0:00:00.013,0:00:03.856 Over the past six months, I've spent my time 0:00:03.856,0:00:07.247 traveling. I think I've done 60,000 miles, 0:00:07.247,0:00:10.169 but without leaving my desk. 0:00:10.169,0:00:13.015 And the reason I can do that is because I'm actually two people. 0:00:13.015,0:00:15.968 I look like one person but I'm two people. I'm Eddie who is here, 0:00:15.968,0:00:20.369 and at the same time, my alter ego is a big green boxy 0:00:20.369,0:00:24.049 avatar nicknamed Cyber Frank. 0:00:24.049,0:00:26.858 So that's what I spend my time doing. I'd like to start, 0:00:26.858,0:00:29.920 if it's possible, with a test, because I do business stuff, 0:00:29.920,0:00:33.504 so it's important that we focus on outcomes. 0:00:33.504,0:00:35.437 And then I struggled, because I was thinking to myself, 0:00:35.437,0:00:37.905 "What should I talk? What should I do? It's a TED audience. 0:00:37.905,0:00:40.713 It's got to be stretching. How am I going to make — ?" 0:00:40.713,0:00:43.806 So I just hope I've got the level of difficulty right. 0:00:43.806,0:00:45.870 So let's just walk our way through this. 0:00:45.870,0:00:49.319 Please could you work this through with me? You can shout out the answer if you like. 0:00:49.319,0:00:51.501 The question is, which of these horizontal lines is longer? 0:00:51.501,0:00:52.647 The answer is? 0:00:52.647,0:00:55.371 Audience: The same.Eddie Obeng: The same. 0:00:55.371,0:00:57.118 No, they're not the same. (Laughter) 0:00:57.118,0:01:00.747 They're not the same. The top one is 10 percent longer than the bottom one. 0:01:00.747,0:01:04.056 So why did you tell me they were the same? Do you remember when we were kids at school, 0:01:04.056,0:01:06.511 about that big, they played the same trick on us? 0:01:06.511,0:01:08.848 It was to teach us parallax. Do you remember? 0:01:08.848,0:01:11.995 And you got, you said, "It's the same!" And you got it wrong. 0:01:11.995,0:01:15.831 You remember? And you learned the answer, and you've carried this answer in your head for 10, 20, 30, 40 years: 0:01:15.831,0:01:19.711 The answer is the same. The answer is the same. So when you're asked what the lengths are, 0:01:19.711,0:01:22.280 you say they're the same, but they're not the same, because I've changed it. 0:01:22.280,0:01:26.447 And this is what I'm trying to explain has happened to us in the 21st century. 0:01:26.447,0:01:28.745 Somebody or something has changed the rules 0:01:28.745,0:01:30.802 about how our world works. 0:01:30.802,0:01:33.708 When I'm joking, I try and explain it happened at midnight, 0:01:33.708,0:01:37.544 you see, while we were asleep, but it was midnight 15 years ago. Okay? 0:01:37.544,0:01:40.159 You didn't notice it? But basically, what they do is, 0:01:40.159,0:01:42.831 they switched all the rules round, so that the way to 0:01:42.831,0:01:46.423 successfully run a business, an organization, or even a country, 0:01:46.423,0:01:49.104 has been deleted, flipped, and it's a completely new 0:01:49.104,0:01:53.384 — you think I'm joking, don't you — there's a completely new set of rules in operation. (Laughter) 0:01:53.384,0:01:55.194 Did you notice that? I mean, you missed this one. 0:01:55.194,0:01:57.029 You probably — No, you didn't. Okay. (Laughter) 0:01:57.029,0:02:01.371 My simple idea is that what's happened is, 0:02:01.371,0:02:05.365 the real 21st century around us isn't so obvious to us, 0:02:05.365,0:02:08.410 so instead we spend our time responding rationally 0:02:08.410,0:02:11.583 to a world which we understand and recognize, 0:02:11.583,0:02:14.002 but which no longer exists. 0:02:14.002,0:02:16.211 You don't believe me, do you? Okay. (Applause) 0:02:16.211,0:02:21.115 So let me take you on a little journey of many of the things I don't understand. 