymeant concentration on one discipline, which, when hopefully mastered, would become the key to later life success. With hindsight I can now understand why there were quizzical looks when I admitted to studying languages, law, economics, mechanical engineering and architecture alongside my stated major of psychology. Nobodymentioned ‘renais- sance’ in describing me. Rather, I’m sure, themonikers of ‘unsure’ or even ‘spoilt’ came to their minds. I’d have been happy to be called an ‘all- rounder,’ but I’m sure that even in my first corporate position as amanagement trainee at Unilever, I was still seen as the ‘Jack of all trades ... master of none.’ For, in thosedayswhenevery desk came equipped with a crank-handle-drivenFacit calcu- lator, the latest desktopcomputers had cathode ray tube green screens and you interfaced via MS- DOS, the normwas still to confine yourself to your specific functional ‘silo.’ It was only with the advent ofthegraphicaluserinterface(GUI) that the computer becamemainstream andtheworldofpersonalcommunications opened up to all. This gave birth to the second ‘renaissance’ (‘rebirth’ in English)

Apple’s unsuccessful PDA, the Newton, which went on sale in 1993, could take notes, store contacts, manage calendars and send a fax.

36 ¦ MechChem Africa • February 2017

Made with