03-01 Understanding

In 1975, at the International Small Business Symposium in Tokyo, five small business leaders, of which I was one, pledged to create a global small business organization that would meet once a year to exchange ideas, culture and technology. Which is what globalism is all about.
This global body was alive and well for 25 years, but died as a result of technology. Why spend $5K to go to a conference when you could get all the good ideas for free just by searching the web.
One of the most interesting speakers at the 1975 Symposium was from MITI, the powerful industrial arm of the Japanese government. He said that 60% of Japanese small business had fax machines, and that this will rise to closer to 100% within two years.
At the time, my arrangements with my Japanese counterpart was all done by fax. But the concept of all Canadian small firms with fax machines was pretty far out.
And while a fax machine is a museum piece today for most of the world, it is still highly popular in Japan with over half of all families with fax machines. They just love sending hand written notes by fax rather than use e-mail.
Most of us appreciate today how technology underpins the global economy. It is all about the Internet and information services, cell phones, networks and personal computers.
My earliest experience with what we now understand as the Internet, was developing a friendship in 1979 with an economist from the University of Lagos in Nigeria.
He explained how his university computer network had links with university networks in Europe and the USA. But within Lagos, communications were by written notes and messengers on bicycles.
So interesting examining the extent Africa is part of the global economy when there is something like 800 million people without electricity.
What you see in the photo is a solar package which includes a battery, lights and a cell phone charger. Those young people are exposed to ideas and culture from around the globe regardless of their financial circumstances.
Part of the challenge for companies of all sizes is to monitor changes in technologies to insure your company does not fall behind. Things like robotics and Artificial Intelligence are changing the world. But this is what technology does.