Among the majority of today's cavemen, even the big hunters will often view the new fire and say: "This looks like it could burn one's hands. I won't use it. I will rather eat my grubs raw." And so they continue eating raw grubs for weeks, months or years, until one day the mouth-watering scent of barbecues from the caves around them will convince them that fire is safe after all. Ultimately all cavemen learn to use fire, or die. The difference is just that those who are slow at adopting fire eat cold grubs a lot longer.
If it was just a matter of eating cold grubs, the story might have been merely ironic. But it is more serious than that. Fire means the difference between survival and extinction when winter comes.
Why is technological extinction so popular among today's cavemen?
We constantly see new technology becoming available at a costs that are entirely feasible. New imaginative ways of financing are presented. Special offers are made available. And yet, many users still shrink away from new technology, thinking that if they haven't seen their neighbours use it, it would be too great a risk to take the leap. There is an old adage that grub-eaters wear like a badge: "If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is." Experienced grub-eaters are well-skilled at thinking of myriads of sound facts to support this supposition.
However, what grub-eaters forget is that 80% of the things that people fear, never happen. And most of the remaining 20% are not as bad as one would have expected either.
Futurists predict that VOIP telephony will replace cable telephones. But many users still look on it as black magic. Cloud computing is expected to be the standard of the future. But grub-eaters continue to cling to terrestrial architecture because on the ground it feels safe. Everywhere big cavemen with small brains continue to clutch at yesterday's magic. They are careful to put thick bars before the windows of the jail cells of their minds. The reality is that in most cases, yesterday's magic is the most dangerous of all.
I have always found myself among early adopters of technology. When tractors became available, my family wasted no time to exchange oxen for tractors. They prospered hugely. We were the first in the district to have cell phones. The neighbours asked us what we could possibly want them for. Today everyone has cell phones and all the farmers have tractors.
In business, we looked at how we thought our products would look 15 years from now - and then we invented the technology that would make them look like that. We built solutions to problems that did not even exist yet. In information technology, we predicted what the market would want 10 years from now - and we set about delivering it today. Not only did it make us successful, but it also made life a lot more fun. Scary perhaps, but exciting.
To be slow at adopting life-changing new technologies is dangerous and foolish. In business it is too expensive and too difficult to chase the market and run up to it from behind. Your best chance lies in predicting where it will go, and then ambushing so that it will run straight into your arms. Early adopters of technology are ambushers of the market. High speed broadband, cloud technology, teleconferencing solutions, e-commerce and next generation video surveillance are all elements of the very near future. And all of it is available today already at a cost that is achievable.
In the study of top business leaders, it soon becomes plain that the best among them are all early adaptors of technology. They think differently. That is what places business leaders at the top of the food chain. How many businesses are still stuck with yesterday's connectivity, yesterday's landline-based telephones and yesterday's way of running their operations?
Will you be roasting meat while your neighbours are eating grubs? If you have found fire, never let go of it. After all, technology is the fire that lights up the world.
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