My Growth as a Writer Essay -- Personal Reflection

I have never liked writing; I always thought it was a waste of time. It was a great therapy but I never found academic writing to be useful just tedious. Only ever writing when I had too made it harder for my writing skills to grow or improve in any way. I have not taken an English class since the 10th grade, even then I never gave it much effort, just doing what I had to so I could pass the class. Then I jump in to College English 1010, I feel like I do well in all other subjects but this one. English is my worst nightmare. However in 8th grade I had an inspiring teacher, Ms. Moe. She told us to write whatever we felt on paper, to create stories from our lives, to write from our souls. Of course all of my stories were morbid with sinister events, but well written. (Maybe because I would spend all the time I could with her, so I would revise and revise until it was perfect- well at least for an 8th grader.) Writing My Past as a Writer was a great way to remind me why writing was alright. This paper was a little easier to write because it was my story. I had to revise it a bit and add some more background to what I was writing in the class, such as my Johnathn story (there are more of them too). As to let the reader know why Ms. Moe called me ‘disturbed’, but that was not hard. I’m sure Ms. Geary was a little concerned after reading this, wondering if she needed to report that I’m unstable or a threat to others, but no I just enjoy writing things that get my dark side out (Iâ €™m stable now, I promise). Getting a perfect score the first time, I still revised it and added things I thought would make it even better to read. Peer reviewing with Russell was great because he had some great insight in how to portray my reputation. Havi... ...one on the topic, so going back to try and find almost every source I have ever read was a little daunting, but I found most of them. I wanted to thank Ms. Geary for reminding me how much writing can do for me. It helped me realize that writing isn’t so horrible but it is just hard work. My writing skills have improved due to this class and all Ms. Geary had taught me. She made class fun with her inflections and just the way she says everything, her personality definitely showed through. I looked forward to class but never the homework. Finally after reading over my final drafts of: My Past as a Writer, Problematic Essay and my Exploratory Research Paper I realize that I have dramatically improved my writing skills in every draft thanks to revisions and some positive criticism for Ms. Geary. I think I am now ready to take on the next step in the English world.

Digital Fortress Chapter 71-75

Chapter 71 Tokugen Numataka lit his fourth cigar and kept pacing. He snatched up his phone and buzzed the main switchboard. â€Å"Any word yet on that phone number?† he demanded before the operator could speak. â€Å"Nothing yet, sir. It's taking a bit longer than expected-it came from a cellular.† A cellular, Numataka mused. Figures. Fortunately for the Japanese economy, the Americans had an insatiable appetite for electronic gadgets. â€Å"The boosting station,† the operator added, â€Å"is in the 202 area code. But we have no number yet.† â€Å"202? Where's that?† Where in the vast American expanse is this mysterious North Dakota hiding? â€Å"Somewhere near Washington, D. C., sir.† Numataka arched his eyebrows. â€Å"Call me as soon as you have a number.† Chapter 72 Susan Fletcher stumbled across the darkened Crypto floor toward Strathmore's catwalk. The commander's office was as far from Hale as Susan could get inside the locked complex. When Susan reached the top of the catwalk stairs, she found the commander's door hanging loosely, the electronic lock rendered ineffective by the power outage. She barged in. â€Å"Commander?† The only light inside was the glow of Strathmore's computer monitors. â€Å"Commander!† she called once again. â€Å"Commander!† Susan suddenly remembered that the commander was in the Sys-Sec lab. She turned circles in his empty office, the panic of her ordeal with Hale still in her blood. She had to get out of Crypto. Digital Fortress or no Digital Fortress, it was time to act-time to abort the TRANSLTR run and escape. She eyed Strathmore's glowing monitors then dashed to his desk. She fumbled with his keypad. Abort TRANSLTR! The task was simple now that she was on an authorized terminal. Susan called up the proper command window and typed: ABORT RUN Her finger hovered momentarily over the ENTER key. â€Å"Susan!† a voice barked from the doorway. Susan wheeled scared, fearing it was Hale. But it was not, it was Strathmore. He stood, pale and eerie in the electronic glow, his chest heaving. â€Å"What the hell's going on!† â€Å"Com†¦ mander!† Susan gasped. â€Å"Hale's in Node 3! He just attacked me!† â€Å"What? Impossible! Hale's locked down in-â€Å" â€Å"No, he's not! He's loose! We need security inhere now! I'm aborting TRANSLTR!† Susan reached for the keypad. â€Å"DON'T TOUCH THAT!† Strathmore lunged for the terminal and pulled Susan's hands away. Susan recoiled, stunned. She stared at the commander and for the second time that day did not recognize him. Susan felt suddenly alone. Strathmore saw the blood on Susan's shirt and immediately regretted his outburst. â€Å"Jesus, Susan. Are you okay?† She didn't respond. He wished he hadn't jumped on her unnecessarily. His nerves were frayed. He was juggling too much. There were things on his mind-things Susan Fletcher did not know about-things he had not told her and prayed he'd never have to. â€Å"I'm sorry,† he said softly. â€Å"Tell me what happened.† She turned away. â€Å"It doesn't matter. The blood's not mine. Just get me out of here.† â€Å"Are you hurt?† Strathmore put a hand on her shoulder. Susan recoiled. He dropped his hand and looked away. When he looked back at Susan's face, she seemed to be staring over his shoulder at something on the wall. There, in the darkness, a small keypad glowed full force. Strathmore followed her gaze and frowned. He'd hoped Susan wouldn't notice the glowing control panel. The illuminated keypad controlled his private elevator. Strathmore and his high-powered guests used it to come and go from Crypto without advertising the fact to the rest of the staff. The personal lift dropped down fifty feet below the Crypto dome and then moved laterally 109 yards through a reinforced underground tunnel to the sublevels of the main NSA complex. The elevator connecting Crypto to the NSA was powered from the main complex; it was on-line despite Crypto's power outage. Strathmore had known all along it was on-line, but even as Susan had been pounding on the main exit downstairs, he hadn't mentioned it. He could not afford to let Susan out-not yet. He wondered how much he'd have to tell her to make her want to stay. Susan pushed past Strathmore and raced to the back wall. She jabbed furiously at the illuminated buttons. â€Å"Please,† she begged. But the door did not open. â€Å"Susan,† Strathmore said quietly. â€Å"The lift takes a password.† â€Å"A password?† she repeated angrily. She glared at the controls. Below the main keypad was a second keypad-a smaller one, with tiny buttons. Each button was marked with a letter of the alphabet. Susan wheeled to him. â€Å"What is the password!† she demanded. Strathmore thought a moment and sighed heavily. â€Å"Susan, have a seat.† Susan looked as if she could hardly believe her ears. â€Å"Have a seat,† the commander repeated, his voice firm. â€Å"Let me out!† Susan shot an uneasy glance toward the commander's open office door. Strathmore eyed the panicked Susan Fletcher. Calmly he moved to his office door. He stepped out onto the landing and peered into the darkness. Hale was nowhere to be seen. The commander stepped back inside and pulled the door shut. Then he propped a chair in front to keep it closed, went to his desk, and removed something from a drawer. In the pale glow of the monitors Susan saw what he was holding. Her face went pale. It was a gun. Strathmore pulled two chairs into the middle of the room. He rotated them to face the closed office door. Then he sat. He lifted the glittering Beretta semi-automatic and aimed steadily at the slightly open door. After a moment he laid the gun back in his lap. He spoke solemnly. â€Å"Susan, we're safe here. We need to talk. If Greg Hale comes through that door†¦Ã¢â‚¬  He let it hang. Susan was speechless. Strathmore gazed at her in the dim light of his office. He patted the seat beside him. â€Å"Susan, sit. I have something to tell you.† She did not move. â€Å"When I'm done, â€Å"he said, â€Å"I'll give you the password to the elevator. You can decide whether to leave or not.† There was a long silence. In a daze, Susan moved across the office and sat next to Strathmore. â€Å"Susan,† he began, â€Å"I haven't been entirely honest with you.† Chapter 73 David Becker felt as if his face had been doused in turpentine and ignited. He rolled over on the floor and squinted through bleary tunnel vision at the girl halfway to the revolving doors. She was running in short, terrified bursts, dragging her duffel behind her across the tile. Becker tried to pull himself to his feet, but he could not. He was blinded by red-hot fire. She can't get away! He tried to call out, but there was no air in his lungs, only a sickening pain. â€Å"No!† He coughed. The sound barely left his lips. Becker knew the second she went through the door, she would disappear forever. He tried to call out again, but his throat was searing. The girl had almost reached the revolving door. Becker staggered to his feet, gasping for breath. He stumbled after her. The girl dashed into the first compartment of the revolving door, dragging her duffel behind her. Twenty yards back, Becker was staggering blindly toward the door. â€Å"Wait!† He gasped. â€Å"Wait!† The girl pushed furiously on the inside of the door. The door began to rotate, but then it jammed. The blonde wheeled in terror and saw her duffel snagged in the opening. She knelt and pulled furiously to free it. Becker fixed his bleary vision on the fabric protruding through the door. As he dove, the red corner of nylon protruding from the crack was all he could see. He flew toward it, arms outstretched. As David Becker fell toward the door, his hands only inches away, the fabric slipped into the crack and disappeared. His fingers clutched empty air as the door lurched into motion. The girl and the duffel tumbled into the street outside. â€Å"Megan!† Becker wailed as hit the floor. White-hot needles shot through the back of his eye sockets. His vision tunneled to nothing, and a new wave of nausea rolled in. His own voice echoed in the blackness. Megan! David Becker wasn't sure how long he'd been lying there before he became aware of the hum of fluorescent bulbs overhead. Everything else was still. Through the silence came a voice. Someone was calling. He tried to lift his head off the floor. The world was cockeyed, watery. Again the voice. He squinted down the concourse and saw a figure twenty yards away. â€Å"Mister?† Becker recognized the voice. It was the girl. She was standing at another entrance farther down the concourse, clutching her duffel to her chest. She looked more frightened now than she had before. â€Å"Mister?† she asked, her voice trembling. â€Å"I never told you my name. How come you know my name?† Chapter 74 Director Leland Fontaine was a mountain of a man, sixty-three years old, with a close-cropped military haircut and a rigid demeanor. His jet-black eyes were like coal when he was irritated, which was almost always. He'd risen through the ranks of the NSA through hard work, good planning, and the well-earned respect of his predecessors. He was the first African American director of the National Security Agency, but nobody ever mentioned the distinction; Fontaine's politics were decidedly color-blind, and his staff wisely followed suit. Fontaine had kept Midge and Brinkerhoff standing as he went through the silent ritual of making himself a mug of Guatemalan java. Then he'd settled at his desk, left them standing, and questioned them like schoolchildren in the principal's office. Midge did the talking-explaining the unusual series of events that led them to violate the sanctity of Fontaine's office. â€Å"A virus?