Umair Haque recently published an article for the Harvard Business Review that I’ve read now four times and it’s time to talk about it. The piece is called Strategy Can Do Better and quantifies what so many people have been feeling so deeply but couldn’t quite get out of their mouths. The piece is so brilliant, so verbally satisfying that I couldn’t regurgitate my own version and provide any improvement whatsoever, so I’m going to quote him, alot. It’s just worth preserving and spreading.

Mr. Haque’s main points revolve around depth, purpose, community, value, people, and beauty, in the world of goods, services, or anything that humans can purchase. We’ve talked about it before, but never in a manner that explicitly calls out the parameters of doing “good” work today. A best practices manual, if you will.

He uses Pontiac as his contextual reference point, and then breaks apart why Pontiac failed.

Purpose.

“You’ve got to make the case for why what you’re making creates value that matters, counts, endures, last, and multiplies — instead of just the illusion of value.”

Yes, ok, making the case for yourself. This would be marketing yourself, but the second half of the sentence is where most corporations & marketers have to take a seat. Value that matters. And multiplies. Wait, matters to whom? Value matters to shareholders, it’s value! So it’s safe to assume value is defined not as currency, but something more meaty. Probably something a human can actually be enriched from. Awesome start, ok show me the rest.

Community

“Walking into a Pontiac dealer was about as “exciting” as watching paint dry in a prison cell. It probably should have been a pulpit of higher purpose, a place from which Pontiac could have invited people to join the flock, and shared with them why Pontiac mattered in bigger, larger, more vital terms than mere “excitement” in the first place — and perhaps even encouraged them to contribute to that larger cause.”

So, clearly, Pontiac just wanted to sell cars and not sell to humans.

People

“people are vital contributors to the art of creating an enduring advantage — and that when people are just dehumanized corporobots, mattering in human terms ceases to be possible.”

Which is why we are where we are at this stage. As stated, it’s why airline attendants won’t take your garbage anymore, why the cubicle belongs in a history book, and why companies like Pontiac fail, and fail hard. Realizing that people are the potent elixir behind any successful brand or experience is so seemingly obvious that it’s been missed altogether.

Beauty

“A steadfast, holistic, uncompromising commitment to beauty, instead of lowest-common-denominator design-by-committee? That’s probably what creating a razor sharp advantage in an arid world of bland, insipid — and sometimes just plain unsightly and unlovable — commodities piling up by the supertankerful is going to take.”

I love that beauty is the last on the list. Generally beauty is enough. It’s not anymore. Designers are trained to make something beautiful, but why are they not trained to make something meaningful? It’s where this century is going, it’s a clear and as fine as the needle in a compass. And here I find myself still making pretty things that are just absolute shite in terms of actual value. This is not abundance, this is not prosperity.

And on prosperity:

“Maybe relying on some enduring ideals is what will ignite a more authentic prosperity. And maybe yet more combat, conquest, plunder, and domination (yawn) won’t — and can’t.”

Still, in the business department today, in a liberal city, in a public university, students are taught how to undermine, cut, and consume their competition until the niche is theirs, and then to dominate it for absolutely as long as possible. Grow, expand, splice. Until there is nothing left to grow, expand, or splice. More plunder. Vikings, wearing Zegna suits and deck shoes on the weekend.

Enter the main star of the show, the wrap that couldn’t get any better.

When you read between the lines, companies that can do the above don’t just create McJobs, they create fulfilling work; they don’t just churn out more toxic junk to be mutely crammed down the throats of “consumers,” but meaningfully “good” goods; they don’t just earn a “profit” — they begin to create authentic, enduring value.

An economy of frenzied speculators flipping thin-value creating companies like Pontiac by the nanosecond, trying to desperately tapdance one step ahead of the next pyroclastic meltdown — that’s what we’ve got, and it’s a house of cards. So unless your definition of plenitude is McJobs, empty profits, excess capacity, mountains of debt, and general stagnation — well, without most of the above, I find hard to see how countries can meaningfully prosper.

Show stopper. This mans mouth speaks truth to power.

“How can you avoid joining the huddled masses of companies formerly known as the masters of the universe?
Don’t do more of. Do more than.”