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I have always viewed Regis McKenna with both amusement and admiration. Amusement at the seeming arrogance of his first book's title: The Regis Touch: Million Dollar Advice from America's Top Marketing Consultant (1986). And admiration of his obvious success. I still pull "Regis Touch" down from the shelf behind me from time to time, referring to a particularly useful table or graphic.
A caution to speed readers accustomed to standard left- and right-justified text: take a seasickness pill before diving in. The many pages with hourglass-shaped and concave text just might upset your equilibrium. While the graceful curves do nicely set off written "sound-bytes" of insight and are a visually attractive way to begin new chapters, they drove me nuts. My feeble brain and CRT-glazed eyes kept saying "No."
McKenna waxes philosophical at times, addressing some fairly heavy-duty concepts, including the change in our perception of self-image, of who we really are. Cyber technology allows us to transcend time and space. And size is no longer the major factor it has always been. Power now belongs to the individual. "We don't yet know how to live in this world."
Some of McKenna's iconoclastic commentary won't sit well with strategists: long range planning is OUT, "now" is IN. "Good enough" is in, extensive quality assurance and testing is out.
..."conventional forecasting has become increasingly pointless in an environment of accelerated, multi-directional, unending metamorphosis...in which...has been introducing new versions of its...software every four months..."
If this is indeed true, is it any wonder that many people refuse to purchase version 1.0 of any software? Toward the end of the book, McKenna writes "Many (people) are using...prototypes riddled with bugs – having come to the correct conclusion that...a polished, bug-free software product is likely to be a polished, bug-free obsolete software product." Oh? Are customers REALLY asking for updates every four months? Last time I checked, there are still millions of Windows 3.1.1. users around the globe.
McKenna presents a new marketing model to fit the new consumer – another variation on one-to-one marketing. Cybernation (as opposed to merely automation)...the instant, round-the-clock access to information. And, the more transparent the better. This is not just customer service, it's dynamic customer service. "Constant interaction and dialogue based on real time information systems."
Some of the cases McKenna presents are brand new, well beyond the warhorse success stories such as Levi's personalized jeans. For example, I liked his description of the "condition management" software that allows diabetic patients to upload their glucose levels from digital monitoring devices securely over the Internet and then receive instant feedback from clinic staff on appropriate actions to take. This is called "patient empowerment" by the chief of the Endocrine Metabolic Medical Centre (EMMC): www.diabeteswell.com
McKenna provides web addresses (with the familiar underlines) throughout the book. At his Web site, you can find new case studies & applications discussed in the book. Go to www.mckenna-group.com
Where I think McKenna really shines is in his description of real-time corporate information sharing between historically-antagonistic departments, such as engineering and production, or marketing and production. Intranets allow managers to review design specifications, materials and work-in-process inventories, purchasing, receivables and other important internal information routinely and in real time. This access to information across departmental boundaries produces subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) changes in human behavior and even adaptation of each others' lingo.
He reports on research on groups of both high- and low-ranking employees making decisions by electronic mail and face to face. The result? "(O)pinions of higher-status people carried less clout and were paid less attention when the medium of communication was electronic mail." YES!
More research findings: people "openly admit their ignorance to perhaps hundreds or even thousands of people. The repliers respond to requests for help from people they do not know with no expectations of any direct benefit to themselves." YES again! The researchers call this "electronic altruism."
"...e-mail...will soon seem the most prosaic medium for corporate communication." I submit that it will soon seem the most prosaic medium for ALL communication, personal as well as business..
McKenna identifies five kinds of discontinuities (shades of Megatrends) that he believes are essential to business success in Real Time:
You'll have to read "Real Time" to discover which of McKenna's nuggets make sense for you and which contribute to the confusing and often destructive (in my humble opinion) chaos that reigns in frenetic releases of new software and other cyberproducts.
Read on for a link to a counterpoint to McKenna's "release early, release often, for tomorrow it's obsolete anyway" philosophy.