I just read an article in Newsweek that started out saying “in Silicon Valley the world is divided into two kinds of people…Those who “get it” and those who don’t”. It went on to say that the ones who “get it” understand that the Internet is the biggest thing that has ever happened in the history of the human race, and the ones that don’t “get it” are entire industries like the music industry, real estate, cable TV providers, newspapers and publishing,  and the list goes on.

This poses quite a conflict I see in some people these days…..How hard do we fight technology?  When I look at how far technology has advanced our company recently, its amazing. We’ve got the IT and Productivity tools we could only dream of 10 years ago, that allow us to achieve and measure higher sales & productivity, give us the ability to measure costs & margins on each job, and on and on.  These are the really good things about the digital revolution, when technology works.

So back to the other side of this conflict, which includes the Frustration. I understand how frustrating technology can be, especially when it doesn’t not work as promised. It’s gotten to the point that you need  to be fairly proficient with your computer skills just to do your job. My personal frustration has been trying to get our AT&T U-Verse programed on all of our TV’s, and figure out the new channel scheme, and TiVo, and all the other junk that comes with it that I did not want. And to make matters worse, the words on the remote they furnish are so small that even with reading glasses you can’t see them, so you have to depend on their menu driven (by the remote you can’t read) interface. I don’t think Apple designed this one. It’s probably not as bad as I make it sound, but watching TV used to be a lot easier.

In the end , it doesn’t pay to fight progress & technology, or the pack will just pass us by. I watch the print shops that have disappeared over the last couple of years. True, there was always some reason or circumstance, but most of the time if you dig deep enough, you find they were out of date. I find that a pretty motivating reason to stay up on technology. If you’re in the position of pushing the company forward, you have to be careful. If you push to hard, it’s possible to experience push back from your team, and sometimes with good reason. Technology does not always live up to the promise, especially when companies are overly eager to get something to market (Remember Vista). I think it takes common sense, a willingness to listen (and not be stubborn), and somehow figure out how to keep moving forward. Thats all.

The article I was reading (Newsweek 1/25/2010 “You can’t fight the future” by Daniel Lyons) actually went on to talk about China and the issue of Google threatening to pull out if the Chinese government does not stop censoring content. You could probably add the Chinese Government to that list of people who don’t “get it”, at least in this case. In the end I think the people of China will figure out how to get uncensored content. This isn’t a political commentary, just another example on a larger scale of people trying to fight  the loosing battle of “fighting Technology”.

What is it that we are the best in the world at? In today’s world of printing, that’s easy to forget. First off, the Printing & Graphics market  has changed and is changing so quickly still that the way we did things 10 years ago has no resemblance to the way our shop runs today. I’ve said before that we are very lucky; we’ve had the opportunity to invest in modern equipment and workflows plus we’ve hired forward thinking people. That changes a lot, because I think we get it.

Second off, the world and market we all live in changed drastically last year. All of a sudden small runs, variable data, full color are the hot items, and the big burdensome print runs are not so hot. Nobody wants to order a large inventory of items and keep them on a shelf just to get the price down. They don’t have to, the digital revolution changed all of that. Order just what you need and make changes to your printed copy when something changes. Design something once and repurpose it to print, the web, all kinds of digital media and any other places you brand your self. I get excited about all the different technology we have at our fingertips now. I just forget that since I work in the middle of this industry, its all around me. We need to help our customers understand what they can do to think differently about printing and save some money.

So my goal this year is to talk and blog more. I have a lot to say (a lot of hot air I’m told) about the way things have been done and better ways of doing them that save money & time. I know some people probably don’t want to hear it, because they make money doing things the way they have always been done. Remember the commercial 1984, lets break down some of these old walls and embrace the change for the better…It’s a new decade!

Anyone who has ever had a pet knows how important they are to us. They are a part of our family. Last week I lost a part of our Family. He was a White boxer named Caesar. He was almost nine years old and passed away quietly in the doctors office while my wife and I held him in our arms. Caesar was my best friend. He was always there when we got home waging his stumpy little tail with a toy in his mouth ready to play and be petted. Someone once told me that he wished he could be the person that his dog treated like he was. I felt that those were profound words. No matter what kind of day I had or how bad I felt Caesar always acted like we were best buddies. He was willing to give us unconditional love no matter what. I miss him. I still walk into the door at night and it takes me a minute to realize that he wont be there to greet me. The kids still ask where he is and we tell them that Caesar is in heaven now. I remember when I first interviewed for the job at Oregon Printing, Judd asked me if I had a dog and we had just gotten Caesar at that point. He was a puppy and adorable. For the first 5 years of his life Caesar was our baby. We had no kids so Caesar was the child we didn’t have at that point. And once we did have Kids, Caesar was so good with them. He let them roughhouse with him and lay on him and he would always just lick them and wag his tail(stump). Caesar was a good dog and a better friend. I miss him every day.  The best lesson he taught me was to always look for the good in people, because he always saw it in everyone and treated everyone like he was their best friend.