Mastering The Hype Cycle

In my working lifetime I’ve lost count of the occasions when I have faced senior decision makers who, with complete conviction, declared a technology would never be significant for their business.  Like the marketing executive who told me the Web was just like Prestel and equally doomed to fail.  And another who suggested the only people likely to use their mobile phones to access data in an airport would be the ’sandals and ponytails brigade’

Well – even Email was hyped once. As this Honeywell advert from 1977 demonstrates.

‘What the Heck is Electronic Mail’

Thanks to Thomas Noggle – a Gartner Emerging technologies best practices council research specialist in the US -who brought it to my attention.

The face in the picture looks just like the ones who are all using Email today … to type hostile copy and block business cases for corporate exploration of Twitter, Second Life, Blogging, Wikis and the rest. However there is a difference 20 years on from this ad…  today’s CEO knows tech adoption timing can be a matter of significant competitive difference. Those who sneer and obstruct without careful research and analysis will be remembered.

A recent TechCrunch blog post by Sarah Lacy used the headline ‘Bloggers: Let’s band together and stop the hype cycle’ . In the piece she is really reacting to the extremes of buzz building and then cynical critique of new ideas by silicon valley commentators online. Pointing to examples like Google, Twitter, Youtube and Loudcloud she is basically calling for bloggers to give start-ups less of a roller-coaster ride for the sake of ‘writing a provocative headline’.  We have read Sarah’s article and there is a lot to agree with her on – though the title perhaps overstates the case.

The hype cycle is a fundamental phenomenon – based in human psychological responses to the new and novel. It forms from the interaction between two forces moving at different speeds, neither of which can be avoided if progress is to be made. It can’t be stopped – though it can be moderated.  If you are involved in buying and applying technology innovations  – your management actions should be designed to make sure the traps of the cycle are avoided and that the worst effects of its highs and lows are moderated.  We have spent many years working on those aspects and that’s why we wrote our book about mastering them.

Here’s our response to Sarah (posted on TechCrunch):

I like your thought provoking viewpoint Sarah. However the Hype Cycle is really an inevitability when any substantial technology based innovation is introduced to a market. It can’t be completely stopped because its existence arises from a fundamental mismatch between the speed of social excitement and the slower pace of engineering progress & market penetration. We explain this in our book about the Hype Cycle.

We believe its effect can be dampened by thoughtful management and mastering it includes learning how to use it to your advantage. It is very important to note that a certain amount of hype can help overcome corporate adoption inertia – so hype is not all bad.

The rise of web based social media is sometimes having an amplifying and sharpening effect on the shape of the curve – I think you are seeing that. This is especially true when the situation is self referential i.e. social media hype about new forms of social media. We probably all have a lot to learn in our use of blogging, twittering and the like – as our societies explore and mature into understanding cultural best practices for these media.

As you get ready to go, remind yourself of the key behavior that will help differentiate you from the competition – you choose the innovation wave, it doesn’t choose you. No matter how inviting it looks – if isn’t the right one, don’t go with it just because the crowd of surfers around you seem to be doing so. If everyone else takes this one and you miss it – the next one might be yours while they are all beached. Sometimes groups of people do all make the same mistake at the same time and perhaps they will all wipe-out. Think independently.

For an overview of ‘Rules for Riders’ see previous post

[Disclaimer - this post DOES NOT constitute an update to Gartner's hype cycle position on microblogging*]

One of the many indicators that the peak of hype has been passed, is when the tenor of media articles about the technology innovation starts to turn sour.  Sometimes that is centered on the lead player in the emerging market for that innovation – which of course requires the analyst to think carefully about whether it is just that company or the generic innovation as a whole which is losing its initial lustre.

With that in mind, here’s an excellent reference example headline that caught my attention yesterday: ” ‘Twitter Sucks!’ The Backlash Begins”

In this article, the New York Observer journalist cites a number of major news media articles about Twitter that have a negative tone – from The Telegraph to CNN. She has even found a Twitter Backlash blog.

Remember the innovation is microblogging (and there are competitors) – so let’s forget the company name for a moment.  This technology innovation example is particularly interesting because the technology is of direct relevance to journalists and media people in their own jobs. So naturally they will discuss it more and the situation is unusually amplified. As they compete for audience attention we will tend to see more extreme hyperbole and backlash. That helps make this innovation a particularly clear reference example, as it passes through the early stages of the Hype Cycle.

