NASSIM TALEB – Rodenberg Tillman & Associates

From Bureaucracy towards Humanocracy.

March 7, 2021

Many management books have been published, however only a few have had great influence on management today. Think of the books of Michael Porter on Competitive Strategies in the 1980s, “Competing for the Future” of Hamel and Phrahalad 1n 1996, “Only the Paranoid Survive” of Andrew Grove in 1996, “Good to Great” of Jim Collins in 2010 and Nassim Taleb’s “Black Swan” in 2007 and “Antifragile” in 2012. “Humanocracy” is the new book in 2020 of Gary Hamel on replacing bureaucracy, which might be seen as another “gamechanger”. Humanocracy leads to exceptional competitive power with unique competitive advantages, difficult to copy for your rivals.

Black Swans, Grey Swans and Gray Rhinos

October 15, 2017

Joseph Rodenberg

A World View, Intelligence Briefings

Every manager in every company business function is part of a high-impact VUCA world: Volatility – Uncertainty – Complexity – Ambiguity. In this VUCA world, Nassim Nicholas Taleb published his famous book “The Black Swan” in 2007. Based on Taleb’s Black Swans, we have been using the phenomenon of Grey Swans with our unique Grey Swan Analysis. In the spring of 2016, Michele Wucker came out with her book “The Gray Rhino”, on the basis of which we added ‘Gray Rhino Analysis’ to our strategic intelligence practices.

Defense and offense data, and crucial other dimensions

August 15, 2017

Joseph Rodenberg

A World View, Intelligence Briefings

The IT-world would like us to believe that Big Data is a success, with the emergence of all kind of data-management functions, data scientists, chief data officers and others. You might ask yourself how effective all of this is in the absence of a coherent strategy for organizing, governing, analyzing and deploying an organization’s information needs. The quote by the renowned author of the famous book “The Black Swan” is also clear in this regard. In the 2017 May/June issue of Harvard Business Review, Thomas Davenport draws a distinction between data defense and offense, and other crucial dimensions.

The Intellectual Yet Idiot

January 15, 2017

Joseph Rodenberg

A World View, Intelligence Briefings

It is fascinating to read these quotes by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of the bestselling “The Black Swan” and “Antifragile”. Taleb is speaking about the IYI, the Intellectual Yet Idiot, a product of modernity which has been accelerating since the mid-20th century, to reach its local maximum today, along with the broad category of people without skin in the game who have been invading many walks of life.

Antifragility

June 1, 2015

Joseph Rodenberg

A World View, Intelligence Briefings

Black swans are large-scale unpredictable and irregular events that have a massive consequence. Examples are a tsunami, huge storms like Sandy in 2012, 9/11, Madrid 2004, and the loss of MH17. Antifragility means randomness, uncertainty, dealing with the unknown, doing things without understanding them and doing them well. However, it is easier to find out if something is fragile.

Banks, business as usual

December 1, 2014

Joseph Rodenberg

A World View, Intelligence Briefings

Can you imagine that five years after the financial crisis, the financial system in Europe has still not yet improved? Banks still continue to package ‘risky financial products’ into special entities. Our bankers still behave the same as they did before the financial crisis. Why is this so? Bankers think they are better protected against the next financial crisis, because they have a higher percentage of equity on total assets. It’s business as usual all over again.

There are more postdictors than predictors

September 15, 2014

Joseph Rodenberg

A World View, Intelligence Briefings

As a result of hindsight, people who did not see an event coming, (think for example of Black or Grey Swans), will manage to convince themselves that they predicted it, before proceeding to convince others. According to Taleb, after every event there will be many more postdictors than true predictors. Think about this statement: “Never ask anyone for their opinion, forecast or recommendation. Just ask them what they have or don’t have in their portfolio”.

Black Swans and Grey Swans

May 15, 2014

Joseph Rodenberg

A World View, Intelligence Briefings

“The more threatening externalities become for a company, the more there is a need to have strategic intelligence in place. Every company faces a continuous flow of threatening externalities”This statement is clear to everybody. But to foresee those threatening externalities, companies need to be able to monitor them in a timely fashion. A couple of years ago, I gave presentations about the “Management of Insights” and the “Management of Foresight” at the Dutch National Marketing Insights Event.