The saying “team work makes the dream work” has never been more true. But the context in which it applies may be slightly different than what we are used to. Having played football from a young age, you often hear the phrase being said in the context of the sport. Scientifically and philosophically, it is the direct translation of emergent properties: When individual parts come together and characteristics which would not have been formed on their own arise (O’Connor, 2020). In an era defined by technological advancements, the phrase must now be applied to the companies which are leading our world economy. Because I believe that if companies can truly work as a team with their stakeholders, the dreams, or more realistically the necessary achievement of economic, social and environmental goals can be done. This is exactly what Iansiti and Lakhani (2018) argue in their HBR article, “Managing our hub economy”. In brief, the writers describe that the world’s leading tech firms, including Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Facebook in the USA and Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu in China have the ability to shape economies, as well as social stability.
As I started off with, “team work makes the dream work” was something I learned from football growing up. Using football as an analogy to the work which these tech companies do may seem highly obscure, but I believe that every business derives from a group of people with a goal. In principle, this is exactly what the sport of football is. The first lesson is, never neglect members of the team, no matter how little they may be contributing to the goal of winning. According to Iansiti and Lakhani (2018), all members of the ecosystem must be taken into account in order for technological hubs to succeed. The second lesson is to understand that a win is a combination of physical and mental training, as well as an element of luck. I believe that big tech companies need to compliment their innovative solutions with values of a higher purpose. Lastly, teams should understand that winning the game is only one step to becoming a successful team.
References
Iansiti, M., & Lakhani, K. R. 2018. Managing our hub economy. Harvard Business Review, 96(1), 17-17.
O’Connor, T. 2020. Emergent Properties. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philisophy.
Pleasant read! I really enjoyed the way you used a metaphor during your explanation. I believe it is a smart way of explaining technical issues that a lot of people may not be familiar with. Furthermore, the topic that you talk about, how big tech companies should use their power to do something good for the society, is a very important one. Educating people that may not be interested in reading very technical articles through a more easy read will still make them realize the importance of this issue. They could by consequence exercice pressure on those company to actually see a change. Would love to read more similar artciles!