We can also see how the web itself is improving the tools to help innovation managers and analysts track technology zeitgeist. I was prompted to read the article becuase I have a daily Google Alert for any mention of the Hype Cycle.  The journalist can quickly follow a hunch (that there is a growing backlash) and find a number of examples to fill her article. She points to a spike in the Google Trends graph for the term ‘Twitter Backlash’ . The mood is encapsulated in the special purpose vehicle of a dedicated public blog. I doubt that blog existed two years ago and I doubt it will be active two years from now – but it will probably be captured for the historical record by systems such as the Internet Archive WayBack machine.

All off this evidence helps form a ‘digital contrail’ for the flight path of the technology – making it far easier to track than when Jackie first described the Hype Cycle in 1995.  Which means that thhe productivity of hype cycle trackers should be improving and you should be able to watch more things with higher frequency for your company.

So what are you waiting for?  Update your own company hype cycle chart of key technologies that matter to your business – right now!

* Gartner’s 2009 Hype Cycles – which will include our updated position for microblogging, will be published late Summer.

During a recent trip to Serbia, I delivered three presentations: IT and the Economy, IT Cost Cutting and the Hype Cycle.

Talking for two and a half hours takes it’s toll so Petar Kocivc and our local team kindly arranged for an entertainment interlude between presentations by local TV magician and VIP Big Brother contestant ‘Big Lale’ ( Lazar Antić ). After some very slick rope cutting and ping pong ball tricks, he decided to take on our Hype Cycle book!.

1) He tears our book to pieces..

2) He works some magic..

3) He produces 3 fresh copies from the wreckage!

Big Lale told me he has been doing magic on TV for so many years, he started out in black and white. All that practice certainly pays off.  It made me wince to see him tear up a copy of our book ( and it takes some strength too ) – he even asked me to tear up some pages. Then he placed them in a magic box which was filled to overflowing. Even at very close range I just could not figure out how all the torn material could be replaced by three copies within that small magic box he had on the table.  Amazing!

David Phillips at Leverwealth has created an online PR hype cycle showing how Web 2.0 has generated a a resurgence of interest and propelled the field toward the plateau of productivity.

Hans Uszkoreit gives a history of the machine translation hype cycle , concluding (hoping?) that the technology is finally on the slope of enlightenment. He also points out insightfully that this field is one where the fractal nature of the hype cycle may come into play: “Perhaps in fact the Hype Cycle is fractal, each slope containing smaller mini peaks and troughs within the overall pattern. It may prove hard to distinguish clearly between those old “inflated expectations” and the current widespread “hype” that there will be genuine productivity when Enlightenment is attained and new projects come to fruition within the (proverbial) next five years. Or to put it more bluntly, will MT ever grow into a visible business over and beyond its role as a technology add-on?”

Ryan Saghir also gives a brief history of satellite radio’s journey through the hype cycle, and triggers some lively debate about whether Sirius XM is in the trough of disillusionment.

Once you get started, it’s very easy to get carried away and to be tempted out of your depth. Remember that’s what the hype is all about – getting swept along with the enthusiasm of a market crowd. It’s a human anthropological trait. We all holler out from the stands at a football game in a way we would never do in private.
How risky does this innovation look and what stage is the wave really at?  Even if you personally like the look of it, consider whether your current organization really has the cultural appetite and ability to come with you.  If not, are you really prepared to swim out alone as a maverick?  There may be a lot stake.  You might be able to swim that far out and survive on your own until the wave builds up and everyone wants to join. Or you might get cramp and find yourself out in the cold, gulping for air. If you decide to go, consider whether the waters are safe. Maybe you are tough enough to take getting stung a couple of times along the way. But check for sharks – there are people out there so desperate to say anything that will sell their ideas, they might eat you alive.

For an overview of ‘Rules for Riders’ see previous post

I’m really enjoying the first UK edition of Wired magazine.

