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Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Netflix Social Company Extraordinaire – OR – You’re Doing it Ugly Kid But You’re Doing It!

I’m not on the inside at Netflix (NFLX), though I confess; this would be an exciting time to be there, so my assessment contains many assumptions and biases, this being the first and largest assumption.

I believe we’re witnessing one of the early examples of just exactly what a socially integrated business might look like from the outside; ugly, messy and with a heaping helping of controversy.  The Social Biosphere is inescapable and will continue to become more and more a complete business reality – in other words; businesses will exist and operate in real time with stakeholder input becoming part of everyday organizational life.

Remember it’s much easier to use technology to push customers and stakeholders away as companies like Express Scripts ESRX  currently do however, this door is already closing and eventually the Express Scripts of the world will fall victim to the three Cs, loss of credibility, customers and capital.

Whereas companies like Netflix are operating within the Social Biosphere, and specifically within its social ecosystems (markets) and making business decisions based on stakeholder input.  Sure it looks messy and maybe a little clumsy from the outside looking in however, this is a relatively new business model and we need to expect missteps from those companies building business processes within the Social Biosphere.

How many times has each of us wanted a company to be more responsive, how many times have we called a company to task for not being responsive to either stakeholders or some other force within its operating environment? 

Netflix is doing business in real time and responding in near-real time to stakeholders and its operating environment, and here we are bashing them for it. 

I say shame on the media, and shame on the nay sayers.  Stop writing about what a Saint and Innovator Steve Jobs was and pay attention to some genuine business process innovation happing, right now.

What we’re witnessing is a break-out new business model for the emerging Social Biosphere.  And we will to see a lot more of this in the future.

Friday, October 7, 2011