0:02:21.115,0:02:23.707 If you search Amazon for the word "creativity," 0:02:23.707,0:02:26.074 you'll discover something like 90,000 books. 0:02:26.074,0:02:28.878 If you go on Google and you look for "innovation + creativity," 0:02:28.878,0:02:33.137 you get 30 million hits. If you add the word "consultants," it doubles to 60 million. (Laughter) 0:02:33.137,0:02:36.322 Are you with me? And yet, statistically, what you discover 0:02:36.322,0:02:39.307 is that about one in 100,000 ideas is found making money 0:02:39.307,0:02:42.430 or delivering benefits two years after its inception. 0:02:42.430,0:02:45.443 It makes no sense. Companies make their expensive executives 0:02:45.443,0:02:48.003 spend ages carefully preparing forecasts and budgets 0:02:48.003,0:02:52.063 which are obsolete or need changing before they can be published. 0:02:52.063,0:02:55.786 How is that possible? If you look at the visions we have, 0:02:55.786,0:02:57.563 the visions of how we're going to change the world, 0:02:57.563,0:03:00.188 the key thing is implementation. We have the vision. 0:03:00.188,0:03:01.544 We've got to make it happen. 0:03:01.544,0:03:04.536 We've spent decades professionalizing implementation. 0:03:04.536,0:03:06.993 People are supposed to be good at making stuff happen. 0:03:06.993,0:03:11.890 However, if I use as an example a family of five 0:03:11.890,0:03:14.624 going on holiday, if you can imagine this, 0:03:14.624,0:03:19.024 all the way from London all the way across to Hong Kong, 0:03:19.024,0:03:22.933 what I want you to think about is their budget is only 3,000 pounds of expenses. 0:03:22.933,0:03:26.064 What actually happens is, if I compare this to the average 0:03:26.064,0:03:31.851 real project, average real successful project, 0:03:31.851,0:03:36.077 the family actually end up in Makassar, South Sulawesi, 0:03:36.077,0:03:39.094 at a cost of 4,000 pounds, 0:03:39.094,0:03:41.799 whilst leaving two of the children behind. (Laughter) 0:03:41.799,0:03:46.134 What I'm trying to explain to you is, there are things which don't make sense to us. 0:03:46.134,0:03:50.419 It gets even worse than that. Let me just walk you through this one. 0:03:50.419,0:03:52.993 This is a quote, and I'll just pick words out of it. 0:03:52.993,0:03:56.336 It says -- I'll put on the voice -- "In summary, your Majesty, 0:03:56.336,0:03:59.842 the failure to foresee the timing, extent and severity 0:03:59.842,0:04:03.605 of the crisis was due to the lack of creativity 0:04:03.605,0:04:07.003 and the number of bright minds," or something like that. 0:04:07.003,0:04:10.811 This was a group of eminent economists apologizing to the Queen of England 0:04:10.811,0:04:12.816 when she asked the question, 0:04:12.816,0:04:15.755 "Why did no one tell us that the crisis was coming?" (Laughter) 0:04:15.755,0:04:19.258 I'll never get my knighthood. I'll never get my knighthood. (Laughter) 0:04:19.258,0:04:21.486 That's not the important point. The thing you have to remember is, 0:04:21.486,0:04:24.948 these are eminent economists, some of the smartest people 0:04:24.948,0:04:28.464 on the planet. Do you see the challenge? (Laughter) 0:04:28.464,0:04:33.011 It's scary. My friend and mentor, Tim Brown of IDEO, 0:04:33.011,0:04:36.913 he explains that design must get big, and he's right. 0:04:36.913,0:04:39.532 He wisely explains this to us. He says design thinking 0:04:39.532,0:04:41.834 must tackle big systems for the challenges we have. 0:04:41.834,0:04:43.971 He's absolutely right. 0:04:43.971,0:04:47.644 And then I ask myself, "Why was it ever small?" 