† the director asked coldly. â€Å"You two think we've got a virus?† Brinkerhoff winced. â€Å"Yes, sir,† Midge snapped. â€Å"Because Strathmore bypassed Gauntlet?† Fontaine eyed the printout in front of him. â€Å"Yes,† she said. â€Å"And there's a file that hasn't broken in over twenty hours!† Fontaine frowned. â€Å"Or so your data says.† Midge was about to protest, but she held her tongue. Instead she went for the throat. â€Å"There's a blackout in Crypto.† Fontaine looked up, apparently surprised. Midge confirmed with a curt nod. â€Å"All power's down. Jabba thought maybe-â€Å" â€Å"You called Jabba?† â€Å"Yes, sir, I-â€Å" â€Å"Jabba?† Fontaine stood up, furious. â€Å"Why the hell didn't you call Strathmore?† â€Å"We did!† Midge defended. â€Å"He said everything was fine.† Fontaine stood, his chest heaving. â€Å"Then we have no reason to doubt him.† There was closure in his voice. He took a sip of coffee. â€Å"Now if you'll excuse me, I have work to do.† Midge's jaw dropped. â€Å"I beg your pardon?† Brinkerhoff was already headed for the door, but Midge was cemented in place. â€Å"I said good night, Ms. Milken,† Fontaine repeated. â€Å"You are excused.† â€Å"But-but sir,† she stammered, â€Å"I†¦ I have to protest. I think-â€Å" â€Å"You protest?† the director demanded. He set down his coffee. â€Å"I protest! I protest to your presence in my office. I protest to your insinuations that the deputy director of this agency is lying. I protest-â€Å" â€Å"We have a virus, sir! My instincts tell me-â€Å" â€Å"Well, your instincts are wrong, Ms. Milken! For once, they're wrong!† Midge stood fast. â€Å"But, sir! Commander Strathmore bypassed Gauntlet!† Fontaine strode toward her, barely controlling his anger. â€Å"That is his prerogative! I pay you to watch analysts and service employees-not spy on the deputy director! If it weren't for him we'd still be breaking codes with pencil and paper! Now leave me!† He turned to Brinkerhoff, who stood in the doorway colorless and trembling. â€Å"Both of you.† â€Å"With all due respect, sir,† Midge said. â€Å"I'd like to recommend we send a Sys-Sec team to Crypto just to ensure-â€Å" â€Å"We will do no such thing!† After a tense beat, Midge nodded. â€Å"Very well. Goodnight.† She turned and left. As she passed, Brinkerhoff could see in her eyes that she had no intention of letting this rest-not until her intuition was satisfied. Brinkerhoff gazed across the room at his boss, massive and seething behind his desk. This was not the director he knew. The director he knew was a stickler for detail, for neatly tied packages. He always encouraged his staff to examine and clarify any inconsistencies in daily procedure, no matter how minute. And yet here he was, asking them to turn their backs on a very bizarre series of coincidences. The director was obviously hiding something, but Brinkerhoff was paid to assist, not to question. Fontaine had proven over and over that he had everyone's best interests at heart; if assisting him now meant turning a blind eye, then so be it. Unfortunately, Midge was paid to question, and Brinkerhoff feared she was headed for Crypto to do just that. Time to get out the resumes, Brinkerhoff thought as he turned to the door. â€Å"Chad!† Fontaine barked, from behind him. Fontaine had seen the look in Midge's eyes when she left. â€Å"Don't let her out of this suite.† Brinkerhoff nodded and hustled after Midge. Fontaine sighed and put his head in his hands. His sable eyes were heavy. It had been a long, unexpected trip home. The past month had been one of great anticipation for Leland Fontaine. There were things happening right now at the NSA that would change history, and ironically, Director Fontaine had found out about them only by chance. Three months ago, Fontaine had gotten news that Commander Strathmore's wife was leaving him. He'd also heard reports that Strathmore was working absurd hours and seemed about to crack under the pressure. Despite differences of opinion with Strathmore on many issues, Fontaine had always held his deputy director in the highest esteem; Strathmore was a brilliant man, maybe the best the NSA had. At the same time, ever since the Skipjack fiasco, Strathmore had been under tremendous stress. It made Fontaine uneasy; the commander held a lot of keys around the NSA-and Fontaine had an agency to protect. Fontaine needed someone to keep tabs on the wavering Strathmore and make sure he was 100 percent-but it was not that simple. Strathmore was a proud and powerful man; Fontaine needed a way to check up on the commander without undermining his confidence or authority. Fontaine decided, out of respect for Strathmore, to do the job himself. He had an invisible tap installed on Commander Strathmore's Crypto account-his E-mail, his interoffice correspondence, his brainstorms, all of it. If Strathmore was going to crack, the director would see warning signs in his work. But instead of signs of a breakdown, Fontaine uncovered the ground work for one of the most incredible intelligence schemes he'd ever encountered. It was no wonder Strathmore was busting his ass; if he could pull this plan off, it would make up for the Skipjack fiasco a hundred times over. Fontaine had concluded Strathmore was fine, working at 110 percent-as sly, smart, and patriotic as ever. The best thing the director could do would be to stand clear and watch the commander work his magic. Strathmore had devised a plan†¦ a plan Fontaine had no intention of interrupting. Chapter 75 Strathmore fingered the Berretta in his lap. Even with the rage boiling in his blood, he was programmed to think clearly. The fact that Greg Hale had dared lay a finger on Susan Fletcher sickened him, but the fact that it was his own fault made him even sicker; Susan going into Node 3 had been his idea. Strathmore knew enough to compartmentalize his emotion-it could in no way affect his handling of Digital Fortress. He was the deputy director of the National Security Agency. And today his job was more critical than it had ever been. Strathmore slowed his breathing. â€Å"Susan.† His voice was efficient and unclouded. â€Å"Did you delete Hale's E-mail?† â€Å"No,† she said, confused. â€Å"Do you have the pass-key?† She shook her head. Strathmore frowned, chewing his lip. His mind was racing. He had a dilemma. He could easily enter his elevator password, and Susan would be gone. But he needed her there. He needed her help to find Hale's pass-key. Strathmore hadn't told her yet, but finding that pass-key was far more than a matter of academic interest-it was an absolute necessity. Strathmore suspected he could run Susan's nonconformity search and find the pass-key himself, but he'd already encountered problems running her tracer. He was not about to risk it again. â€Å"Susan.† He sighed resolutely. â€Å"I'd like you to help me find Hale's pass-key.† â€Å"What!† Susan stood up, her eyes wild. Strathmore fought off the urge to stand along with her. He knew a lot about negotiating-the position of power was always seated. He hoped she would follow suit. She did not. â€Å"Susan, sit down.† She ignored him. â€Å"Sit down.† It was an order. Susan remained standing. â€Å"Commander, if you've still got some burning desire to check out Tankado's algorithm, you can do it alone. I want out.† Strathmore hung his head and took a deep breath. It was clear she would need an explanation. She deserves one, he thought. Strathmore made his decision-Susan Fletcher would hear it all. He prayed he wasn't making a mistake. â€Å"Susan,† he began, â€Å"it wasn't supposed to come to this.† He ran his hand across his scalp. â€Å"There are some things I haven't told you. Sometimes a man in my position†¦Ã¢â‚¬  The commander wavered as if making a painful confession. â€Å"Sometimes a man in my position is forced to lie to the people he loves. Today was one of those days.† He eyed her sadly. â€Å"What I'm about to tell you, I never planned to have to say†¦ to you†¦ or to anyone.† Susan felt a chill. The commander had a deadly serious look on his face. There was obviously some aspect of his agenda to which she was not privy. Susan sat down. There was a long pause as Strathmore stared at the ceiling, gathering his thoughts. â€Å"Susan,† he finally said, his voice frail. â€Å"I have no family.† He returned his gaze to her. â€Å"I have no marriage to speak of. My life has been my love for this country. My life has been my work here at the NSA.† Susan listened in silence. â€Å"As you may have guessed,† he continued, â€Å"I planned to retire soon. But I wanted to retire with pride. I wanted to retire knowing that I'd truly made a difference.† â€Å"But you have made a difference,† Susan heard herself say. â€Å"You built TRANSLTR.† Strathmore didn't seem to hear. â€Å"Over the past few years, our work here at the NSA has gotten harder and harder. We've faced enemies I never imagined would challenge us. I'm talking about our own citizens. The lawyers, the civil rights fanatics, the EFF-they've all played a part, but it's more than that. It's the people. They've lost faith. They've become paranoid. They suddenly see us as the enemy. People like you and me, people who truly have the nation's best interests at heart, we find ourselves having to fight for our right to serve our country. We're no longer peacekeepers. We're eavesdroppers, peeping Toms, violators of people's rights.† Strathmore heaved a sigh. â€Å"Unfortunately, there are naive people in the world, people who can't imagine the horrors they'd face if we didn't intervene. I truly believe it's up to us to save them from their own ignorance.† Susan waited for his point. The commander stared wearily at the floor and then looked up. â€Å"Susan, hear me out,† he said, smiling tenderly at her. â€Å"You'll want to stop me, but hear me out. I've been decrypting Tankado's E-mail for about two months now. As you can imagine, I was shocked when I first read his messages to North Dakota about an unbreakable algorithm called Digital Fortress. I didn't believe it was possible. But every time I intercepted anew message, Tankado sounded more and more convincing. When I read that he'd used mutation strings to write a rotating key-code, I realized he was light-years ahead of us; it was an approach no one here had never tried.† â€Å"Why would we?† Susan asked. â€Å"It barely makes sense.† Strathmore stood up and started pacing, keeping one eye on the door. â€Å"A few weeks ago, when I heard about the Digital Fortress auction, I finally accepted the fact that Tankado was serious. I knew if he sold his algorithm to a Japanese software company, we were sunk, so I tried to think of any way I could stop him. I considered having him killed, but with all the publicity surrounding the algorithm and all his recent claims about TRANSLTR, we would be prime suspects. That's when it dawned on me.† He turned to Susan. â€Å"I realized that Digital Fortress should not be stopped.† Susan stared at him, apparently lost. Strathmore went on. â€Å"I suddenly saw Digital Fortress as the opportunity of a lifetime. It hit me that with a few changes, Digital Fortress could work for us instead of against us.† Susan had never heard anything so absurd. Digital Fortress was an unbreakable algorithm; it would destroy them. â€Å"If,† Strathmore continued, â€Å"if I could just make a small modification in the algorithm†¦ before it was released†¦Ã¢â‚¬  He gave her a cunning glint of the eye. It took only an instant. Strathmore saw the amazement register in Susan's eyes. He excitedly explained his plan. â€Å"If I could get the pass-key, I could unlock our copy of Digital Fortress and insert a modification.† â€Å"A back door,† Susan said, forgetting the Commander had ever lied to her. She felt a surge of anticipation. â€Å"Just like Skipjack.† Strathmore nodded. â€Å"Then we could replace Tankado's give-away file on the Internet with our altered version. Because Digital Fortress is a Japanese algorithm, no one will ever suspect the NSA had any part in it. All we have to do is make the switch.