Have you ever been blinded by science?
By Marcus Timson, FuturePrint
There is no question that science and engineering are amazing. Combined, they enable innovation across industries and they are absolutely essential to human progress. But for most people who do not possess a high competency in chemistry, physics and engineering (but are interested and understand the basic principles), some of the information presented by the boffins from the inkjet world can literally be blinding.
But despite this transformative power, being too scientific and technical can actually hold back progress.
Why? Because the people who will be making investment decisions just aren’t that interested in the micro-details. It is a language they do not speak, nor understand.
Geoffrey Moore said it best with his ‘Crossing the Chasm’ and ‘Inside the Tornado’ books. For any new technology to truly make its way into the mainstream, the new technology (or rather the people behind it) have to be able to make a clear and compelling economic case for adoption. They, therefore, need to be able to speak a mainstream language, and in commercial terms first.
There is a point at which dialogue must move beyond the more technical early adopter/innovator category (those tolerant of imperfection, in love with technology and searching for radical discontinuity) into the early majority.
To achieve this, the discussion needs to become strategic and focused on how the tech is going to make a compelling difference to the commercial performance of the production and the bottom line of the business.
It's as simple as that. If a tech community talks to itself at a high technical level and does not prioritise the need to place 'beachheads’, as Moore calls them, into these new markets, then the early market simply will not convince the mainstream. The people that make up the mainstream are more conservative-minded and need to be emboldened by clear evidence that the investment they need to make will yield proven commercial results quickly.
What these people do not require is highly technical, scientific evidence that they will not understand.
In short, we should not be blinding them with science.
This theme and more will be delved into at the FuturePrint Tech Fest.