0:04:47.644,0:04:51.506 Isn't it weird? You know, if collaboration is so cool, 0:04:51.506,0:04:53.639 is cross-functional working is so amazing, 0:04:53.639,0:04:58.865 why did we build these huge hierarchies? What's going on? 0:04:58.865,0:05:03.146 You see, I think what's happened, perhaps, is that 0:05:03.146,0:05:07.232 we've not noticed that change I described earlier. 0:05:07.232,0:05:10.010 What we do know is that the world has accelerated. 0:05:10.010,0:05:12.332 Cyberspace moves everything at the speed of light. 0:05:12.332,0:05:14.804 Technology accelerates things exponentially. 0:05:14.804,0:05:16.966 So if this is now, and that's the past, 0:05:16.966,0:05:18.336 and we start thinking about change, you know, 0:05:18.336,0:05:20.907 all governments are seeking change, you're here seeking change, 0:05:20.907,0:05:23.578 everybody's after change, it's really cool. (Laughter) 0:05:23.578,0:05:28.021 So what happens is, we get this wonderful whooshing acceleration and change. 0:05:28.021,0:05:32.117 The speed is accelerating. That's not the only thing. 0:05:32.117,0:05:34.788 At the same time, as we've done that, we've done something really weird. 0:05:34.788,0:05:37.437 We've doubled the population in 40 years, 0:05:37.437,0:05:41.051 put half of them in cities, then connected them all up so they can interact. 0:05:41.051,0:05:43.920 The density of the interaction of human beings is amazing. 0:05:43.920,0:05:48.772 There are charts which show all these movements of information. That density of information is amazing. 0:05:48.772,0:05:50.406 And then we've done a third thing. 0:05:50.406,0:05:52.401 you know, for those of you who have as an office 0:05:52.401,0:05:57.870 a little desk underneath the stairs, and you say, well this is my little desk under the stairs, 0:05:57.870,0:06:04.261 no! You are sitting at the headquarters of a global corporation if you're connected to the Internet. 0:06:04.261,0:06:07.175 What's happened is, we've changed the scale. 0:06:07.175,0:06:10.122 Size and scale are no longer the same. 0:06:10.122,0:06:13.344 And then add to that, every time you tweet, 0:06:13.344,0:06:16.134 over a third of your followers follow from a country 0:06:16.134,0:06:19.042 which is not your own. 0:06:19.042,0:06:22.051 Global is the new scale. We know that. 0:06:22.051,0:06:26.063 And so people say things like, "The world is now a turbulent place." Have you heard them saying things like that? 0:06:26.063,0:06:28.824 And they use it as a metaphor. Have you come across this? 0:06:28.824,0:06:31.957 And they think it's a metaphor, but this is not a metaphor. 0:06:31.957,0:06:35.174 It's reality. As a young engineering student, I remember 0:06:35.174,0:06:39.165 going to a demonstration where they basically, 0:06:39.165,0:06:41.576 the demonstrator did something quite intriguing. 0:06:41.576,0:06:46.758 What he did was, he got a transparent pipe — have you seen this demonstration before? — 0:06:46.758,0:06:50.174 he attached it to a tap. So effectively what you had was, 0:06:50.174,0:06:53.349 you had a situation where — I'll try and draw the tap 0:06:53.349,0:06:56.064 and the pipe, actually I'll skip the tap. The taps are hard. 0:06:56.064,0:06:59.262 Okay? So I'll write the word "tap." Is that okay? It's a tap. (Laughter) 0:06:59.262,0:07:03.064 Okay, so he attaches it to a transparent pipe, and he turns the water on. 0:07:03.064,0:07:05.685 And he says, do you notice anything? And the water is whooshing down this pipe. 0:07:05.685,0:07:08.806 I mean, this is not exciting stuff. Are you with me? 0:07:08.806,0:07:12.924 So the water goes up. He turns it back down. Great. 