This popular newsstand journal has given a monthly boost to corporate IT and business innovators all over the world for years, but now there is British and an Italian version – both with a large amount of local editorial content. Originally based out of the MIT media lab, now operated by Conde Nast, it sometimes goes on eclectic wanderings but never fails to inspire and thought-provoke. Jackie and I both love Wired and we know they like the Hype Cycle. It was included in the US edition some years ago and you can see editor Chris Anderson talk about it within a video of his 2004 TED presentation about the long tail.

BUT I am troubled. Something at the back my mind said ‘oh no … not NOW people!’  They could have launched this anytime in the last decade but they chose a deep recession year.  I was immediately reminded of the truly wonderful European edition of Business 2.0 magazine, which launched in 2000, at the peak of a boom but quickly withdrew in 2001.

I really hope British and Italian innovators support their local Wired editions. The stories those magazines provide will help your own storytelling no end. Winning hearts and minds inside dull grey corporate offices is never easy – this is fodder you need.

Use it or lose it.

P.S.  What’s that? Yes, we did publish ‘Mastering the Hypecycle’ in October 2008 during the week of the stock market crash – what’s your point?    Fortune favours the brave.

If you are old enough, or a film fan, you will recall the famous speech by Gordon Gekko in the film Wall Street where he espouses the idea that ‘greed is good’‘ There is a double edge to using that analogy to support my argument – but here goes!…

In a non-tech corporation, the biggest problem in your business-IT function isn’t controlling the hype of an over zealous IT industry anymore. Maybe it was a decade ago, but not today. Many of the incumbents are happy to keep taking repeat maintenance revenues for the stuff you already have without offering game changing innovations or seriously helping you to internally-market new ideas. They are battoning down their revenue stream hatches, waiting for the recession storm to pass.

So if you hope to ‘leverage the downturn’* by introducing major new technology enabled business process changes, business model changes or competencies … where will the energy come from?  Mature, large company management cultures are usually dominated by silo complexity and political inertia. Add the fear of recession job losses and they can go into a glacial torpor – the hope being that ‘if we change nothing we might survive’. Nobody dares take a risk that would mark their card personally, notching them up the the HR department’s severance-list spreadsheet .

Right now, I think some industry hype is a valuable thing. It’s maintaining a sense of momentum under very difficult circumstances. It creates a sense of compulsion – to investigate at least, to experiment hopefully and to implement perhaps.  So think twice before hitting out at cloud hype, green hype and social media hype. These are high energy sources that might overcome inertia and help your industry move on to a new level of performance over the next few years. Like all energy sources they are precious and deplete all too rapidly.

If you think hype offends, try moving your project idea through the business case approval process, to action, during the trough of disillusionment.  Or wait 5 to 10 years until the plateau of productivity is very firmly established…. assuming your position and your company survive that long.

Innovators question everything – including the received wisdom that hype is a problem. Exploit this powerful market/social force to your advantage, rather than sitting on the sidelines hoping the recession will just go away.

Hype will help power the creativity in ‘creative destruction’. One person’s hype is another person’s evangelism anyway. Hype forms in our collective social excitement about the new and the novel. It is both necessary and inevitable – so use it.

* I so dislike this expression but it’s short and functional

At a recent Gartner event I conducted an informal poll of 16 emerging technology managers. The results showed that most were experiencing relative stability in their staffing and funding. Less than 10% had experienced, or were projecting, staff cuts, and half were expecing to grow their staffing and funding levels by 2010. This may be counter to expectations in an economic downturn, but in fact mirrors our experience with inquiries from our clients, where we are still seeing a strong level of interest in emerging technologies and innovation. The lessons from the dot com era, when many organizations were blindsided by the rapid adoption of the Internet and felt they should have been better prepared, have been relatively enduring. Since that time we have seen a steady stream of interest from clients who want to formalize their emerging technology activities and processes to make sure they don’t miss “the next big thing”. Organizations realize that they need to innovate even (especially?) in tight economic times.

However, the same poll showed that around half of the organizations were shifting toward shorter term results, and focusing more on cost reduction than on growth. Still, over a quarter were refocusing on growth and longer term activities. This reflects the overall mood that companies feel they need to emphasize cost reductions and short term results in the current economic climate, but also shows that these trends are never “one size fits all”. The importance of making sure that your innovation activities are aligned with your organizational scope and goals - be they cost-cutting, growth, or a balance of each – is still paramount.