Comments on: Enterprise 2.0, All The Kings Men, Gartner, and The Coase Theorem http://www.johnmwillis.com/gartner/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/ JOHNMWILLIS BLOG Wed, 02 Jun 2010 23:53:59 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 By: CloudDroplets #18 - Don’t wear you Yankee cap when visiting 4 Yawkee Way | IT Management and Cloud Blog http://www.johnmwillis.com/gartner/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/comment-page-1/#comment-28378 CloudDroplets #18 - Don’t wear you Yankee cap when visiting 4 Yawkee Way | IT Management and Cloud Blog Fri, 05 Dec 2008 15:05:49 +0000 http://www.johnmwillis.com/other/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/#comment-28378 [...] Gartner Smartner [...] [...] Gartner Smartner [...]

]]> By: marc farley http://www.johnmwillis.com/gartner/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/comment-page-1/#comment-3248 marc farley Mon, 17 Mar 2008 15:47:58 +0000 http://www.johnmwillis.com/other/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/#comment-3248 Well, I'm no economist, so your perspective on Coase might be better than mine. My understanding puts his work in the context of regulated industries - where resources are scarce and competitors find ways to equalize income derived from the use of those resources. I don't know what reverse Coase is, but it sounds more like basic supply and demand. Well, I’m no economist, so your perspective on Coase might be better than mine. My understanding puts his work in the context of regulated industries – where resources are scarce and competitors find ways to equalize income derived from the use of those resources. I don’t know what reverse Coase is, but it sounds more like basic supply and demand.

]]> By: John http://www.johnmwillis.com/gartner/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/comment-page-1/#comment-3245 John Mon, 17 Mar 2008 15:04:52 +0000 http://www.johnmwillis.com/other/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/#comment-3245 This is what I love about blogging. When someone who is clearly a lot smarter than me reads by blog and makes a great comment. It makes this all worth while. Thanks :) My thoughts... I agree with you in the early days of IBM commercial business processing (e.g., late seventies and early eighties) Gartner had all the kings men. From my perspective I was a Jr systems programmer and they all seemed like gods to me. However, you are right in retrospect they were just guys that had been doing it for a while and knew how to speak the speak. In all honesty most of what I know about Coase's theory came from Tapscott's Wikinomics however I did do a little research before I wrote this article. As I understand it, and trust me I am all ears if I am wrong, the rise and fall of Gartner might be related Coases's theory because Gartner like the Ford's of the 1930's had a strong supply chain and this alowed them to be strong grow and maintain their employees. In the case of Gartner their supply chain is IT knowledge. It just didn't make sense,in most cases, for someone to try and do what Gartner did back then because Gartner had leverage to key contacts, their own research libraries, and almost exclusive vendor face time. Today anyone can show up at a AG meeting however back then Gartner was the 1k Elephant in the room. Part of Gartner's fall, IMHO, could be possibly related to what Tapscott refers to as a reverse Coase law. In other words the supply chain to IT knowledge is much more affordable and therefore gives individuals choices to be entrepreneurial IT analysts. I am definitely interested in your thoughts. Thanks John This is what I love about blogging. When someone who is clearly a lot smarter than me reads by blog and makes a great comment. It makes this all worth while. Thanks :)

My thoughts…

I agree with you in the early days of IBM commercial business processing (e.g., late seventies and early eighties) Gartner had all the kings men. From my perspective I was a Jr systems programmer and they all seemed like gods to me. However, you are right in retrospect they were just guys that had been doing it for a while and knew how to speak the speak.

In all honesty most of what I know about Coase’s theory came from Tapscott’s Wikinomics however I did do a little research before I wrote this article. As I understand it, and trust me I am all ears if I am wrong, the rise and fall of Gartner might be related Coases’s theory because Gartner like the Ford’s of the 1930′s had a strong supply chain and this alowed them to be strong grow and maintain their employees. In the case of Gartner their supply chain is IT knowledge. It just didn’t make sense,in most cases, for someone to try and do what Gartner did back then because Gartner had leverage to key contacts, their own research libraries, and almost exclusive vendor face time. Today anyone can show up at a AG meeting however back then Gartner was the 1k Elephant in the room. Part of Gartner’s fall, IMHO, could be possibly related to what Tapscott refers to as a reverse Coase law. In other words the supply chain to IT knowledge is much more affordable and therefore gives individuals choices to be entrepreneurial IT analysts.

I am definitely interested in your thoughts.

Thanks
John

]]> By: marc farley http://www.johnmwillis.com/gartner/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/comment-page-1/#comment-3243 marc farley Mon, 17 Mar 2008 14:32:31 +0000 http://www.johnmwillis.com/other/entperprise-20-all-the-kings-men-gartner-and-the-coase-theorem/#comment-3243 John, Its not like Gartner was ever a think tank with all the 4.0 Harvard grads. They had good people and great discipline as a company. The business model was based on vendor-customers paying a high price for information. In addition, these customers needed Gartner to validate their technologies and products. If you didn't pay the piper's pizzo, you would not receive your validation. As you point out, times have changed and Gartner no longer has the leverage it once did on either the information or validation. Furthermore, with so much more information available, their good people can only come across that way, not as the gods of technology - as they once did. I don't agree that Coase's theory applies much here. This is not about negotiations among businesses competing to utilize scarce resources. Instead the resource in question here (smart people who can analyze and write about technology) is not scarce, as your example of the bloggers and analysts points out. John, Its not like Gartner was ever a think tank with all the 4.0 Harvard grads. They had good people and great discipline as a company. The business model was based on vendor-customers paying a high price for information. In addition, these customers needed Gartner to validate their technologies and products. If you didn’t pay the piper’s pizzo, you would not receive your validation.

As you point out, times have changed and Gartner no longer has the leverage it once did on either the information or validation. Furthermore, with so much more information available, their good people can only come across that way, not as the gods of technology – as they once did. I don’t agree that Coase’s theory applies much here. This is not about negotiations among businesses competing to utilize scarce resources. Instead the resource in question here (smart people who can analyze and write about technology) is not scarce, as your example of the bloggers and analysts points out.

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