ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Eddie Obeng - Business Educator
Our environment changes faster than we can learn about it, Eddie Obeng says. How do we keep up?

Why you should listen

What will business look like in 5 years? (Er, what does it look like now?) Eddie Obeng helps executives keep up with a business and social environment that's changing faster than we can know. Through Pentacle, his online business school, Obeng teaches a theory of management that focuses on adaptation to change. Called "New World Management," it's all about forming and re-forming workgroups, constantly re-evaluating metrics, and being open to all kinds of learning, from hands-on group exercises to a virtual lecture hall/meeting room called the QUBE.

More profile about the speaker
Eddie Obeng | Speaker | TED.com
TEDGlobal 2012

Eddie Obeng: Smart failure for a fast-changing world

Filmed:
1,611,121 views

The world is changing much more rapidly than most people realize, says business educator Eddie Obeng -- and creative output cannot keep up. In this spirited talk, he highlights three important changes we should understand for better productivity, and calls for a stronger culture of “smart failure."
- Business Educator
Our environment changes faster than we can learn about it, Eddie Obeng says. How do we keep up? Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:15
Over the past six months, I've spent my time
0
13
3843
00:19
traveling. I think I've done 60,000 miles,
1
3856
3391
00:23
but without leaving my desk.
2
7247
2922
00:26
And the reason I can do that is because I'm actually two people.
3
10169
2846
00:28
I look like one person but I'm two people. I'm Eddie who is here,
4
13015
2953
00:31
and at the same time, my alter ego is a big green boxy
5
15968
4401
00:36
avatar nicknamed Cyber Frank.
6
20369
3680
00:39
So that's what I spend my time doing. I'd like to start,
7
24049
2809
00:42
if it's possible, with a test, because I do business stuff,
8
26858
3062
00:45
so it's important that we focus on outcomes.
9
29920
3584
00:49
And then I struggled, because I was thinking to myself,
10
33504
1933
00:51
"What should I talk? What should I do? It's a TED audience.
11
35437
2468
00:53
It's got to be stretching. How am I going to make — ?"
12
37905
2808
00:56
So I just hope I've got the level of difficulty right.
13
40713
3093
00:59
So let's just walk our way through this.
14
43806
2064
01:01
Please could you work this through with me? You can shout out the answer if you like.
15
45870
3449
01:05
The question is, which of these horizontal lines is longer?
16
49319
2182
01:07
The answer is?
17
51501
1146
01:08
Audience: The same.Eddie Obeng: The same.
18
52647
2724
01:11
No, they're not the same. (Laughter)
19
55371
1747
01:13
They're not the same. The top one is 10 percent longer than the bottom one.
20
57118
3629
01:16
So why did you tell me they were the same? Do you remember when we were kids at school,
21
60747
3309
01:19
about that big, they played the same trick on us?
22
64056
2455
01:22
It was to teach us parallax. Do you remember?
23
66511
2337
01:24
And you got, you said, "It's the same!" And you got it wrong.
24
68848
3147
01:27
You remember? And you learned the answer, and you've carried this answer in your head for 10, 20, 30, 40 years:
25
71995
3836
01:31
The answer is the same. The answer is the same. So when you're asked what the lengths are,
26
75831
3880
01:35
you say they're the same, but they're not the same, because I've changed it.
27
79711
2569
01:38
And this is what I'm trying to explain has happened to us in the 21st century.
28
82280
4167
01:42
Somebody or something has changed the rules
29
86447
2298
01:44
about how our world works.
30
88745
2057
01:46
When I'm joking, I try and explain it happened at midnight,
31
90802
2906
01:49
you see, while we were asleep, but it was midnight 15 years ago. Okay?
32
93708
3836
01:53
You didn't notice it? But basically, what they do is,
33
97544
2615
01:56
they switched all the rules round, so that the way to
34
100159
2672
01:58
successfully run a business, an organization, or even a country,
35
102831
3592
02:02
has been deleted, flipped, and it's a completely new
36
106423
2681
02:05
— you think I'm joking, don't you — there's a completely new set of rules in operation. (Laughter)
37
109104
4280
02:09
Did you notice that? I mean, you missed this one.
38
113384
1810
02:11
You probably — No, you didn't. Okay. (Laughter)
39
115194
1835
02:12
My simple idea is that what's happened is,
40
117029
4342
02:17
the real 21st century around us isn't so obvious to us,
41
121371
3994
02:21
so instead we spend our time responding rationally
42
125365
3045
02:24
to a world which we understand and recognize,
43
128410
3173
02:27
but which no longer exists.
44
131583
2419
02:29
You don't believe me, do you? Okay. (Applause)
45
134002
2209
02:32
So let me take you on a little journey of many of the things I don't understand.
46
136211
4904
02:37
If you search Amazon for the word "creativity,"
47
141115
2592
02:39
