Looking around the corner can help you choose a strategy that might succeed in many possible futures. On the other hand, if we chase predictions, we often settle on one possible future and choose narrower strategies. › Continue reading…
Tag: Innovation
Tags: audiovisual, Innovation, process improvement, recovery, Strategy, Trends
Which things can we fix and which are here to stay?
By Tom Stimson CTS
Shrinking margins, unfair competition, price shopping customers, disloyal suppliers, greedy bankers, and a general lack of appreciation for the value of your services…does this about sum it up? Ten or fifteen years ago the industry starting mumbling about AV becoming a commodity. At that time 40-50% equipment margins and an exclusive lock on professional gear made AV dealers quite happy and the AV Industry very attractive to investors. Value-added services like design, programming, and project management were considered overhead costs and what little revenue they represented was just gravy on an already profitable transaction. › Continue reading…
I was thinking the other day about companies that I admire and enjoy working with the most. What do they have in common? At first I thought it was that they are friendly and open, but that knocked a couple of favorites out of the running. I also know some very nice companies that are not that fun to work with. They are stuck in a pattern that cannot be broken without extreme intervention. When you are in a role like mine that is designed to help people, and they won’t let themselves be helped – it’s frustrating. Still, it doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy being with them. › Continue reading…
2008-09 has been a study in business defense. Adjusting staffing levels, hedging operating budgets, and rethinking strategies has consumed most small businesses – and it is getting kinda old. We all seem to be waiting for some sort of sign that will trigger us back into business offense. If defense is characterized by control and saving, then offense has to be the willingness to take some risks and bet that there is more available upside than downside. The past couple of months have proven to a lot of folks that recent upticks of activity have been just bursts and not trends. What will be the your true indicator to switch gears? › Continue reading…
OK, We’re still here. Now what?
From Rental & staging Systems July 2009
By Tom Stimson CTS
It’s been a tough year for a lot of folks in our industry. The great shakeout is still ongoing, but we are getting a short breather. Three months of relative stability in the stock market has reduced the panic and knee-jerk reactions of our big business customers, but unemployment is at a 26 year high. Business travel and meeting excesses are not currently big news topics, but there I still no sign of the return of the big show. So you may ask, when will everything be back to normal? Never. Sorry. The recovery and whatever it will bring has been tentatively scheduled for next year. In the meantime, the changes are afoot in how customers will expect us to do business – if we can prove that our product is not a commodity. › Continue reading…
Imagine 100 AV Industry geeks talking about the future of technology without mentioning a single product. It was tough, but somehow we managed to stay on task. The InfoComm 100 was an think-tank of AV and related professionals from around the world that examined the 3-5 year future of the AV Industry. Let’s examine the list of primary assumptions about the 3-5 year future of technology influences on our industry and ponder their implications: › Continue reading…
The Visionaries of the InfoComm 100 think tank have presented us with some interesting and sometimes conflicting assumptions about how the AV Industry will compete in the next 3 to 5 years. Let’s examine the list of primary assumptions and ponder their implications: › Continue reading…
A huge theme of the InfoComm 100 event was the trend towards an IT-centric world. It predicts that more IT departments will take ownership of AV management and delivery, that computers will increasingly replace AV products as the endpoint for communications. “The AV industry will need to fully understand unified communications, networks, and wireless applications.” It will be an open-source world.
In my recent Roadmap for the Future blog I touched on the six macro-trends identified by the InfoComm 100 in April 2009. The implications for the Audiovisual Live Event Industry are significant and expand the outlook I have been noodling over the past three years. › Continue reading…
In April, 2009 I was fortunate to participate in a landmark event for the AV Industry, the InfoComm 100. InfoComm International brought together one hundred industry leaders and key volunteers from around the world for a two-day think tank. The “100″ as we came to be known, brainstormed about future trends that will affect the AV Industry over the next five years. › Continue reading…
