Going LARGE by Staying small

Tom Peters called it – “Crazy times call for crazy organizations” (The Tom Peters Seminar 1994) We are in crazy times. The bubble bursts and capital gets destroyed in larger chunks than in any time before. Obama tries to help his country to survive this crisis and one thing is absolutely clear – going large was a mistake.

Ford, GM, Toyota, Chrysler, Siemens, Infineon, Nokia, Sony all are in big trouble. Open the newspaper and you get scared.

What happened? Large organizations – like dinosaurs survive just because they are big! They can effort to be ineffective, dull and slow because they are large.

As long as the equilibrium in which they can exist does not change – they are the kings.

But – Napster and iTunes changed the music business, the game industry is hit by self publishing game developers like tellgate.  The first line of defense of the big ones was to by the small ones. But if you do not have big pockets anymore, you can not assimilate the smaller, the more agile companies.

What will happen? The smaller will survive – and the big ones will die.

I did this presentation yesterday at the Summer School of C.E.S.A.R. in Recife and I will do it today a 19:00 at SWQuality in Recife Antigo.

If you want to know what you need to do to stay small to become LARGE, this presentation can give you some hints.

A translation to Portuguese you will find here:

Tom Peters clamou – “Tempos insanos clamam por organizações insanas” (Crazy times call for crazy organizations) (The Tom Peters Seminar, 1994). Nós estamos vivendo tempos insanos. A bolha estourou, e riqueza vem sendo destruída em quantidades jamais vistas. Obama tenta ajudar seu país a sobreviver à crise, e uma coisa está absolutamente clara – ficar grande foi um erro!