you'll discover something like 90,000 books.
48
143707
2367
02:41
If you go on Google and you look for "innovation + creativity,"
49
146074
2804
02:44
you get 30 million hits. If you add the word "consultants," it doubles to 60 million. (Laughter)
50
148878
4259
02:49
Are you with me? And yet, statistically, what you discover
51
153137
3185
02:52
is that about one in 100,000 ideas is found making money
52
156322
2985
02:55
or delivering benefits two years after its inception.
53
159307
3123
02:58
It makes no sense. Companies make their expensive executives
54
162430
3013
03:01
spend ages carefully preparing forecasts and budgets
55
165443
2560
03:03
which are obsolete or need changing before they can be published.
56
168003
4060
03:07
How is that possible? If you look at the visions we have,
57
172063
3723
03:11
the visions of how we're going to change the world,
58
175786
1777
03:13
the key thing is implementation. We have the vision.
59
177563
2625
03:16
We've got to make it happen.
60
180188
1356
03:17
We've spent decades professionalizing implementation.
61
181544
2992
03:20
People are supposed to be good at making stuff happen.
62
184536
2457
03:22
However, if I use as an example a family of five
63
186993
4897
03:27
going on holiday, if you can imagine this,
64
191890
2734
03:30
all the way from London all the way across to Hong Kong,
65
194624
4400
03:34
what I want you to think about is their budget is only 3,000 pounds of expenses.
66
199024
3909
03:38
What actually happens is, if I compare this to the average
67
202933
3131
03:41
real project, average real successful project,
68
206064
5787
03:47
the family actually end up in Makassar, South Sulawesi,
69
211851
4226
03:51
at a cost of 4,000 pounds,
70
216077
3017
03:54
whilst leaving two of the children behind. (Laughter)
71
219094
2705
03:57
What I'm trying to explain to you is, there are things which don't make sense to us.
72
221799
4335
04:02
It gets even worse than that. Let me just walk you through this one.
73
226134
4285
04:06
This is a quote, and I'll just pick words out of it.
74
230419
2574
04:08
It says -- I'll put on the voice -- "In summary, your Majesty,
75
232993
3343
04:12
the failure to foresee the timing, extent and severity
76
236336
3506
04:15
of the crisis was due to the lack of creativity
77
239842
3763
04:19
and the number of bright minds," or something like that.
78
243605
3398
04:22
This was a group of eminent economists apologizing to the Queen of England
79
247003
3808
04:26
when she asked the question,
80
250811
2005
04:28
"Why did no one tell us that the crisis was coming?" (Laughter)
81
252816
2939
04:31
I'll never get my knighthood. I'll never get my knighthood. (Laughter)
82
255755
3503
04:35
That's not the important point. The thing you have to remember is,
83
259258
2228
04:37
these are eminent economists, some of the smartest people
84
261486
3462
04:40
on the planet. Do you see the challenge? (Laughter)
85
264948
3516
04:44
It's scary. My friend and mentor, Tim Brown of IDEO,
86
268464
4547
04:48
he explains that design must get big, and he's right.
87
273011
3902
04:52
He wisely explains this to us. He says design thinking
88
276913
2619
04:55
must tackle big systems for the challenges we have.
89
279532
2302
04:57
He's absolutely right.
90
281834
2137
04:59
And then I ask myself, "Why was it ever small?"
91
283971
3673
05:03
Isn't it weird? You know, if collaboration is so cool,
92
287644
3862
05:07
is cross-functional working is so amazing,
93
291506
2133
05:09
why did we build these huge hierarchies? What's going on?
94
293639
5226
05:14
You see, I think what's happened, perhaps, is that
95
298865
4281
05:19
we've not noticed that change I described earlier.
96
303146
4086
05:23
What we do know is that the world has accelerated.
97
307232
2778
05:25
Cyberspace moves everything at the speed of light.
98
310010
2322
05:28
Technology accelerates things exponentially.
99
312332
2472
05:30
So if this is now, and that's the past,
100
314804
2162
05:32
and we start thinking about change, you know,
101
316966
1370
05:34
all governments are seeking change, you're here seeking change,
102
318336
2571
05:36
everybody's after change, it's really cool. (Laughter)
103
320907
2671
05:39
So what happens is, we get this wonderful whooshing acceleration and change.
104
323578
4443
05:43
The speed is accelerating. That's not the only thing.
105
328021
4096
05:48
At the same time, as we've done that, we've done something really weird.
106
332117
2671
05:50
We've doubled the population in 40 years,
107
334788
2649
05:53
put half of them in cities, then connected them all up so they can interact.
108
337437
3614
05:56
The density of the interaction of human beings is amazing.
109
341051
2869
05:59
There are charts which show all these movements of information. That density of information is amazing.
110
343920
4852
06:04
And then we've done a third thing.
111
348772
1634
06:06
you know, for those of you who have as an office
112
350406
1995
06:08
