Ontem à tarde Joseph Pine II,
autor de livros que me ajudaram a percepcionar o mundo de forma diferente, escreveu no Twitter algo que logo me fez recordar Mongo:
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"My plan for American manufacturing jobs: shift from mass producing to mass customizing goods close to the customer. Problem solved."
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Será absurdo pensar na cidade de Nova York como uma referência para pistas sobre a evolução do futuro?
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"Brooklyn, ground zero of the artisanal-food universe, where competition is intense."
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O meu conselho de há muitos anos, para qualquer sector de actividade:
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"Like many successful entrepreneurs in the United States, Woehrle followed what seems like an ancient business model: making things by hand. He rejected the high-volume, low-margin commodity business in which ConAgra and PepsiCo compete against each other with their Slim Jim and Matador jerky products. Instead, Kings County found a niche in which engaged consumers will pay a premium for a specialty product." (Moi ici: É o já tradicional "Trabalhar para aumentar preços" à custa de mais valor potencial percepcionado pelos clientes-alvo. Enquanto isso, os encalhados da tríade só pensam na redução de custos para reduzir preços)
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Contrary to popular belief, the revival of craft manufacturing isn’t just a fad for Brooklyn hipsters. (Woehrle resists the term. His beard is too short, he says.) Jason Premo, an entrepreneur I recently met in Greenville, S.C., is also studying the unmet needs of his customers and carefully making the things they most value, albeit on a more industrial scale. Premo, a former corporate manager, learned that
many large companies faced challenges getting their hands on precision parts (like rocketry propulsion housings for ICBMs or rotor hardware for Black Hawk helicopters)
that must be made of high-performance metal alloys and cut to exacting standards. So he and a partner bought a tiny metal-machining shop, invested in some precision machines and hired a few advanced machining experts. (
Moi ici: Este sublinhado tem a sequência certa: descobrir um cliente-alvo, perceber o que lhes faz falta, oferecer uma proposta de valor e criar o mosaico de actividades capaz de oferecer a proposta) Their company, Adex Machining Technologies, now has contracts with Boeing and G.E.
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It’s tempting to look at craft businesses as simply a rejection of modern industrial capitalism. But
the craft approach is actually something new — a happy refinement of the excesses of our industrial era (
Moi ici: Isto é o que encalhados da tríade não percebem e que expus aqui e aqui) plus a return to the vision laid out by capitalism’s godfather, Adam Smith. One of his central insights in “The Wealth of Nations” is the importance of specialization. When everyone does everything — sews their own clothes, harvests their own crops, bakes their own bread — each act becomes inefficient, because generalists are rarely as quick or able as specialists.
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As other countries move into mass production, the United States, even in the depths of economic doldrums, has a level of wealth that translates to fewer people willing to do dreary, assembly-line work at extremely low wages. More significant,
we’re entering an era of hyperspecialization.
(
Moi ici: Recordar aquele subtítulo "Concentrar uma organização no que é essencial")
Huge numbers of middle-class people are now able to make a living specializing in something they enjoy, including creating niche products for other middle-class people who have enough money to indulge in buying things like high-end beef jerky.
(
Moi ici: É Mongo em todo o seu esplendor a caminho da sociedade de prosumers, a caminho de uma sociedade mais diversa, mais resiliente, mais povoada de pequenas empresas, mais povoada de empreendedores...)
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When it comes to profit and satisfaction,
craft business is showing how American manufacturing can compete in the global economy. Many of the manufacturers who are thriving in the United States (they exist, I swear!) have done so by
avoiding direct competition with low-cost commodity producers in low-wage nations.
(
Moi ici: Ei! Encalhados! Aprendam que eu não duro sempre! Eheheh longe das folhas de cálculo e directo à capacidade de ter paixão pelo que se faz!!!)
Instead, they have scrutinized the market and created customized products for less price-sensitive customers.
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As our economy recovers, there will be nearly infinite ways to meet custom needs at premium prices. (Moi ici: Daí o já ter incluído aqui no blogue, tantas vezes, aquele excerto do filme em que Dave diz "Something is going to happen. Something wonderful!")
e
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The transition to an increasingly craft-centered economy will not be without agony. Woehrle and Premo succeeded because both had access to investors and the innate ability to segue from the salaried confines of corporate life to a much riskier, entrepreneurial world.
A craft economy is far less stable: those who succeed this year may fail the next, as their once-unique products become commodities made cheaply overseas. (
Moi ici: Eu escreveria, uma economia mais resiliente, assente em empresas menos estáveis, mas mais resiliente por causa da quantidade, da diversidade e da reduzida dimensão de cada empresa em particular) Still, this new world seems, to some extent, inevitable. Instead of rolling our eyes at self-conscious Brooklyn hipsters pickling everything in sight,
we might look to them as guides to the future of the American economy. Just don’t tell them that. It would break their hearts to be called model 21st-century capitalists."
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Um artigo que é um autêntico resumo da pregação deste blogue.
