Your cartoonist sometimes gets to go to places where business strategy is discussed. Always listening carefully, Szpylbert developed a pet hate for two particularly misleading words: “ecosystem” and “democratisation”. Both are supposed to somehow sound inviting and empowering – but in reality their meaning is very different.
Ecosystems are created by big businesses to get small companies to do risky things or stuff that they think is not worthwhile. Naturally, that includes the possibility of involuntary exit from the ecosystem, a.k.a. “death”. With survival being a struggle, an ecosystem is not a happy place!
Now for democratisation. This is normally suggested to entice amateur usership of technology or something without a proper value proposition, e.g. low-cost 3D printing or blogging. Of course, there is no real commercial opportunity here for the dilettante – and the money is made elsewhere. If there’s a gold rush, don’t join it. Sell shovels!
Today with Szpylbert: motivational training. Sometimes, even a small comment can greatly boosts people’s ambitions. Szpylbert suspects that this can be the case especially if they understand their circumstances well. An example: upon reviewing an (admittedly mediocre) paper written by Szpylbert, the reviewer stated that the article was “workmanlike but will not set the world on fire”. Because Szpylbert had a good understanding of what was missing, it was also clear that much more ambitious work could be delivered in the future – world still to be set on fire, though.