† Susan realized the plan was beyond ingenious. It was pure†¦ Strathmore. He planned to facilitate the release of an algorithm the NSA could break! â€Å"Full access,† Strathmore said. â€Å"Digital Fortress will become the encryption standard overnight.† â€Å"Overnight?† Susan said. â€Å"How do you figure that? Even if Digital Fortress becomes available everywhere for free, most computer users will stick with their old algorithms for convenience. Why would they switch to Digital Fortress?† Strathmore smiled. â€Å"Simple. We have a security leak. The whole world finds out about TRANSLTR.† Susan's jaw dropped. â€Å"Quite simply, Susan, we let the truth hit the street. We tell the world that the NSA has a computer that can break every algorithm except Digital Fortress.† Susan was amazed. â€Å"So everyone jumps ship to Digital Fortress†¦ not knowing we can break it!† Strathmore nodded. â€Å"Exactly.† There was a long silence. â€Å"I'm sorry I lied to you. Trying to rewrite Digital Fortress is a pretty big play, I didn't want you involved.† â€Å"I†¦ understand,† she replied slowly, still reeling from the brilliance of it all. â€Å"You're not a bad liar.† Strathmore chuckled. â€Å"Years of practice. Lying was the only way to keep you out of the loop.† Susan nodded. â€Å"And how big a loop is it?† â€Å"You're looking at it.† Susan smiled for the first time in an hour. â€Å"I was afraid you'd say that.† He shrugged. â€Å"Once Digital Fortress is in place, I'll brief the director.† Susan was impressed. Strathmore's plan was a global intelligence coup the magnitude of which had never before been imagined. And he'd attempted it single-handedly. It looked like he might pull it off too. The pass-key was downstairs. Tankado was dead. Tankado's partner had been located. Susan paused. Tankado is dead. That seemed very convenient. She thought of all the lies that Strathmore had told her and felt a sudden chill. She looked uneasily at the commander. â€Å"Did you kill Ensei Tankado?† Strathmore looked surprised. He shook his head. â€Å"Of course not. There was no need to kill Tankado. In fact, I'd prefer he were alive. His death could cast suspicion on Digital Fortress. I wanted this switch to go as smoothly and inconspicuously as possible. The original plan was to make the switch and let Tankado sell his key.† Susan had to admit it made sense. Tankado would have no reason to suspect the algorithm on the Internet was not the original. Nobody had access to it except himself and North Dakota. Unless Tankado went back and studied the programming after it was released, he'd never know about the back door. He'd slaved over Digital Fortress for long enough that he'd probably never want to see the programming again. Susan let it all soak in. She suddenly understood the commander's need for privacy in Crypto. The task at hand was time-consuming and delicate-writing a concealed back door in a complex algorithm and making an undetected Internet switch. Concealment was of paramount importance. The simple suggestion that Digital Fortress was tainted could ruin the commander's plan. Only now did she fully grasp why he had decided to let TRANSLTR keep running. If Digital Fortress is going to be the NSA's new baby, Strathmore wanted to be sure it was unbreakable! â€Å"Still want out?† he asked. Susan looked up. Somehow sitting there in the dark with the great Trevor Strathmore, her fears were swept away. Rewriting Digital Fortress was a chance to make history-a chance to do incredible good-and Strathmore could use her help. Susan forced a reluctant smile. â€Å"What's our next move?† Strathmore beamed. He reached over and put a hand on her shoulder. â€Å"Thanks.† He smiled and then got down to business. â€Å"We'll go downstairs together.† He held up his Berretta. â€Å"You'll search Hale's terminal. I'll cover you.† Susan bristled at the thought of going downstairs. â€Å"Can't we wait for David to call with Tankado's copy?† Strathmore shook his head. â€Å"The sooner we make the switch, the better. We have no guarantees that David will even find the other copy. If by some fluke the ring falls into the wrong hands over there, I'd prefer we'd already made the algorithm switch. That way, whoever ends up with the key will download our version of the algorithm.† Strathmore fingered his gun and stood. â€Å"We need to go for Hale's key.† Susan fell silent. The commander had a point. They needed Hale's pass-key. And they needed it now. When Susan stood, her legs were jittery. She wished she'd hit Hale harder. She eyed Strathmore's weapon and suddenly felt queasy. â€Å"You'd actually shoot Greg Hale?† â€Å"No.† Strathmore frowned, striding to the door. â€Å"But let's hope he doesn't know that.†

Entrepreneurs Personality for Being Successful in Business

Entrepreneurs Personality for Being Successful in Business Miss. Sarita Ghanshyam Tiwari, (M.Com. M. Phil.) e-mail: tiwari_sarita@rediffmail.com Abstract Business success may causes due to many factors, but the greatest determinant of the business success is the entrepreneur himself / herself. Therefore, the question of what makes a successful entrepreneur is very important. There have been many answers to this question. Some people think entrepreneurs are born, others that they are made. Some see entrepreneurs as passionate leaders with a vision that is totally focused on one objective, while others describe them as compulsive controller. Some says entrepreneurs are risk takers while others say they are†¦show more content†¦whether is it a nice book or not? Here a decorative cover page does not carry a long lasting impact on that persons mind. Therefore, personality includes both factors i.e. physical appearance and formidable foundation of good behavior and character. Physical appearance is that personality which creates first impression in front of others that’s why it can be taken as the ‘primary or outer’ personality of an individual, while foundation is considered as ‘secondary or inner’ personality because it has second impact on others. It is not necessary that one should possess physical appearance because it is sometimes depends on the heredity factors of that person. It is inborn type of personality and sometimes depends on the luck factor too. If a person got good looks then it adds to his plus point. We should remember that a person’s height, weight and complexion are not in his hand but he can take care to keep himself neat and clean to impress others. Thus, working on primary personality is necessary but only putting concentration on it is not sufficient. The best personality is based on the solid foundation of character. Good behavior and co-operation makes a man popular. But this strong foundation is not an inborn quality of a person. It can be developed from one’s childhood and has impact of family, family background, friends, working area, society, regions and experience etc. These factors also contribute in developing one’s character and behavior.Show MoreRelated The Keys to Entrepreneurship Essay710 Words   |  3 Pagesto Entrepreneurship What makes a successful entrepreneur? What can one do to put oneself in a position to succeed on their own? Jay Goltz, for example, is an extremely successful entrepreneur who started his business from the ground up. In the summer of 1978, Jay Goltz founded the Artist’s Frame Service. His business started by using his father’s basement as his office, but eventually moved to an old factory district in Chicago. Today, Goltz’s business in the largest retail, custom pictureRead MoreEntrepreneurship Is A Nature Or Nurture Process Essay1468 Words   |  6 Pagescomplex field of study in business that sparks much debate. One prominent discussion relates to whether entrepreneurship is a nature or nurture process. In order to answer this question, entrepreneurship must first be defined. As it is a multi-faceted field that spans across a wide range of contexts, there is no agreed definition of entrepreneurship (Schaper, 2014). For the context of this essay, however, it is a process that brings together a team- with a leading entrepreneur-, an opportunity, the rightRead MoreDoes Education Or Genetic Inheritance Play An Role Of An Entrepreneur?1560 Words   |  7 Pagesrole in the becoming of an entrepreneur? Entrepreneurs are individuals who take the initiative to invest in a business idea that they consider an opportunity, therefore willing to accept eventual risks and devote a lot of time and effort into their ideas. Because these people are often under a lot of work pressure and frequently need to calculate and innovate their ideas, many people consider Entrepreneurs to be creative and hard workers. However, being an entrepreneur is not something that everybodyRead MoreThe Concept Of An Entrepreneurship1345 Words   |  6 Pagesby many different people. The Business in Action textbook defines entrepreneurship as the combination of innovation, initiative and willingness take risks required to create and operate new businesses and an entrepreneur as a person with positive, forward-thinking desire to create profitable, sustainable business enterprise. According to this definition, a small business owner could definitely be classed as an entrepreneur, as anyone who runs and owns their ow n business is taking risks with their financesRead MoreEssay The Missing Entrepreneur in Economics1602 Words   |  7 Pageseconomic research denies the innate characteristics of the entrepreneur. Rather than attributing economic growth and innovation to personality traits, economists would rather advocate a form of economic determinism: if an aggressive personality dominated an industry, economists try to explain the characteristics of the industry that made aggression a successful strategy. Economic models are contrived to remove the personality from the entrepreneur, to make all entrepreneurial decisions predestined, givenRead MoreWhy Entrepreneurs Start Their Own Business1676 Words   |  7 Pagesdeveloping society. The term ‘entrepreneur’ is becoming increasingly common amongst individuals in society. Living in a constantly developing world, with rapid technological, environmental and social changes that effect the way we live means the modern man is constantly seeking new and innovative ways to adapt to these changes. During this research paper I will discuss my findings of what the motivations are of an entrepreneur to start a business. Having interviewed an entrepreneur, I got a sense of howRead MoreThe Practice Of Entrepreneurship Through Time And The Global Enterprise1642 Words   |  7 Pagesthe global enterprise. During the life of Marco Polo, entrepreneurship was defined as the practice of being the â€Å"go-between† (Arthur Hisrich, 2011, p. 2) in trade endeavors. Today, the definition includes: the development of ideas, comprehensive risk, commitment of time and resources, and vision with the overarching goal of holistic success and autonomy (Arthur Hisrich, 2011). The entrepreneur exudes behaviors which foster initiative, orchestrate options, and accept responsibility for the successRead MoreThe Success Of New Ventures1354 Words   |  6 Pagestag lines such as â€Å"own your own business now† attached to advertisements pushing the sale of franchises or becoming an entr epreneur. It is a fallacy. A franchise owner is not necessarily an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs are good business people. They are visionaries who take the time to plan, and the time to participate in the day to day activities needed to achieve long term objectives, and who are passionate about an idea; all of these lead to a successful entrepreneur. Research shows the reasons forRead MoreEntrpreneurs Who are Born or Made1049 Words   |  5 PagesIntroduction Entrepreneurs are born. This statement by Professor James V. Koch from Old Dominion University, Virginia, USA reflects that entrepreneurs have entrepreneurship skills that are part of a person’s innate traits one must be born with (Kuratko 2014). Entrepreneur who is born is the entrepreneur that has a family business. The entrepreneur inherits their parent’s business. Inheritance can make a person to be an entrepreneur. Matter of fact, heredity affects personality and behavior (DaleyRead MoreWhat Do We Call People Who Start Their Own Businesses?1504 Words   |  7 PagesWhat do we call people who start their own businesses? Who put their ideas into action? Who create opportunities for others? The term is ‘Entrepreneurs’, they are people who take advantage of a profitable opportunity and take the risk to create and start up their own business. They try and achieve the unmet wants and needs of society. Entrepreneurs have inspired what we now call the ‘Entrepreneurial Spirit,’ which could be defined as an attitude and approach to thinking that actively seeks out change

