The new rules of business

"The rules of business are now different because of the great networked connections that bring us all together. There's a kind of new Cartesian Darwinism at work. It used to be 'I think, therefore I am'. Now, it's 'I didn't think fast enough, therefore I was.' "

SOURCE: I was invited to a closed meeting of one of the Big Five consultancy groups a while back - It was kind of a pep rally for their highly paid consultants, partners, and a jolly for their big ticket customers. Can't remember why they let me in. It was themed based on The Matrix. The door staff all wore Smith agent suits, dark glasses, earpieces. The stage looked like a film set, with a copy of the dentist chair-thing you sit in to be plugged into the Matrix.

The back of the chair was to the audience as we filed in. It was all decidedly surreal. Then the lights in the theatre dimmed, the chair swung around to reveal the surprise speaker sitting in it, playing the role of Neo the messianic rebel, come to tell us where real truth lay and that what we thought was real about business and leadership was in fact an illusion.

It was Sir Bob. He embarked on an inspired rant about the new world of business and leadership that blew me away. Luckily I had my notebook in my pocket and could just about write shorthand in the dark. I just found the notes in a drawer this morning. Thought you might like that quote...I'll post a bit more of it later.