MBA in the City

June 10, 2018January 18, 2021

Who am I? A real question as the physical/digital divide gets blurrier

Who am I? Many a wise man, from Beanie Man to Hugh Jackman in Les Misérables, have asked this question over the years. And with each individual’s growing digital presence, the question becomes more challenging to answer. Not only is a different piece of ourselves presented at work, school, and home. Now different aspects of the self are also presented via the different digital platforms we engage with. We are being shaped by what we consumer, by our digital socialization, and by how we interlink our physical and digital realities.

You are what you consume

Similar to the truism “You are what you eat”, the modern equivalent “you are what you consumer virtually” rings true in this digital age. My inbox has provided a retrospective of my digital self of late. Rather like a string of Facebook Memories, GDPR has surfaced all sorts of websites with Privacy Policy updates that I’d long forgotten, that are vestiges of my digital self from 10-15 years ago. It’s fascinating to see what I was interested in as a teen and reflect upon how those interactions have shaped me today — but equally frightening how many people have my e-mail address!

Projection, personification, and socialization

It is easy to project perceptions and feelings onto increasingly human-like and sophisticated AI, particularly in the realm of voice assistants. With increasing openness to the Alexas and Siris of the world comes a new level of openness to such AI shaping our behavior and thinking. Kids provide clear illustrations of this. Children today may not believe in the tooth fairy, but they believe in Siri and Alexa. Not only do children consider these voice assistants friends; they also see them as a source of encouragement. Think about it – if you ask Siri a question, she answers honestly and admits when she can’t answer. She never gets frustrated, no matter how many questions you ask. If you struggle to express yourself fully, Alexa offers non-judgemental, friendly reactions. Inc. Uncensored cited a story of a child learning English gaining the courage to be vocal through interactive dialogue with Google Assistant.

Connecting the digital and the physical

With our augmented brain, a.k.a. our phones, continuing to connect the dots with our physical selves, we will increasingly see ourselves and the physical items around us as having digital identities as much as physical ones. Apple has already released new features of its ARKit to developers, and look how one creator has already connected digital information to physical items: he’s connected his account data to loyalty cards and passes. This pairing of physical and digital removes not just the logistical separation of information, but also the mental separation.

Easier to use loyalty cards with AR

Easier to use loyalty cards with AR

There is much to be wary of — or at the very least, to be aware off — as the information age continues to transform not just our daily lives but our beings. I, for one, have found cyborgs in the Sci-Fi universe fascinating and hope to evolve into a hopefully good-natured one myself. This is a space I will be watching – so stay tuned!

What a friendly-looking cyborg!

What a friendly-looking cyborg!

May 20, 2018January 17, 2021

AI enabled travel is here: 5 ways travel just got easier

All segments of the leisure industry seem to be having the same idea simultaneously – how can they make your travel experience more seamless. We all want to get the most out of each day, and to minimize the decision fatigue that degrades our experiences. Five companies stand out in their moves to integrate technology into a traveler’s day-to-day.

1. Before you go – KLM has your back with its voice-driven packing assistant

Just let service bot BB know where you’re going and when you’re leaving, and she will walk you through packing, piece by piece, equipped with silly pre-programed jokes to let you know bot makers have a sense of humor, too. Enabled by Google Home.

2. When you arrive – voice-driven concierge service in beta testing at Best Western

Best Western is testing out Amazon Dot for customers and staff, to quickly customize in-room experiences, from wake-up calls to room service requests.

3. For work trips – work from the shower

For those on a work trip or who are looking to create on the go, Marriott is beta testing a technology to whiteboard in the shower.

4. Also for work trips – work in a co-working space

Airbnb is offering WeWork day passes to guests.

5. For play trips – wearables making cruise navigation easy

Carnival Cruise has created the Ocean Medallion to provide customized experiences and recommendations based on your profile and location on the cruise ship.

All of these initiatives, striving to make the customer experience frictionless, both expand the customer experience, and more easily open customer wallets to ancillary offerings. I count this as a win-win.

May 13, 2018

There’s a reason Taco Tuesdays exist

I’m going to write a short post today, because I have decision fatigue. What is decision fatigue? I’m glad you asked. Here’s a great summary explanation.

April 23, 2018January 17, 2021

Minimum viable niceness – when high design and average quality make a happy consumer

In the consumer world, design and appearances matter. People want to feel good using the items they buy, for wearing or for everyday use. And with ever-improving just-in-time supply chains and the rapid dispersion of ideas via the internet, it’s hard to keep the best designs a secret. Which has given consumers the M.O. to comparison shop, to find a nice version of the thing they want that will work well and cost less than the ultra premium. We are looking for minimum viable niceness.