Life of Petrarch by Ernest Hatch Wilkins - 1328 Words

For the period of the Middle Ages, Europe went through a great ruin in the duration of the 5th and 15th century. Europe faced great blows from both sides of spectrum. For instance, one of the greatest fatal blows was the Hundred Years War. The war not only caused famine, and starvation all around Europe, but also included around 20 million recorded deaths. About one third of the population was wiped out. Countless towns in Europe had a loss of more than 40% of their population. In fact Paris lost half of its residents and Venice, Hamburg and Bremen are projected to have lost at least 60% of their populations. A popular belief in that time period was that the devastation was a punishment from God. With little hope, people desperately†¦show more content†¦This movement was called Humanism, the philosophy of rationalism relied upon the belief in the dignity of human beings. This philosophy quickly grew and expanded all across Europe as an outburst of human creativity and paved the way to contemporary learning. The birth of humanism was the beginning of the Renaissance period. The creating of new inventive literature, expanding the once bounded writing curriculum. New values were stressed in writing in the importance of poetry and books. Especially expressed by the Father of Humanism Francesco Petrarch. He was one of the most significant and influential poets and writers in the Middle Ages. Francesco Petrarch was born July 20, 1304. He was born into a family exiled in the town of Arezzo. He was the first son of the notary Pietro di Parenzo di Garzo. He studied in law and religion heavily in his earlier, although his major would quickly change, asserting, I couldnt face making a merchandise of my mind, in his opinion politics were too much of a dishonest profession. Petrarch always had an interest in writing and Latin literature, he quickly emerged himself in books and began to write extensively. In his extensive pursuit for old Latin writing and manuscripts, he traveled through France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. From his large scale work, an epic in Latin, Africa, and his works began to be credited and worldly renowned marking his influence in literature forever. TheShow MoreRelated Francis Petrarch: Leader of the Humanistic Movement and Father of the Renaissance2215 Words   |  9 PagesFrancis Petrarch: Leader of the Humanistic Movement and Father of the Renaissance Before the civic spirit and individuality evident and necessary to the Renaissance came to fruition, there had to have been something to trigger a change in the mentality of the medieval civilization. The medieval manorialism fostered illiteracy and ignorance and a very narrow view of the outside world, people did not question their place, the church, or the need to prepare for the after life. The awakening

The World Was A Wonderful Place - 1763 Words

When I was a boy, I used to believe the world was a wonderful place. Growing up in a small town with a close knit community I was isolated from the real world and never saw it for what it was until I entered my teens. Slowly I began watching the news and becoming aware of many of the world s problems. I used to think that everyone had a little good in them and that as a species we would work together to solve issues which plagued millions of us. I still believe that people are capable of amazing feats and that to this day we can solve the problems, which I see, corrupting the world. People tend to misjudge just how important every single organism is on this planet. Without one, another will suffer and throw the whole ecosystem off balance. People tend to take the little things for granted and react out of greed. This is why our climate is changing and thousands of species are at risk of extinction. Humans have the choice to preserve these species but few stand answer the call. Humans have been selfish as species and although we have improved to protect others and our environment, we still allow many injustices. Our forests are being chopped or burned to the ground for farmland and lumber. Harmful oil and chemicals are constantly being leaked into ecosystems. Our climate is changing from an increase of CO2 and man made chemicals in our atmosphere. These conditions which we have brought upon ourselves are why several plants and animals are slowly going extinct. If oneShow MoreRelatedWriting, Or Lyricism, By 21 Pilots And Louis Armstrong s What A Wonderful World?11 38 Words   |  5 PagesPilots and Louis Armstrong’s What a Wonderful World. There are literary similarities, but there are also many differences that set these songs apart from each other and elicit differing emotional responses from the audience. Heathens and What a Wonderful World have contrasting themes related to the times from which they were written influencing each song’s meaning, but they were written in a similar way with the same intent to inform the audience. What a Wonderful World is a jazz song written in 1967Read MoreThe Expansive Of Islam Is My Historical Subject That Interests Me1110 Words   |  5 PagesIslam’s culture. I was so interested about the subject that I decided to read a book based on it to learn more about this wonderful religion Islam. According to the book,.................................................... , the author discusses about the Islam’s traditions. The author, Tanya Gulevich was born and raised as a child in a beautiful place called San Francisco Bay area and this area was filled with different kinds of cultures so this was pretty much a place that was known to be a veryRead More Biography of Louis Armstrong Essay1236 Words   |  5 PagesLouis Armstrong was born in one of the poorest sections in New Orleans, August 4, 1901. Louis a hard-working kid who helped his mother and sister by working every type of job there was, including going out on street corners at night to singing for coins. Slowly making money, Louis bought his first horn, a cornet. At age eleven Armstrong was sent to juvenile Jones Home for the colored waifs for firing a pistol on New Year’s Eve. While in jail Armstrong received his first formal music lesson from oneRead MoreAlice Of Wonderland By Alice Walker1159 Words   |  5 PagesAlice very quietly wandered away and sat down under a tree†pg2 †¢ Alice in wonderland takes place during summer in a magical place called wonderland. I know this because the play is called Alice in wonderland. â€Å"One warm and quiet summer afternoon, a little girl named Alice was in her garden†. Pg2 †¢ Alice doesn’t like the world and wants a world of her own where you can do whatever you want â€Å"If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense.† Pg2 †¢ Alice eventually noticed a rabbit and afterRead MoreThe Wonderful Wizard Of Oz1615 Words   |  7 Pages L. Frank Baum’s children’s novel, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz became a favorite read for America. The novel became a huge part of the American culture. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz impacted twentieth and twenty-first century ethos. The book influenced people around the globe. The story of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz created several forms of entertainment, such as film and theatre. Baum’s novel cannot necessarily be classified as childish because of all the adult themes and topics covered in theRead MoreThe Wizard Of Oz By Frank Baum1187 Words   |  5 PagesThe Wizard of Oz is the first in the Oz series by Frank Baum. From the other books, we learn that the word Oz has one meaning for the Wizard and another for the residents of the beautiful and magical world. The most common meaning for OZ is for the Wizard: Oz refers to the initials of his first two names, Oscar Zoroaster. However, there are additional meanings, as well. For the residents, Oz is the name of their â€Å"God,† the being that they look up to that can do all. Also, for the residents, Oz isRead MoreWelcome to Honolulu, Hawaii Are you wondering about, if is there a place like paradise to visit600 Words   |  3 PagesWelcome to Honolulu, Hawaii Are you wondering about, if is there a place like paradise to visit in the world?. Honolulu, in the Island of Oahu, is the best and biggest city of Hawaii to visit to. Honolulu is the capital of Hawaii( more than 75% population of Hawaii lives there). Today I am going to tell you about some of the history of this astonishing place, the wonderful beaches that you have to go there, and some other interesting location for you or the tourists to visit. I hope for you toRead MoreEssay Weddings Venues: Choose Gloucestershire1141 Words   |  5 Pagesthere is no place in the world that offers you more for that special day. UK wedding venue is second to none. You will find beautiful castles from various centuries. These castles are usually peaceful and serene, and are staff with great staff whose goal is to make your special day is unforgettable. You will find setting with scenic gardens and gorgeous lakes, providing you the perfect backdrop for this memorable day. Your friends and fam ily will not only be amaze about how wonderful you look,Read More The Wonder behind The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum749 Words   |  3 PagesThe Wonder behind The Wonderful Wizard of Oz Often, people who enjoy reading are found disappointed by the film versions of their favorite books. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum and The Wizard of OZ movie produced by Vincent Fleming serve as a good example of a distorted transition from text to film. While the novel was originally created to teach that anything is possible with hard work and is a straightforward children’s book, the film tacks on many unintended morals, further changingRead MoreComparison Between John Smith and William Bradford737 Words   |  3 PagesDescription of New England †. In this book Smith shows a wonderful world of vast food and pleasure. Also, William Bradford another pilgrim who arrived to Plymouth on the coast of Massachusetts, wrote a book called â€Å" Of Plymouth Plantation † in which he describes what really happened, how the pilgrims actually lived. The purpose of this essay is to compare and contrast both authors and their books. John Smith wrote about the wo nderful place the New World was, on the other hand, William Bradford wrote about

Marketing Is Everything Free Essays

