DIY Investor Magazine
/
Jan 2017
37
IN OUR RISK-OFF COUNTRY MEDIOCRITY HAS PAID VERY
WELL INDEED FOR THOSE AT THE TOP
In an article for the FT published two days into 2017
and under the heading ‘Daring rather than data will
save advertising,’ he said: ‘It would be wonderful if
we could simply feed a number of assumptions into a
databank and wait for the suggested actions. Indeed,
many marketing professionals believe that is the future-
predictable, assured and safe. But life is not like that
and neither is marketing.
‘Steve Jobs or James Dyson did not build brilliant
companies by waiting for a set of algorithms to tell them
what to do. They built those companies by backing their
own beliefs, innovating with technology that changed
the way we think and behave, and then communicating
those beliefs through the use of broadcast and other
media. Persuasion and promotion.’
Indeed a quarter of a century of slumbering
governments lumbering us with a plethora of over
endowed entities of indifferent ability was perfectly
rounded off with David Cameron’s resignation honours
list.
In amongst 46 gongs handed out were peerages
for 13 of his advisors, some of whom are barely in
long trousers and all of whom are failures by dint of
his resignation. Not forgetting the OBE for Samantha
Cameron’s stylist who I suppose did at least have the
quality of keeping her looking pretty to the end.
But hark! 2017 dawns with the country waking up to the
invigorating task of shaking off the largest stupefying
presence of them all, the EU.
Is Theresa May up to pulling the sword from the stone?
There are some encouraging signs. Some of the old
school are now leaving. At the time of writing our EU
ambassador, Ivan Rogers, has resigned whilst penning
a note to his staff urging them to carry on his fight, so no
professionalism there then but it is what we have come
to expect from such people.
The real test though is about to come. It must by now
be clear on either side of the Brexit debate that it will
be a complete waste of time attempting to hammer
out some kind of deal with Brussels et al. Just like our
leaders of the last 27 years they are masters of the art
of can kicking and obfuscation. Come March when
May exercises Article 50 we must say to the 27 remain
countries: ‘We are leaving with no pre-conditions.
If in the next two years you wish to negotiate on certain
elements of interest to you our door is, of course, open.’
Will May have the courage to wake us from our slumber?
I hope so. It is time to move from risk off to risk-on.
