Public Collaboration vs. Secrecy - Competitive Intelligence2024-03-29T10:36:19Zhttps://competitiveintelligence.ning.com/forum/topics/public-collaboration-vs?feed=yes&xn_auth=noThis is a really cool polemic…tag:competitiveintelligence.ning.com,2009-01-10:2036441:Comment:143232009-01-10T14:24:00.268ZEric Garlandhttps://competitiveintelligence.ning.com/profile/EricGarland
This is a really cool polemic. I've been wrestling internally with the ramifications of secrecy/openness for sometime, and this Lego is a good case study. Perhaps social media can outflank slow, hierarchical structures for intelligence gathering, software projects, design, and some types of journalism. Surely, though, there's a place for cleverness and the element of surprise. You want to be open, but not <i>too</i> open.<br />
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I predict that companies will never want to be completely open with…
This is a really cool polemic. I've been wrestling internally with the ramifications of secrecy/openness for sometime, and this Lego is a good case study. Perhaps social media can outflank slow, hierarchical structures for intelligence gathering, software projects, design, and some types of journalism. Surely, though, there's a place for cleverness and the element of surprise. You want to be open, but not <i>too</i> open.<br />
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I predict that companies will never want to be completely open with their decision making processes, no matter how much Webs 2, 3, 4, and 5.0 take hold. In a turbulent market, sometimes only one company will be left standing. Let's say you have four companies in a space, all of them losing money. The last company in the market will profit, but not until all other competitors have left. So who moves first? Keeping that kind of information secret ("We're closing 150 stores next month!") is surely going to have its uses. Gandhi said that secrecy was the enemy of freedom, but it's still bidness.<br />
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That said, the legendary American football coach Vince Lombardi said of his Green Bay Packers, "We only have four plays. I can tell you what they are in advance. You still can't stop us." In a world of total information openness, this may be the attitude to take.<br />
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Now, it's time for me to play with my Indiana Jones Legos!