string(71) " the product generally achieved a market share of between 15% and 20%\." HER JANUARY-FEBRUARY 1991 Marketing Is Everything by Regis McKenna he 1990s will belong to the customer. And that is great news for the marketer. Technology is transforming choice, and choice is transforming the marketplace. We will write a custom essay sample on Marketing Is Everything or any similar topic only for you Order Now As a result, we are witnessing the emergence of a new marketing paradigm – not a â€Å"do more† marketing that simply turns up the volume on the sales spiels of the past but a knowledge- and experience-based marketing that represents tbe once-and-for-all death of the salesman. Marketing’s transformation is driven by tbe enormous power and ubiquitous spread of tecbnology. So pervasive is technology today tbat it is virtually meaningless to make distinctions between technology and nontecbnology businesses and industries: tbere arc only tecbnology companies. Tecbnology has moved into products, the workplace, and the marketplace with astonishing speed and thorougbness. Seventy years after tbey were invented, fractional borsepower motors are in some IS to 20 bousebold products in tbe average American home today. In less than 20 years, the microprocessor has achieved a similar penetration. TWenty years ago, there Regis McKenna is chairman of Regis McKenna Inc. a Palo Alto-headquartered marketing consulting firm that advises some of America’s leading high-tech companies. He is also a general partner of Kleiner Perkins Caufield ) Byers, a technology venture-capital company. He is the author of Who’s Afraid of Big Blue? (Addison-Wesley, 1989) and The Regis Touch (Addison-Wesley, 1985]. DRAWING BY TIMOTHY BLECK T 65 MARKETING IS EVERYTHING were f ewer than 50,000 computers in use,- today more than . 50,000 computers are purchased every day. The defining characteristic of this new technological push is programmahility. In a computer chip, programmability means the capability to alter a command, so that one chip can perform a variety of prescribed functions and produce a variety of prescribed outcomes. On the factory floor, programmability transforms the production operation, enabling one machine to produce a wide variety of models and products. More broadly, programmability is the new corporate capability to produce more and more varieties and choices for customers – even to offer each individual customer the chance to design and implement the â€Å"program† that will yield the precise product, service, or variety that is right for him or her. The technological promise of programmahility has exploded into the reality of almost unlimited choice. Take the world of drugstores and supermarkets. According to Gorman’s New Product News, which tracks new product introductions in these two eonsumer-products arenas, between 1985 and 1989 the number of new products grew by an astonishing 60% to an all-time annual high of 12,055. As venerable a brand as Tide illustrates this multiplication of brand variety. In 1946, Procter Gamble introduced the laundry detergent, the first ever. For 38 years, one version of Tide served the entire market. Then, in the mid-1980s, Procter Gamble began to bring out a succession of new Tides: Unscented Tide and Liquid Tide in 1984, Tide with Bleach in 1988, and the concentrated Ultra Tide in 1990. To some marketers, the creation of almost unlimited customer choice represents a threat – particularly when choice is accompanied by new competitors. TVenty years ago, IBM had only 20 competitors,- today it faces more than 5,000, when you count any company that is in the â€Å"computer† business. Twenty years ago, there were fewer than 90 semiconductor companies; today there are almost 300 in the United States alone. And not only are the competitors new, bringing with them new products and new strategies, but the customers also are new: 90% of the people who used a computer in 1990 were not using one in 1980. These new customers don’t know ahout the old rules, the old understandings, or the old ways of doing business – and they don’t care. What they do care about is a company that is willing to adapt its products or services to fit their strategies. This represents the evolution of marketing to the market-driven company. Several decades ago, there were sales-driven companies. These organizations focused their energies on changing customers’ minds to fit the product – praeticing the â€Å"any color as long as it’s black† school of marketing. As teehnology developed and competition increased, some companies shifted their approach and became eustomer driven. These companies expressed a new willingness to change their product to fit customers’ requests – practicing the â€Å"tell us what color you want† school of marketing. In the 1990s, successful companies are becoming market driven, adapting their products to fit their customers’ strategies. These companies will practice â€Å"let’s figure out together whether and how color matters to your larger goal† marketing. It is marketing that is oriented toward creating rather than controlling a market; it is 66 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW January-February 1991 based on developmental education, incicmcntul improvement, and ongoing process rather than on simple market-share tactics, raw sales, and one-time events. Most important, it draws on the base of knowledge and experience that exists in the organization. T ese two fundamentals, knowledge-based and experiencebased marketing, will increasingly define the capabilities of a successful marketing organization. They will supplant the old approach to marketing and new product development. The old approach – getting an idea, conducting traditional market research, developing a product, testing the market, and finally going to market – is slow, unresponsive, and turf-ridden. Moreover, given the fast-changing ma rketplace, there is less and less reason to believe that this traditional approach can keep up with real customer wishes and demands or with the rigors of competition. Consider the mueh-publieized 1988 lawsuit that Beecham, the international consumer products group, filed against advertising giant Saatchi ; Saatchi. The suit, which sought more than $24 million in damages, argued that Yankelovich Clancy Shulman, at that time Saatchi’s U. S. market-research subsidiary, had â€Å"vastly overstated† the projected market share of a new detergent that Beecham launched. Yankelovich forecast that Beecham’s product, Delicare, a cold-water detergent, would win between 45. 4% and 52. 3% of the U. S. arket if Beecham backed it with $18 million of advertising. According to Beeeham, however, Delicare’s highest market share was 25%; the product generally achieved a market share of between 15% and 20%. You read "Marketing Is Everything" in category "Papers" The lawsuit was settled out of court, with no clear winner or loser. Regardless of the outcome, however, the issue it illustrates is widespread and fundamental: forecasts, by their v ery nature, must be unreliable, particularly with technology, competitors, customers, and markets all shifting ground so often, so rapidly, and so radically. The alternative to this old approach is know ledge-based and experience-based marketing. Knowledge-based marketing requires a company to master a scale of knowledge: of the technology in which it competes; of its competition; of its customers; of new sources of technology that can alter its competitive environment; and of its own organization, capabilities, plans, and way of doing business. Armed with this mastery, companies can put knowledge-based marketing to work in three essential ways: integrating tbe customer into tbe design process to guarantee a product tbat is tailored not only to the customers’ needs and desires but also to the customers’ strategies; generating nicbe thinking to use tbe company’s knowledge of cbannels and markets to identify segments of tbe market tbe company can own; and developing the infrastructure of suppliers, vendors, partners, and users wbose relationships will help sustain and support tbe company’s reputation and technological edge. The otber balf of this new marketing paradigm is experiencebased marketing, wbicb empbasizes interactivity, connectivity, and creativity. With tbis approacb, companies spend time with tbeir customers, constantly monitor tbeir competitors, and develop a feedback-analysis system tbat turns this information about the market and the competition into important new product intelligence. At the same time, tbese companies botb evaluate their own )anuary February 1991 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW 67 MARKETING IS EVERYTHING echnology to assess its currency and cooperate with other companies to create mutually advantageous systems and solutions. These close encounters – with customers, competitors, and internal and external technologies – give companies the firsthand experience they need to invest in market development and to take intelligent, calculated risks. In a time of exploding choice and unpredictable change, marketing – the new marketing – is the answer. With so m uch choice for customers, companies face the end of loyalty. To combat that threat, they can add sales and marketing people, throwing costly resources at the market as a way to retain customers. But the real solution, of course, is not more marketing but better marketing. And that means marketing that finds a way to integrate the customer into the company, to create and sustain a relationship between the company and the customer. The marketer must he the integrator, both internally – synthesizing technological capability with market needs – and externally bringing the customer into the company as a participant in the development and adaptation of goods and services. It is a fundamental shift in the role and purpose of marketing: from manipulation of the customer to genuine customer involvement; from telling and selling to communicating and sharing knowledge; from last-in-line function to corporate-credibility champion. Playing the integrator requires the marketer to command credibility. In a marketplace characterized by rapid change and potentially paralyzing choice, credibility becomes the company’s sustaining value. The character of its management, the strength of its financials, the quality of its innovations, the congeniality of its customer references, the capabilities of its alliances – these are the measures of a company’s credibility. They are measures that, in turn, directly affect its capacity to attract quality people, generate new ideas, and form quality relationships. The relationships are the key, the hasis of customer choice and company adaptation. After all, what is a successful brand hut a special relationship? And who hetter than a company’s marketing people to create, sustain, and interpret the relationship between the company, its suppliers, and its customers? That is why, as the demands on the company have shifted from controlling costs to competing on products to serving customers, the center of gravity in the company has shifted from finance to engineering-and now to marketing. In the 1990s, marketing will do more than sell. It will define the way a company does business. The old notion of marketing -was epitomized hy Marketing Is Everythins, and Everything T A/T / +’ IS IViarKCting he ritual phone call from the CEO to the corporate headhunter saying, â€Å"Find me a good marketing per- ^†Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ^ ^† ‘^†^ ^^ marketing operation! † What the Q^Q wanted, of course, was someone who could take on a discrete set of textbook functions that were generally associated with run-of-the-mill marketing. That person would immediately go to Madison Avenue to hire an advertising agency, change the ad campaign, redesign the company logo, redo the brochures, train the sales force, retain a high-powered public relations firm, and alter or otherwise reposition the company’s image. HARVARD BUSINESS REVTEW lanuary-February 1991 68 Behind the CEO’s call for â€Å"a good marketing person† were a number of assumptions and attitudes about marketing: that it is a distinct function in the company, separate from and usually subordinate to the core functions; that its job is to identify groups of potential customers and find ways to convince them to buy the company’s product or service; and that at the heart of it is image making – creating and projecting a false sense of the company and its offerings to lure the customer into the company’s grasp. If those assumptions ever were warranted in the past, however, all three are totally unsupportable and obsolete today. Marketing today is not a function; it is a way of doing business. Marketing is not a new ad campaign or this month’s promotion. Marketing has to be all-pervasive, part of everyone’s job description, from the receptionists to the board of directors. Its job is neither to fool the customer nor to falsify the company’s image. It is to integrate the customer into the design of the product and to design a ystematic process for interaction that will create substance in the relationship. To understand the difference between the