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Coming from a family of educators, I have become deeply concerned about the state of education in the United States today. My largest issue is how education does not relate enough to innovation, as the only hope for humanity to solve its problems has always been through education. This has been true since we learned to learn, and will continue until or unless we forget how to learn.

The concept of signifiant digits, also called signifiant figures is relevant here. My embedded Apple dictionary defines this as “each of the digits of a number that are used to express it to the required degree of accuracy, starting from the first nonzero digit: this text will round numbers to three significant figures.” The basic concept is beyond a specific point, more numbers do not increase accuracy. Ten divided by two is five. There is only one signifiant digit even though 5.00 or 5.0000 are also correct but without increasing accuracy. Infinitely long series of digits are important in science and engineering but less so for normal business people where in general there is only one significant digit.

It is rare for a business plan to predict anything with better than 10% accuracy, which is why 100 page business plans are not more significant or useful beyond 10 pages. As most plans do not survive contact with reality, there is not much point to being overly attached to detailed results derived from hypotheticals. Innovators and startups are both much more likely to succeed when they are flexible enough to change in response to the external world. Until an enterprise gets into a feedback loop with reality, through engaging real customers, suppliers, staff and the other stakeholders, extended speculation is counterproductive.

Much more than a page or three on predicted revenues for a startup is engaging in artificial accuracy.  And from an innovation perspective so is teaching to a test. There are several problems with it. It presumes someone actually knows what should be on the test that is being taught to, and that implies a universe that is more static than it really is.  Also it is the lower primary and secondary grades who are tracking the most to tests, and these individual teachers have been taught to teach, often do not have much domain expertise which comes from experiences in the outside real world. On the other hand higher education is staffed by individuals with significant domain expertise who are often not trained in teaching or in the communication of knowledge.

There is a problem here – the world is accelerating so much that the half life of specialized knowledge is decreasing every year. In other words when we teach students increasing amounts of information,  or even knowledge which is more context rich, its life expectancy decreases every year.  The only hope is teach people how to learn increasingly quickly accompanied by the critical thinking skills to determine what to learn and what to forget.

We desperately desire rigor for repeatability and predictability which brings us to metrology, the science of measurement where the notion of significant digits lives. It also brings us to a more philosophical approach to life as determining what to measure, and how to measure it, is often not straight forward.

One notion accompanying our changing society is the current definition of quality has been changing as well.

The Metrology of Quality, Quantity and Convenience

Convenience and quantity seem to be becoming society’s new definition of quality. Both require less consumer discrimination than quality. Storing 10,000 songs or photos is considerably easier to understand objectively than determining which ones are great. Is driving 1000 miles better than walking ten great ones?

Meaning, usually more dependent upon quality, is usually achieved more through diminishing returns, than either quantity or convenience. As such quality usually requires more resources in the forms of time, money and effort to achieve. It can also be more difficult to qualify than to quantify.

Metrology, the science of measurement, continues to be critical for humanities development. Rigor requires repeatability, for without the ability to measure how can we repeat and progress? It appears, that for much of the world there has been a shift from quality to quantity, perhaps because it is easier to quantify than to qualify?

This presents us with multiple challenges to overcome – what to measure, how to measure it and how much accuracy is real? And all of these border on the philosophical.

People want real not fake rigor, but they also tend to only absorb information that is emotionally relevant.  This raises the issue of context and context management.

Context and Stories  

Data has less value than Information, which has less value than knowledge. And knowledge has less value than wisdom.   What is increasing along this path from data to wisdom at every level, is context.

One reason stories are so successful at transmitting lessons is they place information and knowledge within an experiential context. This permits making information and knowledge emotionally engaging which is necessary for emotional relevancy, the only kind of relevancy.

This makes it difficult to determine exactly which accuracy is not artificial.

 

Aesthetic Engineering refers to the field where emotionally relevance and robustness meet in a balanced and integrated manner. Two classical examples of this are architecture and industrial design. Building have to last and also look good and European sports cars are beautiful and run reliably. The internet has been improving in this regard where content is emotionally engaging and relevant and the sites which house it also work robustly.

Artists are not always taught reliability and engineers are not always taught emotional relevancy but a small college in Silicon Valley had for a short time a degree granting program called Aesthetic Engineering. This program rapidly evolved into one called Innovation Management which ultimately led to the formation of the Silicon Valley Innovation Institute.  The Aesthetic Engineering program encouraged artists to learn how to write code and coders to learn how to draw or play music. The thinking at the time was balancing the heart and mind was not enough, money had to enter into it as well, because the primary difference between creativity and innovation was a business model. In order to be creative one does not have to be operating under a business model but if innovation, applied insight is to be adopted than it has to be sustainable for long enough to be adopted and that generally requires a business model.  The Innovation Management program included a new innovation project management process which balanced required resources and budgets against emotionally relevant value propositions.