0:07:12.924,0:07:16.636 And he says, "Anything you notice?" No. Then he sticks a needle into the pipe, 0:07:16.636,0:07:18.812 and he connects this to a container, and he fills 0:07:18.812,0:07:22.133 the container up with green ink. You with me? 0:07:22.133,0:07:25.923 So guess what happens? A thin green line comes out 0:07:25.923,0:07:30.269 as it flows down the pipe. It's not that interesting. 0:07:30.269,0:07:34.561 And then he turns the water up a bit, so it starts coming back in. And nothing changes. 0:07:34.561,0:07:37.747 So he's changing the flow of the water, but it's just a boring green line. 0:07:37.747,0:07:40.614 He adds some more. He adds some more. And then something weird happens. 0:07:40.614,0:07:45.770 There's this little flicker, and then as he turns it ever so slightly more, 0:07:45.770,0:07:48.745 the whole of that green line disappears, and instead 0:07:48.745,0:07:52.105 there are these little sort of inky dust devils close to the needle. 0:07:52.105,0:07:55.269 They're called eddies. Not me. And they're violently dispersing the ink 0:07:55.269,0:07:58.953 so that it actually gets diluted out, and the color's gone. 0:07:58.953,0:08:02.966 What's happened in this world of pipe 0:08:02.966,0:08:06.893 is somebody has flipped it. They've changed the rules from laminar to turbulent. 0:08:06.893,0:08:10.574 All the rules are gone. In that environment, instantly, 0:08:10.574,0:08:14.693 all the possibilities which turbulence brings are available, 0:08:14.693,0:08:17.535 and it's not the same as laminar. 0:08:17.535,0:08:22.493 And if we didn't have that green ink, you'd never notice. 0:08:22.493,0:08:25.790 And I think this is our challenge, because somebody 0:08:25.790,0:08:29.894 has actually increased — and it's probably you guys with all your tech and stuff — 0:08:29.894,0:08:33.875 the speed, the scale and the density of interaction. 0:08:33.875,0:08:35.574 Now how do we cope and deal with that? 0:08:35.574,0:08:39.007 Well, we could just call it turbulence, or we could try and learn. 0:08:39.007,0:08:44.105 Yes, learn, but I know you guys grew up in the days when 0:08:44.105,0:08:46.909 there were actually these things called correct answers, 0:08:46.909,0:08:50.070 because of the answer you gave me to the horizontal line puzzle, 0:08:50.070,0:08:51.883 and you believe it will last forever. 0:08:51.883,0:08:55.310 So I'll put a little line up here which represents learning, 0:08:55.310,0:08:57.485 and that's how we used to do it. We could see things, 0:08:57.485,0:08:59.998 understand them, take the time to put them into practice. 0:08:59.998,0:09:03.847 Out here is the world. Now, what's happened to our pace 0:09:03.847,0:09:07.092 of learning as the world has accelerated? Well, if you work 0:09:07.092,0:09:09.638 for a corporation, you'll discover it's quite difficult to work 0:09:09.638,0:09:12.584 on stuff which your boss doesn't approve of, isn't in the strategy, 0:09:12.584,0:09:15.189 and anyway, you've got to go through your monthly meetings. 0:09:15.189,0:09:20.557 If you work in an institution, one day you will get them to make that decision. 0:09:20.557,0:09:23.292 And if you work in a market where people believe in cycles, 0:09:23.292,0:09:25.679 it's even funnier, because you have to wait all the way 0:09:25.679,0:09:29.302 for the cycle to fail before you go, "There's something wrong." You with me? 0:09:29.302,0:09:34.854 So it's likely that the line, in terms of learning, is pretty flat. 0:09:34.854,0:09:39.051 You with me? This point over here, the point at which 0:09:39.051,0:09:42.954 the lines cross over, the pace of change 0:09:42.954,0:09:46.098 overtakes the pace of learning, 0:09:46.098,0:09:48.983 and for me, that is what I was describing 0:09:48.983,0:09:52.240 when I was telling you about midnight. 