old and tbe new marketing, compare how two bigb-tech medical instrument companies recently bandied similar customer telepbone calls requesting tbe repair and replacement of their equipment. Tbe first eompany – call it Gluco – delivered tbe replacement instrument to tbe customer witbin 24 hours of tbe request, no que stions asked. Tbe box in wbich it arrived contained instructions for sending back tbe broken instrument, a mailing label, and even tape to reseal tbe box. Tbe pbone call and tbe excbange of instruments were handled conveniently, professionally, and witb maximum consideration for and minimum disruption to tbe customer. The second company – call it Pumpco – bandied tbings quite differently. Tbe person wbo took the customer’s telepbone call bad never been asked about repairing a piece of equipment; sbe tbougbtlessly sent tbe customer into tbe limbo of bold. Finally, sbe came back on the line to say tbat tbe customer would have to pay for tbe equipment repair and tbat a temporary replacement would cost an additional $ 15. Several days later, tbe customer received tbe replacement witb no instructions, no information, no directions. Several weeks after the customer returned tbe broken equipment, it reappeared, repaired but witb no instructions concerning tbe temporary replacement. Finally, tbe customer got a demand letter from Pumpco, indicating tbat someone at Pumpco bad made the mistake of not sending tbe equipment C. O. D. To Pumpco, marketing means selling tbings and collecting money; to Gluco, marketing means building relationsbips witb its custotners. The way tbe two eompanies bandied two simple eustomer requests refleets tbe questions tbat customers increasingly ask in interactions witb all kinds of businesses, from airlines to software makers: Wbicb company is competent, responsive, and well organized? Wbicb company do I trust to get it rigbt- Wbicb company would I ratber do business witb? Successful companies realize tbat marketing is like quality integral to tbe organization. Like quality, marketing is an intangible tbat tbe customer must experience to appreciate. And like quality – wbicb in tbe United States bas developed from early ideas like HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW )anuary-February 1991 69 MARKETING IS EVERYTHING planned obsolescence and inspecting quality in to more ambitious concepts like the systemization of quality in every aspect of tbe organization – marketing bas been evolutionary. Marketing bas shifted from tricking tbe customer to blaming the customer to satisfying the customer – and now to integrating tbe customer systematically. As its next move, marketing must permanently shed its reputation for hucksterism and image making and create an award for marketing much like tbe Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. In fact, companies tbat continue to see marketing as a bag of tricks will lose out in sbort order to companies tbat stress substance and real performance. Marketing’s ultimate assignment is to serve customers’ real needs and to communicate tbe substance of tbe company – not to introduce tbe kinds of cosmetics tbat used to typify tbe auto industry’s annual model cbanges. And because marketing in tbe 1990s is an expression of tbe company’s cbaracter, it necessarily is a responsibility tbat belongs to the whole company. The Goal ofMarketing Is to Own the Market, Not fust U. S. companies typically make two kinds of mistakes. Some get caught up in the excitement and drive of making things, particularly new creto Sell the ations. Others become absorbed in the competiPwduct ^^^^  °^ selling things, particularly to increase their market share in a given product line. Both approaches could prove fatal to a business. Tbe problem witb tbe first is tbat it leads to an internal focus. Companies can become so fixated on pursuing tbeir RD agendas that they forget about tbe customer, tbe market, tbe competition. They end up winning recognition as RD pioneers but lack the more important capability – sustaining their performance and, sometimes, maintaining their independence. Genentech, for example, clearly emerged as the RD pioneer in biotechnology, only to be acquired by Rocbe. Tbe problem with the second approach is that it leads to a market-sbare mentality, which inevitably translates into undershooting the market. A market-share mentality leads a company to think of its customers as â€Å"share points† and to use gimmicks, spiffs, and promotions to eke out a percentage-point gain. It pusbes a company to look for incremental, sometimes even minuscule, growtb out of existing products or to spend lavishly to launch a new product in a market where competitors enjoy a fat, dominant position. It turns marketing into an expensive fight over crumbs rather than a smart effort to own the whole pie. Tbe real goal of marketing is to own the market – not just to make or sell products. Smart marketing means defining what wbole pie is yours. It means thinking of your company, your technology, your product in a fresh way, a way that begins by defining what you can lead. Because in marketing, what you lead, you own. Leadership is ownership. When you own the market, you do different things and you do tbings differently, as do your suppliers and your customers. When you own tbe market, you develop your products to serve tbat market specifically; you define tbe standards in that market; you bring into your camp third parties who want to develop their own compatible products or offer you new features or add-ons to aug- 70 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW January-February 19yi ent your product; you get the first look at new ideas that others are testing in that market; you attract the most talented people because of your acknowledged leadership position. Owning a market can become a self-reinforcing spiral. Beeause you own the market, you become the dominant force in the field; beeause you dominate the field, you deepen your ownership o f the market. Ultimately, you deepen your relationship with your customers as well, as they attribute more and more leadership qualities to a company that exhibits such an integrated performance. To own the market, a eompany starts by thinking of a new way to define a market. Take, for instance, the case of Convex Computer. In 1984, Convex was looking to put a new computer on the market. Because of tbe existing market segmentation. Convex could have seen its only choice as competing for market sbare in the predefined markets: in supercomputers where Cray dominated or in minicomputers where Digital led. Determined to define a market it could own. Convex created the â€Å"mini-supercomputer† market by offering a product with a priee/performance ratio between Cray’s $5 million to $15 million supercomputers and Digital’s $300,000 to $750,000 minieomputers. Convex’s product, priced between $500,000 and $800,000, offered teehnological performance less than that of a full supercomputer and more than that of a minicomputer. Within this new market. Convex established itself as the leader. Intel did the same thing with its microprocessor. The company defined its early products and market more as computers than semiconductors. Intel offered, in essence, a computer on a chip, creating a new category of products that it could own and lead. Sometimes owning a market means broadening it; other times, narrowing it. Apple has managed to do both in efforts to create and own a market. Apple first broadened the category of small computers to achieve a leadership position. The market definition started out as hobby computers and had many small players. The next step was the home computer – a market that was also crowded and limiting. Tb own a market, Apple identified the personal computer, which expanded the market concept and made Apple the undeniable market leader. In a later move, Apple did the opposite, redefining a market by narrowing its definition. Unquestionably, IBM owned the business market; for Apple, a market-share mentality in that arena would have been pointless. Instead, with technology alliances and marketing eorreetly defined, Apple created – and owned – a whole new market: desktop publishing. Once inside the corporate world with desktop publishing, Apple could deepen and broaden its relationships with the business customer. Paradoxically, two important outcomes of owning a market are substantial earnings, which can replenish the company’s RD coffers, and a powerful market position, a beachhead from wbich a company can grow additional market share by expanding both its teehnological capabilities and its definition of the market. The greatest praetitioners of this marketing approach are Japanese companies in industries like autos, commercial electronics, semiconductors, and computers and communications. Their primary goal is ownership of certain target markets. The keiretsv industrial! structure allows them to use all of the market’s infrastructure to achieve HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW January-February 1991 * r ^ MARKETING IS EVERYTHING this; relationships in technology, information, politics, and distribution help tbe company assert its leadership. Tbe Japanese strategy is consistent. Tbese companies begin by using basic research from tbe United States to jump-start new product development. From 1950 to 1978, for example, Japanese companies entered into 32,000 licensing arrangements to acquire foreign technology at an estimated cost of $9 billion. But the United States spent at least 50 times tbat much to do the original RD. Next, these Japanese companies pusb out a variety of products to engage the market and to learn and then focus on dominating tbe market to force foreign competitors to retreat – leaving them to barvest substantial returns. Tbese buge profits are recycled into a new spiral of RJ3, innovation, market creation, and market dominance. Tbat model of competing, which links RD, technology, innovation, production, and finance – integrated through marketing’s drive to own a market – is the approacb tbat all competitors will take to succeed in the 1990s. In a world of mass manufacturing, the counterpart was mass marketing. In a world of flexible Technolo2V n^^nufacturing, the counterpart is flexible market7-. 7 ine. The technology comes first, the ability to marJZ VUI Vt^Ci j^gj follows. The tecbnology embodies adaptability, programmability, and customizability; now comes marketing that delivers on those qualities. Today tecbnology has created tbe promise of â€Å"any thing, any way, any time. † Customers can have their own version of virtually any product, including one that appeals to mass identification rather than individuality, if tbey so desire. Think of a product or an industry where customization is not predominant. The telephone? Originally, Bell Telephone’s goal was to place a simple, all-black pbone in every home. Today there are more than 1,000 permutations and combinations available, ith options running the gamut from different colors and portahility to answering machines and programmability – as well as services. Tbere is the further promise of optical fiber and the convergence of computers and communications into a unified industry with even greater technological choice. How about a venerable product like the bicycle, which appeare d originally as a sketch in Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks? According to a recent article in the Washington Post, tbe National Bicycle Industrial Company in Kokubu, Japan builds made-to-order bicycles on an assembly line. The bicycles, fitted to each customer’s measurements, are delivered within two weeks of the order – and the company offers 11,231,862 variations on its models, at prices only 10% higher than ready-made models. Even newspapers tbat report on this technology-led move to customization are themselves increasingly customized. Faced witb stagnant circulation, the urban daily newspapers have begun to customize their news, advertising, and even editorial and sports pages to appeal to local suburban readers. The Los Angeles Times, for example, has seven zoned