Tom Peters: ‘the key to New Zealand’s trade future’
“New Zealand and the US can’t manufacture more cheaply than China does,” Mr Peters said. “The option is to produce cooler stuff and nothing is more important to enterprises than unadorned, unabashed fanaticism about design.
“To move up the value-added chain design is a metaphor, a synonym for more interesting stuff, better than they make in China.
“But most companies don’t get it – they don’t really bother about design because it’s damned hard work and requires constant care and attention. But New Zealand is bothering about it and so am I.”
Mr Peters, whose latest book Re-imagine calls for a new global corporate order and culture with design a major factor, will be lead speaker at the New Zealand Better By Design 2005 conference.
Part of the Trade and Enterprise creative sector Better by Design programme, the event will help New Zealand businesses make world-class design a competitive advantage for their products in export markets.
Mr Peters said the September 11 New York terrorist attacks had been a wake-up call for corporates as well as the military, leaving a wealthy nation of 300 million people unnerved and embarrassed by 19 men with cell-phones, the internet and a box-cutter.
The enormity of the acts made all Americans re-think their position in a changing world and business had survived a “disruptive age” since 9/11.
“The military had a new enemy and corporates realised the old order was doomed and that they must become fast, flexible, wily and determined through a change to new rules and a new business model,” he said.
“Design is an important factor – it is the soul of new enterprise – but it must be inbuilt in corporate thinking, culture, products, systems and branding from the start – not add-ons and pretty stuff but the Everest of intellectual capital.
“Good design transforms a product into a national icon, like the iPod, and corporate fanaticism about design translates into customer fanaticism – they must have that product.
“The car industry is a classic example of design. The Japanese make reliable cars which keep going but people flock to the BMW because it’s exotic and sexy.”
Mr Peters said Ireland had made extraordinary economic improvements since it joined the EEC, initially by performing back-office processing for US businesses.
“But now the Indians are doing it too and the Irish are asking what’s the next act to get them up the intellectual capital ladder,” he said.
“Singapore has been the most efficient place in Southeast Asia but in a world where there are three of you to three zillion Chinese how do you compete now?
“The efficiencies the US learned from Japan are not doing us or Japan any good against China.
“New Zealand, the US, Ireland and Singapore are enjoying high standings in wages and GDP but we have all got to learn a new act in the age of China and design stands as important as any other issue when we are looking for points of difference.”
Mr Peters said New Zealand’s handling of the America’s Cup was a spectacular example of design as its best.
“I don’t know what went on in the New York Yacht Club 100 years ago when it was of interest only to about 20 old white men,” he said. “But New Zealand made it a world event.
“It’s a sail-boat race that became part of New Zealand’s new-found energy, a design-based, high-value-added product with tourism, marketing and high-tech yacht design, which was money in the bank for what became a classic event – that’s design.”