a little desk underneath the stairs, and you say, well this is my little desk under the stairs,
113
352401
5469
06:13
no! You are sitting at the headquarters of a global corporation if you're connected to the Internet.
114
357870
6391
06:20
What's happened is, we've changed the scale.
115
364261
2914
06:23
Size and scale are no longer the same.
116
367175
2947
06:26
And then add to that, every time you tweet,
117
370122
3222
06:29
over a third of your followers follow from a country
118
373344
2790
06:32
which is not your own.
119
376134
2908
06:34
Global is the new scale. We know that.
120
379042
3009
06:37
And so people say things like, "The world is now a turbulent place." Have you heard them saying things like that?
121
382051
4012
06:41
And they use it as a metaphor. Have you come across this?
122
386063
2761
06:44
And they think it's a metaphor, but this is not a metaphor.
123
388824
3133
06:47
It's reality. As a young engineering student, I remember
124
391957
3217
06:51
going to a demonstration where they basically,
125
395174
3991
06:55
the demonstrator did something quite intriguing.
126
399165
2411
06:57
What he did was, he got a transparent pipe — have you seen this demonstration before? —
127
401576
5182
07:02
he attached it to a tap. So effectively what you had was,
128
406758
3416
07:06
you had a situation where — I'll try and draw the tap
129
410174
3175
07:09
and the pipe, actually I'll skip the tap. The taps are hard.
130
413349
2715
07:11
Okay? So I'll write the word "tap." Is that okay? It's a tap. (Laughter)
131
416064
3198
07:15
Okay, so he attaches it to a transparent pipe, and he turns the water on.
132
419262
3802
07:18
And he says, do you notice anything? And the water is whooshing down this pipe.
133
423064
2621
07:21
I mean, this is not exciting stuff. Are you with me?
134
425685
3121
07:24
So the water goes up. He turns it back down. Great.
135
428806
4118
07:28
And he says, "Anything you notice?" No. Then he sticks a needle into the pipe,
136
432924
3712
07:32
and he connects this to a container, and he fills
137
436636
2176
07:34
the container up with green ink. You with me?
138
438812
3321
07:38
So guess what happens? A thin green line comes out
139
442133
3790
07:41
as it flows down the pipe. It's not that interesting.
140
445923
4346
07:46
And then he turns the water up a bit, so it starts coming back in. And nothing changes.
141
450269
4292
07:50
So he's changing the flow of the water, but it's just a boring green line.
142
454561
3186
07:53
He adds some more. He adds some more. And then something weird happens.
143
457747
2867
07:56
There's this little flicker, and then as he turns it ever so slightly more,
144
460614
5156
08:01
the whole of that green line disappears, and instead
145
465770
2975
08:04
there are these little sort of inky dust devils close to the needle.
146
468745
3360
08:08
They're called eddies. Not me. And they're violently dispersing the ink
147
472105
3164
08:11
so that it actually gets diluted out, and the color's gone.
148
475269
3684
08:14
What's happened in this world of pipe
149
478953
4013
08:18
is somebody has flipped it. They've changed the rules from laminar to turbulent.
150
482966
3927
08:22
All the rules are gone. In that environment, instantly,
151
486893
3681
08:26
all the possibilities which turbulence brings are available,
152
490574
4119
08:30
and it's not the same as laminar.
153
494693
2842
08:33
And if we didn't have that green ink, you'd never notice.
154
497535
4958
08:38
And I think this is our challenge, because somebody
155
502493
3297
08:41
has actually increased — and it's probably you guys with all your tech and stuff —
156
505790
4104
08:45
the speed, the scale and the density of interaction.
157
509894
3981
08:49
Now how do we cope and deal with that?
158
513875
1699
08:51
Well, we could just call it turbulence, or we could try and learn.
159
515574
3433
08:54
Yes, learn, but I know you guys grew up in the days when
160
519007
5098
09:00
there were actually these things called correct answers,
161
524105
2804
09:02
because of the answer you gave me to the horizontal line puzzle,
162
526909
3161
09:05
and you believe it will last forever.
163
530070
1813
09:07
So I'll put a little line up here which represents learning,
164
531883
3427
09:11
and that's how we used to do it. We could see things,
165
535310
2175
09:13
understand them, take the time to put them into practice.
166
537485
2513
09:15
Out here is the world. Now, what's happened to our pace
167
539998
3849
09:19
of learning as the world has accelerated? Well, if you work
168
543847
3245
09:22
for a corporation, you'll discover it's quite difficult to work
169
547092
2546
09:25
on stuff which your boss doesn't approve of, isn't in the strategy,
170
549638
2946
09:28
and anyway, you've got to go through your monthly meetings.
171
552584
2605
09:31
If you work in an institution, one day you will get them to make that decision.
172
555189
5368
09:36
And if you work in a market where people believe in cycles,
173
560557
2735
09:39
it's even funnier, because you have to wait all the way