editions targeting each of tbe city’s surrounding communities. What is at work here is the predominant matbematical formula of today’s marketing: variety plus service equals customization. For 72 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW January-February all of its handying about as a marketing buzzword, customization is a remarkably direct concept – it is the capacity to deal with a customer in a unique way. Technology makes it increasingly possible to do that, but interestingly, marketing’s version of the laws of physics makes it increasingly difficult. According to quantum physics, things act differently at the micro level Light is the classic example. When subjected to certain kinds of tests, light behaves like a wave, moving in much the way an ocean wave moves. But in other tests, light behaves more like a particle, moving as a single ball. So, scientists ask, is it a wave or a particle? And when is it which? Markets and customers operate like light and energy. In fact, like light, the customer is more than one thing at the same time. Sometimes consumers behave as part of a group, fitting neatly into social and psychographic classifications. Other times, the consumer breaks loose and is iconoclastic. Customers make and break patterns: the senior citizen market is filled with older people who intensely wish to act youthful, and the upscale market must contend with wealthy people who hide their money behind the most utilitarian purchases. Markets are subject to laws similar to those of quantum physics. Different markets have different levels of consumer energy, stages in the market’s development where a product surges, is absorbed, dissipates, and dies. A fad, after all, is nothing more than a wave that dissipates and then becomes a particle. Take the much-discussed Yuppie market and its association with certain branded consumer products, like BMWs. After a stage of bigh customer energy and close identification, the wave has broken. Having been saturated and absorbed by the marketplace, the Yuppie association has faded, just as energy does in the physical world. Sensing the change, BMW no longer sells to the Yuppie lifestyle but now focuses on the technological capabilities of its machines. And Yuppies are no longer the wave they once were; as a market, they are more like particles as they look for more individualistic and personal expressions of their consumer energy. Of course, since particles can also behave like waves again, it is likely that smart marketers will tap some new energy source, such as values, to recoalesce the young, affluent market into a wave. And technology gives marketers the tools they need, such as database marketing, to discern waves and particles and even to design programs that combine enough particles to form a powerful wave. The lesson for marketers is much the same as that voiced by Buckminster Fuller for scientists: â€Å"Don’t fight forces,- use them. Marketers who follow and use technology, rather than oppose it, will discover that it creates and leads directly to new market forms and opportunities. Take audiocassettes, tapes, and compact discs. For years, record and tape companies jealously guarded their property. Knowing that home hackers pirated tapes and created their own composite cassettes, the music companies steadfastly resisted the forces of technology – until the Personics System realized th at technology was making a legitimate market for authorized, high-quality customized composite cassettes and CDs. Rather than treating the customer as a criminal, Personics saw a market. Today consumers can design personalized music tapes from the Personics System, a rewed-up jukebox with a library of HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW (anuary R-bmary 1991 73 MARKETING IS EVERYTHING over 5,000 songs. For $1. 10 per song, consumers tell tbe macbine wbat to record. In about ten minutes, tbe system makes a customized tape and prints out a laser-quality label of tbe selections, complete witb tbe customer’s name and a personalized title for tbe tape. Launcbed in 1988, tbe system bas already spread to more tban 250 stores. Smart marketers bave, once again, allowed tecbnology to create the customizing relationship witb tbe customer. We are witnessing tbe obsoleseence of advertisg-1^ tbe old model of marketing, it made sense as oveS fTOm ^^^ wbole formula: you sell mass-produced tn lU Q 3 j^ygg market tbrougb mass media. Marketing’s job was to use advertising to deliver a message to tbe consumer in a one-way communication: â€Å"Buy tbis! † Tbat message no longer works, and advertising is sbowing tbe effects. In 1989, newspaper advertising grew only 4%, compared witb 6% in 1988and9% in 1987. According to a study by Syracuse University’s Jobn Pbilip Jones, ad spending in tbe major media bas been stalled at 1. 5% of GNP since 1984. Ad agency staffing, researcb, and profitability bave been affected. Three related factors explain tbe decline of advertising. First, advertising overkill bas started to ricocbet back on advertising itself. Tbe proliferation of products has yielded a proliferation of messages: U. S. customers are hit witb up to 3,000 marketing messages a day. In an effort to bombard the customer with yet one more advertisement, marketers are squeezing as many voices as they can into tbe space allotted to tbem. In 1988, for example, 38% of primetime and 47% of weekday daytime television commercials were only 15 seconds in duration; in 1984, those figures were 6% and 11 % respeetively. As a result of the shift to 15-second commercials, the number of television commercials bas skyrocketed; between 1984 and 1988, prime-time commercials increased by 25%, weekday daytime by 24%. Predictably, bowever, a greater number of voices translates into a smaller impact. Customers simply are unable to remember wbich advertisement pitcbes wbich product, much less wbat qualities or attributes might differentiate one product from anotber. Very simply, it’s a jumble out tbere. Take tbe enormously clever and critically acclaimed series of advertisements for Eveready batteries, featuring a tireless marching rabbit. Tbe ad was so successful tbat a survey conducted by Video Storyboard Tests Inc. named it one of tbe top commercials in 1990 for Duracell, Eveready’s top competitor. In fact, a full 40% of tbose wbo selected tbe ad as an outstanding commercial attributed it to Duracell. Partly as a consequence of tbis confusion, reports indicate that Duracell’s market share has grown, while Eveready’s may have sbrunk sligbtly. Batteries are not the only market in whicb more advertising succeeds in spreading more confusion. The same thing bas happened in markets like athletic footwear and soda pop, where competing companies have signed up so many celebrity sponsors that consumers can no longer keep straight who is pitcbing wbat for whom. In 1989, for example. Coke, Diet Coke, Pepsi, and Diet Pepsi used nearly three dozen movie stars, athletes, musicians, and television personalities to tell consumers to buy more cola. But wben tbe 74 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW January-February 1991 moke and mirrors bad cleared, most consumers couldn’t remember wbetber foe Montana and Don Jobnson drank Coke or Pepsi – or botb. Or wby it really mattered. Tbe second development in advertising’s decline is an outgrowth of the first: as advertising has proliferated and become more obnoxiously insistent, consumers bave gotten fed up. Tbe more advertising seeks to intrude, tbe more people try to shut it out. Last year, Disney won the applause of commercial-weary customers when the company announced tbat it would not screen its films in tbeaters that showed commercials before the feature. A Disney executive was quoted as saying, â€Å"Movie theaters should he preserved as environments where consumers can escape from the pervasive onslaught of advertising. † Buttressing its position, tbe company cited survey data obtained from moviegoers, 90% of wbom said tbey did not want commercials sbown in movie tbeaters and 95% of wbom said tbey did want to see previews of coming attractions. More recently, after a number of failed attempts, the U. S. Congress responded to the growing concerns of parents and educators over the eommercial content of children’s television. A new law limits tbe number of minutes of commercials and directs tbe Federal Communications Commission botb to examine â€Å"programlength commercials† – cartoon shows linked to commercial product lines – and to make each television station’s contribution to cbildren’s educational needs a condition for license renewal. Tbis concern over advertising is mirrored in a variety of arenas from public outcry over cigarette marketing plans targeted at blacks and women to calls for more environmentally sensitive packaging and products. The underlying reason bebind botb of these factors is advertising’s dirty little secret: it serves no useful purpose. In today’s market, advertising simply misses the fundamental point of marketing – adaptability, flexibility, and responsiveness. Tbe new marketing requires a feedback loop; it is tbis element tbat is missing from tbe monologue of advertising but that is built into the dialogue of marketing. Tbe feedback loop, connecting company and customer, is central to tbe operating definition of a truly market-driven company: a company that adapts in a timely way to the changing needs of tbe customer. Apple is one such company. Its Macintosh computer is regarded as a machine that launched a revolution. At its birth in 1984, industry analysts received it with praise and acclaim. But in retrospect, the first Macintosh had many weaknesses: it had limited, nonexpandable memory, virtually no applications software, and a blackand-wbite screen. For all tbose deficiencies, bowever, tbe Mac bad two strengtbs tbat more than compensated: it was incredibly easy to use, and it bad a user group tbat was prepared to praise Mac publicly at its launeb and to advise Apple privately on bow to improve it. In other words, it had a feedback loop. It was tbis feedback loop tbat brougbt about change in tbe Mac, wbicb ultimately became an open, adaptable, and colorful computer. And it was changing the Mac that saved it. Months before launebing tbe Mac, Apple gave a sample of tbe product to 100 influential Americans to use and comment on. It signed up 100 tbird-party software suppliers wbo began to envision applications that could take advantage of the Mac’s simplicity. It HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW (anuary-February 1991 75 MARKETING IS EVERYTHING trained over 4,000 dealer salespeople and gave full-day, hands-on demonstrations of the Mac to industry insiders and analysts. Apple got two benefits from this network: educated Mac supporters who could legitimately praise the product to the press and invested consumers who could tell the company what the Mac needed. The dialogue witb customers cmd media praise were worth more than any notice advertising could buy. Apple’s approach represents the new marketing model, a shift from monologue to dialogue. It is accomplished through experience-based marketing, where companies create opportunities for customers and potential customers to sample their products and then provide feedback. It is accomplished through beta sites, where a company can install a prelaunch product and study its use and needed refinements. Experienced-based marketing allows a company to work closely with a client to change a product, to adapt the technology – recognizing that no product is perfect wben it comes from engineering. This interaction was precisely the approach taken by Xerox in developing its recently announced Docutech System. Seven months before launeh, Xerox established 25 beta sites. From its prelaunch eustomers, Xerox learned what adjustments it should make, what service and support it should supply, and what enhancements and related new products it might next introduce. The goal is adaptive marketing, marketing that stresses sensitivity, flexibility, and resiliency. Sensitivity comes from having a variety of modes and channels