Although innovation does not always have a vetted business plan as can be seen by the number of fits and starts that may have to be iterated through in order to work out populating the business model relating the appropriate variables by market supporting ratios to make sure the resource flow can be sustained.

And this was where aesthetic engineering sometime fell short. Examples like Italian sports cars that were a joy to behold and to drive as well but sometimes had a tendency to fall apart more quickly than less technically robust models. People who spend all of their effort and resources looking good sometimes neglect other necessary aspects of life and eventually pay the price.

Developing a life or a career integrating emotional relevancy and sustainability can also be a difficult balancing act which sometimes drives parents to advise their offspring to avoid the arts as a vocation but to become something more reliable in terms of earning such as becoming a licensed professional in medicine, law, and other high earning professions.

Some people go so far as to please their parents but sacrifice their own emotional needs. In other words they make money but are not satisfied. This is not the territory of the aesthetically engineered life. A different population may pursue their hearts desire and run out of steam when they can no longer pay the bills again the sustainability argument which pushed Aesthetic Engineering to rapidly evolve into Innovation Management at Cogswell Polytechnical.

One time honored solution has been for artists to have patrons or to spend a significant portion of their energies teaching. Most artists teach to bridge the financial gap which sometimes creates an artistic gap between academia and fine art. This happens in the performing arts as well as the fine arts.

Aesthetic Engineering can provide marketable skills permitting artists to commercialize their arts. In todays economy the most likely candidate is technical skills which also has the fringe benefit of leveraging artists to increase their creative footprint. More on that topic another day.

Marketplaces, Meetingplaces and Meaningplaces

In addition to being aware of the marketplace where things are sold, and meetingplaces where people connect, another critically important place which addresses identity and existential angst is the MeaningPlace.

Big box stores and internet sales are the fastest growing part of  B to C (business to consumer) retail. And connectivity advances have dramatically increased the number and variety of meeting places which impacts how we work together to  collaborate. Meaningplaces, places that create or support meaning are equally important to the Future of Work.

Small retailers have the emotionally valuable ability to recognize and acknowledge customers, something big box stores and online sales outlets have a hard time doing creating business opportunity.  Additionally the criticality of attracting and retaining a quality workforce is dependent upon providing a meaningplace, something great tech companies like Google do exceedingly well.

As we are accelerating toward IoT (the internet of things) and the commoditization of everything, emotionally engaging customers and staff becomes increasingly critical because without emotional relevancy there is no engagement. Although  we like to believe our world is rational, experience tells us otherwise.  People make most if not all decisions emotionally. Emotional engagement impacts all decisions. Companies that are meaningplaces sell more and hire better people.

A meaning place, is a place where a person can create meaning, either alone or with others. Public places which support meaning, often through community, include schools, libraries, museums, parks, beaches and other venues supporting nature and / or culture. Public places that can support meaning are often small local retail establishments, where proprietors recognize, acknowledge and serve customers. In many retail places customers create meaning for themselves simply by being there. Some examples are bookstores, food establishments, and nurseries which provide nurture through knowledge, meals, and plants.

One group needing to pay more attention to this is Main Street America as it is in crisis. Small privately owned stores experiencing increased overhead in many dimensions are particularly hurt by new forms of competition driving down their margins at the same their costs are going up. The net impact of globalization and large entity domestic retail competition is reducing the sustainability of small local businesses.

Local stores need to reinvent their business to stay in the game. People agree that local business plays a significant role in response to local needs and has a “hometown advantage” over big store chains. To use this advantage, local business owners build one-on-one relationships with their customers to get to know more than just their buying preferences. Humans derive much meaning through conversational exchanges with those they have good relationships with. In general meaning requires in-person relationship building accelerates rapport and rapport.

It does not have to take much time or money to create meaning and there is no substitute. Saving money to accumulate more items does not make our lives better or more meaningful. As people age relationships become more important than milestones. People become more important than projects. Those who have meaning in their lives  live longer and live better.  Actively creating meaningplaces for ourselves and for others is one of the most powerful activities we can engage in publicly, professionally and personally.

And in case you were wondering what this has to do with innovation – the act of innovating is one of the very best ways to create meaning for yourself and for others.

Monsemble: Maximizing Solo Artist / Innovator Relevancy