174
563292
2387
09:41
for the cycle to fail before you go, "There's something wrong." You with me?
175
565679
3623
09:45
So it's likely that the line, in terms of learning, is pretty flat.
176
569302
5552
09:50
You with me? This point over here, the point at which
177
574854
4197
09:54
the lines cross over, the pace of change
178
579051
3903
09:58
overtakes the pace of learning,
179
582954
3144
10:01
and for me, that is what I was describing
180
586098
2885
10:04
when I was telling you about midnight.
181
588983
3257
10:08
So what does it do to us? Well, it completely transforms what we have to do,
182
592240
3161
10:11
many mistakes we make. We solve last year's problems
183
595401
3639
10:14
without thinking about the future. If you try and think about it,
184
599040
2736
10:17
the things you're solving now, what problems are they going to bring in the future?
185
601776
2936
10:20
If you haven't understood the world you're living in,
186
604712
2520
10:23
it's almost impossible to be absolutely certain that what you're going to deliver fits.
187
607232
3616
10:26
I'll give you an example, a quick one. Creativity and ideas,
188
610848
3408
10:30
I mentioned that earlier. All the CEOs around me, my clients, they want innovation,
189
614256
3041
10:33
so they seek innovation. They say to people, "Take risks and be creative!"
190
617297
3304
10:36
But unfortunately the words get transformed as they travel through the air.
191
620601
2927
10:39
Entering their ears, what they hear is, "Do crazy things and then I'll fire you." Why? (Laughter) Because —
192
623528
4121
10:43
Why? Because in the old world, okay, in the old world,
193
627649
3655
10:47
over here, getting stuff wrong was unacceptable.
194
631304
2465
10:49
If you got something wrong, you'd failed. How should you be treated?
195
633769
2632
10:52
Well, harshly, because you could have asked somebody who had experience.
196
636401
3136
10:55
So we learned the answer and we carried this in our heads for 20, 30 years, are you with me?
197
639537
5064
11:00
The answer is, don't do things which are different.
198
644601
2703
11:03
And then suddenly we tell them to and it doesn't work.
199
647304
2223
11:05
You see, in reality, there are two ways you can fail in our new world.
200
649527
2612
11:08
One, you're doing something that you should follow a procedure to, and it's a very difficult thing,
201
652139
3851
11:11
you're sloppy, you get it wrong. How should you be treated? You should probably be fired.
202
655990
3482
11:15
On the other hand, you're doing something new, no one's ever done before,
203
659472
3232
11:18
you get it completely wrong. How should you be treated?
204
662704
1980
11:20
Well, free pizzas! You should be treated better than the people who succeed.
205
664684
3612
11:24
It's called smart failure. Why? Because you can't put it on your C.V.
206
668296
3488
11:27
So what I want to leave you, then, is with the explanation
207
671784
2729
11:30
of why I actually traveled 60,000 miles from my desk.
208
674513
3824
11:34
When I realized the power of this new world,
209
678337
2040
11:36
I quit my safe teaching job, and set up a virtual business school,
210
680377
4372
11:40
the first in the world, in order to teach people how to make this happen,
211
684749
3795
11:44
and I used some of my learnings about some of the rules which I'd learned on myself.
212
688544
5333
11:49
If you're interested, worldaftermidnight.com, you'll find out more,
213
693877
3049
11:52
but I've applied them to myself for over a decade,
214
696926
2920
11:55
and I'm still here, and I still have my house, and the most important thing is,
215
699846
3749
11:59
I hope I've done enough to inject a little green ink into your lives,
216
703595
5380
12:04
so that when you go away and you're making your next
217
708975
2743
12:07
absolutely sensible and rational decision, you'll take some time to think,
218
711718
4599
12:12
"Hmm, I wonder whether this also makes sense
219
716317
3080
12:15
in our new world after midnight." Thank you very much.
220
719397
2783
12:18
(Applause)
221
722180
7050
12:25
Thank you, thank you. (Applause)
222
729230
6429
Translated by Joseph Geni
Reviewed by Morton Bast

▲Back to top

ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Eddie Obeng - Business Educator
Our environment changes faster than we can learn about it, Eddie Obeng says. How do we keep up?

Why you should listen

What will business look like in 5 years? (Er, what does it look like now?) Eddie Obeng helps executives keep up with a business and social environment that's changing faster than we can know. Through Pentacle, his online business school, Obeng teaches a theory of management that focuses on adaptation to change. Called "New World Management," it's all about forming and re-forming workgroups, constantly re-evaluating metrics, and being open to all kinds of learning, from hands-on group exercises to a virtual lecture hall/meeting room called the QUBE.

More profile about the speaker
Eddie Obeng | Speaker | TED.com