through which companies can read the environment, from user groups that offer live feedback to sophisticated consumer scanners that provide data on customer choice in real time. Flexibility comes from creating an organizational structure and operating style that permits the company to take advantage of new opportunities presented by customer feedback. Resiliency comes from learning from mistakes – marketing that listens and responds. The line between products and services is fast Marketing a Product d Service Is Is iVl(irK6tll2g Q. 1 rOuUCt gj-jjj ]viotors makes more money from lending its eroding, what once appeared to be a rigid polarity ^^^ ^^^ become a hybrid: the servicization of prod^^^^ ^^^ ^^ productization of services. When Gen- ustomers money to buy its cars than it makes from manufacturing the cars, is it marketing its products or its services? When IBM announces to all the world that it is now in the systems-integration business – the customer can buy any box from any vendor and IBM will supply the systems know-how to make the whole thing work together – is it marketing its products or its services? In fact, the computer busi ness today is 75% services; it consists overwhelmingly of applications knowledge, systems analysis, systems engineering, systems integration, networking solutions, security, and maintenance. The point applies just as well to less grandiose eompanies and to less expensive consumer products. Take the large corner drugstore that stocks thousands of products, from cosmetics to wristwatches. The products are for sale, but the store is actually marketing a service – the convenience of having so much variety collected and arrayed in one location. Or take any of the ordinary products found in the home, from boxes of cereal to table lamps to VCRs. All of 76 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW January-February 1991 hem come with some form of information designed to perform a service: nutritional information to indicate tbe actual food value of the cereal to tbe health-conscious consumer; a United Laboratories label on tbe lamp as an assurance of testing; an operating manual to belp tbe nontecbnical VCR customer rig up tbe new unit. Tbere is ample room to improve tbe quality of this information – to make it more useful, more convenient, or even more entertaining – hut in a lmost every case, the service information is a critical component of the product. On the other side of tbe hybrid, service providers are acknowledging tbe productization of services. Service providers, such as banks, insurance companies, consulting firms, even airlines and radio stations, are creating tangible events, repetitive and predictable exercises, standard and customizable packages tbat are product services. A frequent-flier or a frequent-listener club is a product service, as are regular audits performed by consulting firms or new loan packages assembled by banks to respond to cbanging economic conditions. As products and services merge, it is critical for marketers to understand clearly what marketing the new hybrid is not. Tbe serviee component is not satisfied by repairing a product if it breaks. Nor is it satisfied by an 800 number, a warranty, or a customer survey form. Wbat customers want most from a product is often qualitative and intangible; it is tbe service tbat is integral to the product. Service is not an event; it is the process of creating a customer environment of information, assurance, and comfort. Consider an experienee that by now must have become commonplace for all of us as consumers. You go to an electronics store and buy an expensive piece of audio or video equipment, say, a CD player, a VCR, or a video camera. You take it bome, and a few days later, you accidentally drop it. It breaks. It won’t work. Now, as a customer, you have a decision to make. When you take it back to the store, do you say it was broken wben you took it out of the box? Or do you tell the truth? The answer, honestly, depends on how you think the store will respond. But just as honestly, most customers appreciate a store that encourages them to tell the truth by making good on all customer problems. Service is, ultimately, an environment that encourages honesty. The company that adopts a â€Å"we’ll make good on it, no questions asked† policy in the face of adversity may win a customer for life. Marketers who ignore the service component of their products focus on competitive differentiation and tools to penetrate markets. Marketers who appreciate the importance of the product-service hybrid focus on building loyal customer relationships. Technology and marketing once may bave Technology looked like opposites. The cold, impersonal sameness of technology and the high-touch, human Technology uniqueness of marketing seemed eternally at odds, Computers would only make marketing less personal; marketing could never leam to appreciate the look and feel of computers, datahases, and the rest of the high-tech paraphernalia. On the grounds of cost, a truce was eventually arranged. Very simply, marketers discovered that real savings could be gained hy KARVAKD BUSINESS REVIEW lanuary-February 1991 Markets 77 MARKETING IS EVERYTHING using technology to do what previously had required expensive, intensive, and often risky, people-directed field operations. For example, marketers learned that by matching a database with a marketing plan to simulate a new product launch on a computer, they could accomplish in 90 days and for $50,000 what otherwise would take as long as a year and cost at least several hundred thousand dollars. But having moved beyond the simple automation-for-cost-saving stage, technology and marketing have now not only fused but also begun to feed hack to each other. The result is the transformation of both technology and the product and the reshaping of both the customer and tbe company. Technology permits information to flow in both directions between the customer and the company. It creates the feedback loop that integrates the customer into the company, allows tbe company to own a market, permits customization, creates a dialogue, and turns a product into a service and a service into a product. T he direction in which Genentech has moved in its use of laptop and hand-held computers illustrates the transforming power of technology as it merges with marketing. Originally, the biotechnology company planned to have salespeople use laptops on their sales calls as a way to automate the sales function. Sales reps, working solely out of their homes, would use laptops to get and send electronic mail, file reports on computerized â€Å"templates,† place orders, and receive company press releases and information updates. In addition, the laptops would enable sales reps to keep databases that would track customers’ buying histories and company performance. That was the initial level of expectations – very low. In fact, the technology-marketing marriage has dramatically altered the customer-company relationship and the joh of the sales rep. Sales reps have emerged as marketing consultants. Armed with technical information generated and gathered by Genentech, sales reps can provide a valuable educational service to their customers, who are primarily pharmacists and physicians. For example, analysis of the largest study of children with a disease called short stature is available only through Genentech and its representatives. With this analysis, which is hased on clinical studies of 6,000 patients between the ages of one month and 30 years, and with the help of an on-line â€Å"growth calculator,† doctors can better judge when to use the growth hormone Protropin. Genentecb’s system also includes a general educational component. Sales reps can use their laptops to access the latest articles or technical reports from medical conferences to help doctors keep up to date. The laptops also make it possible for doctors to use sales reps as research associates: Genentech has a staff of medical specialists who can answer highly technical questions posed through an on-line question-and-answer template. When sales reps enter a question on the template, the e-mail function immediately routes it to the appropriate specialist. For relatively simple questions, online answers come back to the sales rep within a day. In the 1990s, Genentech’s laptop system – and the hundreds of similar applications that sprang up in tbe 1980s to automate sales, marketing, service, and distribution – will seem like a rather obviHARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW January-February 1991 78 ous and primitive way to meld tecbnology and marketing. The marketer will bave available not only existing tecbnologies but also tbeir converging capabilities: personal computers, databases, CD-ROMs, grapbic displays, multimedia, color terminals, computer-video tecbnology, networking, a custom processor tbat can be built into anytbing anywhere to create intelligence on a countertop or a dasbboard, seanners that read text, and networks tbat instantaneously create and distribute vast reacbes of information. As design and manufacturing tecbnologies advance into â€Å"real time† processes, marketing will move to eliminate tbe gap between production and consumption. Tbe result will be marketing workstations – the marketers’ counterpart to CAD/CAM systems for engineers and product designers. Tbe marketing workstation will draw on grapbic, video, audio, and numeric information from a network of databases. The marketer will be able to look tbrougb windows on tbe workstation and manipulate data, simulate markets and products, bounce concepts off otbers in distant cities, write production orders for product designs and packaging concepts, and obtain costs, timetables, and distribution scbedules. Just as computer-comfortable cbildren today tbink notbing of manipulating figures and playing fantastic games on tbe same color screens, marketers will use the workstation to play botb designer and eonsumer. Tbe workstation will allow marketers to integrate data on historic sales and cost figures, competitive trends, and consumer patterns. At tbe same time, marketers will be able to create and test advertisements and promotions, evaluate media options, and analyze viewer and readersbip data. And finally, marketers will be able to obtain instant feedbaek on concepts and plans and to move marketing plans rapidly into production. Tbe marriage of technology and marketing should bring witb it a renaissance of marketing RikD – a new capability to explore new ideas, to test tbem against tbe reactions of real eustomers in real time, and to advance to experience-based leaps of faith. It should be the vehicle for bringing tbe customer inside the company and for putting marketing in tbe eenter of tbe company. In tbe 1990s, tbe critical dimensions of tbe company – including all of tbe attributes tbat togetber define how the company does business – are ultimately tbe functions of marketing. That is wby marketing is everyone’s job, wby marketing is everytbing and everytbing is marketing. ^ Reprint 91108 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW liinuary-February 1991 79 Harvard Business Review Notice of Use Restrictions, May 2009 Harvard Business Review and Harvard Business Publishing Newsletter content on EBSCOhost is licensed for the private individual use of authorized EBSCOhost users. It is not intended for use as assigned course material in academic institutions nor as corporate learning or training materials in businesses. Academic licensees may not use this content in electronic reserves, electronic course packs, persistent linking from syllabi or by any other means of incorporating the content into course resources. Business licensees may not host this content on learning management systems or use persistent linking or other means to incorporate the content into learning management systems. Harvard Business Publishing will be pleased to grant permission to make this content available through such means. For rates and permission, contact permissions@harvardbusiness. org. How to cite Marketing Is Everything, Papers