0:09:52.240,0:09:55.401 So what does it do to us? Well, it completely transforms what we have to do, 0:09:55.401,0:09:59.040 many mistakes we make. We solve last year's problems 0:09:59.040,0:10:01.776 without thinking about the future. If you try and think about it, 0:10:01.776,0:10:04.712 the things you're solving now, what problems are they going to bring in the future? 0:10:04.712,0:10:07.232 If you haven't understood the world you're living in, 0:10:07.232,0:10:10.848 it's almost impossible to be absolutely certain that what you're going to deliver fits. 0:10:10.848,0:10:14.256 I'll give you an example, a quick one. Creativity and ideas, 0:10:14.256,0:10:17.297 I mentioned that earlier. All the CEOs around me, my clients, they want innovation, 0:10:17.297,0:10:20.601 so they seek innovation. They say to people, "Take risks and be creative!" 0:10:20.601,0:10:23.528 But unfortunately the words get transformed as they travel through the air. 0:10:23.528,0:10:27.649 Entering their ears, what they hear is, "Do crazy things and then I'll fire you." Why? (Laughter) Because — 0:10:27.649,0:10:31.304 Why? Because in the old world, okay, in the old world, 0:10:31.304,0:10:33.769 over here, getting stuff wrong was unacceptable. 0:10:33.769,0:10:36.401 If you got something wrong, you'd failed. How should you be treated? 0:10:36.401,0:10:39.537 Well, harshly, because you could have asked somebody who had experience. 0:10:39.537,0:10:44.601 So we learned the answer and we carried this in our heads for 20, 30 years, are you with me? 0:10:44.601,0:10:47.304 The answer is, don't do things which are different. 0:10:47.304,0:10:49.527 And then suddenly we tell them to and it doesn't work. 0:10:49.527,0:10:52.139 You see, in reality, there are two ways you can fail in our new world. 0:10:52.139,0:10:55.990 One, you're doing something that you should follow a procedure to, and it's a very difficult thing, 0:10:55.990,0:10:59.472 you're sloppy, you get it wrong. How should you be treated? You should probably be fired. 0:10:59.472,0:11:02.704 On the other hand, you're doing something new, no one's ever done before, 0:11:02.704,0:11:04.684 you get it completely wrong. How should you be treated? 0:11:04.684,0:11:08.296 Well, free pizzas! You should be treated better than the people who succeed. 0:11:08.296,0:11:11.784 It's called smart failure. Why? Because you can't put it on your C.V. 0:11:11.784,0:11:14.513 So what I want to leave you, then, is with the explanation 0:11:14.513,0:11:18.337 of why I actually traveled 60,000 miles from my desk. 0:11:18.337,0:11:20.377 When I realized the power of this new world, 0:11:20.377,0:11:24.749 I quit my safe teaching job, and set up a virtual business school, 0:11:24.749,0:11:28.544 the first in the world, in order to teach people how to make this happen, 0:11:28.544,0:11:33.877 and I used some of my learnings about some of the rules which I'd learned on myself. 0:11:33.877,0:11:36.926 If you're interested, worldaftermidnight.com, you'll find out more, 0:11:36.926,0:11:39.846 but I've applied them to myself for over a decade, 0:11:39.846,0:11:43.595 and I'm still here, and I still have my house, and the most important thing is, 0:11:43.595,0:11:48.975 I hope I've done enough to inject a little green ink into your lives, 0:11:48.975,0:11:51.718 so that when you go away and you're making your next 0:11:51.718,0:11:56.317 absolutely sensible and rational decision, you'll take some time to think, 0:11:56.317,0:11:59.397 "Hmm, I wonder whether this also makes sense 0:11:59.397,0:12:02.180 in our new world after midnight." Thank you very much. 0:12:02.180,0:12:09.230 (Applause) 0:12:09.230,0:12:15.659 Thank you, thank you. (Applause)