Recently I joined the slowing growing ranks of early adopters who received their Google Wave invites. After the excitement of clicking on that invite, my thoughts quickly shifted to “and now what ?”. We’re told that Wave is a whole new way to communicate real time and an in integrated way… that’s my take, not a direct Google Quote. What will it actually mean for us though ? I haven’t formed an opinion yet, but a good place to start is with Ben Parr and the Mashable team who are posting often on Google Wave.
Of course there is always the possibility that Google Wave, whilst innovative and exciting, will fail to hit the spot with a critical mass of your contact list. After all, email would be of no value if you were the only person who used it.
So, is Google Wave the next big thing, or will it remind us of the old phrase “a Camel is a horse designed by committee” ? Time will tell, but I have a fear, shared by Chris O’Brien at Mercury News, that it is a case of “engineers developing for engineers”
Going off on a tangent (after all, thoughts about Google Wave are a little too narrow-focussed for this blog !), in my experience (and yes, in a past life this was an area I worked in) good systems design requires a systems architect to bridge between user needs and the engineers, and I worry that Google Wave lacked this from concept stage onwards. It sounded cool to the team, so they just pressed ahead.
To draw a parallel spun out of my love for good design in all things, in my neighbourhood there are custom homes built and lived in by engineers, quantity surveyors and accountants, ie people driven by function and cost over form…. you can spot some of them from a distance by their lack of aesthetic considerations. The thing is, in assigning a value to a home, potential buyers also look at aesthetics, form and other areas that one needs a quality architect to design in from the very beginning. Avoiding the upfront cost of getting that design input to help you design a home that is both right for you and for (eventually) the next owner is, then, a false economy.
When the time is right to re-assess your business to ensure it is correctly positioned for the future, do invest in a “business architect”. You may have an almost completely formed idea of the “design” for your business for 2010 and beyond, so you may just need that “architect” to help you “tweak” the design. Alternatively, you may need more detailed guidance to help you with your “design” in detail. Whatever situation is yours, don’t skimp on the architect or your business too could be the next new breed of Camel.
Oh, and about my love for design, I find that Facebook pages are a better venue than a blog for posting ideas and insights on areas such as design and advertising, so do check out the McCallum Solutions Facebook page. Hmm.. maybe Google Wave will be the solution to posting on blogs, Facebook, Twitter and the increasing number of online channels we find ourselves using. The jury is out, I’m on the fence right now, but open to persuasion. You ?
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