I had the opportunity to be at a great event today with keynote speaker Don Tapscott. Don is a compelling presenter - delivering a presentation that focused on Wikinomics. What is Wikinomics?
From the Wikinonics website: “In the last few years, traditional collaboration—in a meeting room, a conference call, even a convention center—has been superceded by collaborations on an astronomical scale.
Today, encyclopedias, jetliners, operating systems, mutual funds, and many other items are being created by teams numbering in the thousands or even millions. While some leaders fear the heaving growth of these massive online communities, Wikinomics explains how to prosper in a world where new communications technologies are democratizing the creation of value. Anyone who wants to understand the major forces revolutionizing business today should consider Wikinomics their survival kit.”
Don’s presentation has made me think about the possibilities for our business - and I know that his thought-provoking presentation will continue to occupy my mind-space as I step onto a plane for ITB Berlin. What was so compelling about Don’s message? Large and small collaboration communities are working together to develop and deliver new market ready products and services in highly unique and engaging ways. How? One example he used in his presentation was a Toronto-based Gold mining company whose CEO changed a fledgling gold mining company into a multi-billon dollar valuation with one simple [and courageous] idea. Share Intellectual Property with a targeted community of users to solve a challenging problem.
This CEO faced great adversity. While the company owned a number of gold mines, the geologists could not provide meaningful answers to two specific questions - How much gold is in the mines? And where is it?
With years of research, studies, reports, analysis and more analysis - no one within the company could provide answers to these two critical questions. Then a life changing event happened. CEO, Rob McEwen ended up at an MIT conference when the subject of Linux came up where the lecturer talked about a massive community of coders working together on free world-class software for the greater good - an idea, a concept that created an ephiphany! Mr. McEwen decided that he was going to share his IP with the world, [sharing his IP in an industry that locks its mining and exploration data in vaults!], creating the “Goldcorp Challenge” where Goldcorp offered $575,000 in prizes for anyone who could solve the corporation’s problem - How much gold was in the mines? And where was it?
“News of the contest spread quickly around the Internet, as over one thousand virtual prospectors from fifty countries got busy crunching the data.”
Rob McEwen’s bold move created collaboration, ideas, and a variety of technology solutions from unrelated industry sectors [from scientists and companies from all over the world], opening up the collaboration process by creating an open source approach to gold exploration. The end result? Over 100 proposals were sent in for review - with the top three proposals being shortlisted. The CEO made a final decision on the winning proposal - selecting a solution from an unrelated industry sector. The result - the technology was able to determine where the gold was - and how much was in the mines! Wow! His valuation skyrocketed from an underperforming $100 Million company to a mining corporation with a market cap of $9 Billion!
How is this relevant to our business? your business? Imagine what would happen if you exposed your IP, your competitive advantages, your best practices, your plans for new product development and services with a targeted community of collaborators who were genuinely interested in your success? What would that mean for your business?
From the book Wikonomics
“The Goldcorp story flies in the face of much conventional wisdom about how to run a business. Companies seek to protect their intellectual property, and through hiring and retaining the best people they generate new ideas, make new discoveries, compete, and grow their business lines.
McEwen saw things differently. He realized the uniquely qualified minds to make new discoveries were probably outside the boundaries of his organization, and by sharing some intellectual property he could harness a powerful new force—mass collaboration. In doing so he stumbled successfully into the future of innovation, business, and how wealth and just about everything else will be created.”
Powerful thinking! and more food for thought!
