Introduction
Welcome to The ContraMind Code.
The ContraMind Code provides you with a system of principles, signals, and ideas to aid you in your pursuit of excellence.
The Newsletter shares the source code, through quick snapshots, for a systems thinking approach to be the best in what you do.
The Code helps you reboot and reimagine your thinking by learning from the best and enables you to draw a blueprint on what it takes to get extraordinary things done.
Take a journey to www.contraminds.com. Listen and watch some great minds talking to us about their journey of discovery of what went into making them craftsmen of their profession to drive peak performance.
Life’s Work: An Interview with Jerry Seinfeld
by Daniel McGann
In this mind-altering interview in HBR, Jerry Seinfeld, the well-known and celebrated American Stand-up Comedian, talks about, amongst many other things, his definition of innovation.
Here are some key points from the article that we found valuable:
“What am I really sick of?” is where innovation begins.
McKinsey who? - If you’re efficient, you’re doing it the wrong way. The right way is the hard way.
Micromanaging is not so bad after all - “The show was successful because I micromanaged it—every word, every line, every take, every edit, every casting. That’s my way of life.”
Proportion is key to everything.
How it is important to add humour to your leadership.
If you want to be a world-class performer - Confidence, Courage and Being harshly critical of oneself are essential traits to build in oneself.
(There may be access issues to this HBR article for you. Please check the required registration process to read the article.)
Rolex: Timeless Excellence
by Colossus
Business Breakdown is brought to you by Colossus. In one of the business breakdown episodes, they cover the luxury watch company Rolex.
Rolex has become the leading name in luxury watches. But, while the company’s products are iconic, the business itself is highly secretive. Little is known about Rolex, owned by a Foundation and run as a non-profit entity. Listen to the conversation here.
Here’s a summary of some points from this chat:
The reasons why people buy luxury watches nowadays are for investment reasons!
Luxury Product marketing is about storytelling, riding on historical events and being silent.
Rolex sells about a million watches at an average price of $7000!
There is an apparent absence of a profit motive, and they are the most secretive company management in the world. The promoters and top executives are completely media-shy.
Three tenets of Rolex’s manufacturing: Precision, Waterproof case and Self-Winding.
The story of transformation from outsourcing to insourcing.
Two Nobel prize scientists are working for them.
Importance of long-term thinking and meaningful relationships.
What Does It Take To Succeed?
by Richard St. John
Richard St. John is a researcher, marketing guru, and CEO speechwriter. He has won design awards, done breakthrough consumer/user research, and masterminded creative production for many of Nortel’s most significant product launches.
In this fantastic 3-minute video, Richard talks about the eight things needed to succeed. You may know these eight things, but many often find it challenging to practice them daily.
Innovation And Longtermism
There is a profound truth in what Jerry Seinfeld mentioned about where innovation begins.
Often when we look at many things from an internal perspective - say, the pains that we go through using a product or service, these often create possibilities to spark innovation. Take, for example, Netflix - probably Reed Hastings was observing what people were sick of - driving down to a Blockbuster store to rent videos. Netflix changed the game by renting DVDs by mail. This innovation transformed a whole industry at that time. Then, he may have started looking at what is making this DVD rental business by mail sick, the sheer cost of managing the logistics and operations, which led to an online streaming subscription service - an on-demand viewing platform. This transformed the entire media, entertainment and DVD industry.
Similarly, in the automotive industry, Elon Musk was sick of how the automotive industry did business with customers and damaged the environment. A whole new EV industry was born. This statement by Jerry Seinfeld, “What am I sick of” is a great starting point for where innovation could begin. And it is an excellent perspective for any product or category to start thinking about innovation.
Listening to the Rolex business story triggered thoughts about how businesses need to embed long-term thinking in their operations, make it an agenda in the board rooms, and have it as a mental model for senior leadership in companies. This requires a new way of approaching product design, market development, pricing strategies and distribution. The challenge with long-term thinking, strategy & execution is that it has no visible manifestation in the short term. But, this requires conviction of a different kind. It will have to start with how the business model needs to be looked at in the very early stages - like it was a real surprise to know Rolex is owned by a foundation and run as a non-profit entity. How do you approach this thinking if a company is already an entity doing business today? Not sure if there are answers but indeed requires more thought. Executive Compensation is another factor that encourages longtermism if businesses are already running entities. Companies have found solutions for short-term rewards like yearly bonuses and increments, but how do you compensate them for long-term initiatives? The other interesting point was vertical integration thinking which seems to encourage long-term thinking in any investment decisions companies make. Apple appears to follow this with its M1 chip strategy, unlike other firms manufacturing PCs. Does a trading and assembling mindset discourage long-term thinking? Also, there is so much discussion around scaling today that it looks like ‘Scaling with a Purpose’ is an essential ingredient for longtermism. There is a need to explore these aspects further. Also, there is a case for being media shy, internally driven, and having externally facing sprawling offices that invite media attention, etc., which sometimes contradicts the current thinking of the need to be media and PR savvy.
Building a fundamentally differentiated solid product at the core seems to be a prerequisite. However, it looks like it needs to be combined with many other factors that go around the product, like - how you want your business to be run, core manufacturing principles - insourcing vs outsourcing, not being externally focussed but crafting your process and execution internally, backing long-term relationships despite short-term volatility, compensation, how to deploy profits etc. seems to be as important as the product itself. It will be interesting to study businesses that are over 100 years, like Rolex, to understand the business owners’ mindsets and how they have survived new product competition onslaught over decades and many downturns yet remain rock-solid even today.
Some of the lessons we learnt from this week’s mission:
Innovation has beginnings with a strong dislike and an urge to change it.
Being a world-class performer requires Confidence, Courage and being harshly critical of oneself.
Long-term thinking businesses seem to have different templates and operating methods. There are a lot of learnings to be taken from them.