There are a few brands that have come up with a mass market model, that have cracked the “fast-follow” code such that they can rapidly roll out a cheaper rendition for a fraction of the price. No, this isn’t the Canal Street equivalent of a “Louis Vuitton” handbag anymore; these items will last well beyond one use. Here’s my view on some of the “nice with a good price” go-tos.

Wayfair

When kitting out my new home, I found lamps and bed frames that looked straight out of a Chelsea furniture store, but at a fraction of the price. I was pleased that products matched the website pictures to the tee.

Macy’s

Their buyers seriously know what they are doing. I’ve seen brands like BCBG that are rapidly losing their brick and mortar footprint have much more stylish pieces at Macy’s with 40% markdowns on top. I also found my futuristic leather couch for a fraction of what the high end decor stores would charge.

Beauty in general

A lot of skin care product quality depends on ingredients more than brands. I advise getting a facial or two and picking the brains of your estheticians. They often have a few recommendations that are inexpensive. And for make-up, I learned from a beauty business person that all eye shadows are basically the same.

Ann Taylor

This one is sort of a hidden gem. I have found some great dresses and accessories there that are nearly runway. It’s hit or miss – but the hits are well worth the browsing.

Stitch Fix

I am continually impressed with their stylists’ ability to find on-trend items, personalized to me, at reasonable prices. I’d give Stitch Fix a try if you don’t have a nose for fashion wins but, rather, “know it when you see it”.

You may be wondering how we got to this point of having so many moderately priced, stylish consumer product king pins. The advent of “masstige” brands like Target in the 1990s brought the the public the idea that they could own decent stuff that represented personal styles at a very reasonable price. This was easier to pull off in the fashion industry to start, where the styles of the season are established a year or so ahead of time, allowing fast fashion houses like Zara and H&M to crank up their supply chains as soon as Italian models hit the runway. The next frontier for affordability after fashion was home decor and furnishings. We saw brands like Ikea and Wayfair give West Elm and RH a run for their money. And beauty brands like L’Oreal convey modest luxury while also being available at CVS. So now, in our great nation, personal style can be done at prices that work with the people and for the people.

April 16, 2018

Turn it up – temperature control and the human experience

Temperature is like logistics: when everything is right, you don’t notice it. It affects our performance, and our daily experience. And yet it has only been since the 1980s that air conditioners have become a standard fixture in homes as well as office buildings. The 99% Invisible episode on the advent of air conditioners provides a clear example of what separates us from the monkeys – despite what Stephen Dubner might say – namely, that we can modify our environment to our preferred specifications to an insane degree now (pun intended).

Not only can we make our stationary spaces as comfortable as possible, but more an more we can control our personal environment as we travel, with the advent of performance fabrics. I’m not just talking GOR-TEX and the Colombia Omni Heat boot. I’m talking about Stanford’s reversible fabric innovation that can warm and cool. The inventor, Yi Cui, was slightly horrified at the green house implications of our American life style and posed the question: rather than changing a whole building, can we localize temperature control to a single person. He invented an answer. Not yet wearable, but when it gets there, we may be able to experience comfort everywhere we go, without so many negative externalizes. Right now, I’m wearing a hoodie because I’m freezing in my open office. But tomorrow, I will choose my Performance Hoodie (TM) to maximize value for my employer. It’s a win-win – my work will be better than if I micro dosed on LSD*, and office overhead costs will drop with lower energy bills. It will be the real deal.

*This reference is not an endorsement of taking illegal drugs. I mean, even Steve Jobs said you should, but I can’t endorse it.

April 11, 2018January 17, 2021

A word from our readers: the addendum edition

This week we’ve aggregated the musings and factoids of our readers from past posts.

America’s success is Japan’s ikigai

After reading our Index Card Summary of “So Good They Can’t Ignore You”, one reader likened the American Success (TM) model to the slightly more sophisticated Japanese idea of ikigai, which adds societal need into the equation of success.

So now before you quite your job to start your Yelp for people app, ask yourself the critical question – does the world need it?

Working people! Make some ambient noise!

On the topic of focus, we covered a music platform populated by music writing software that knows how to get you on the right wavelength: brain.fm. A reader shared that once you’ve picked the right music, it’s handy to choose the right volume – which happens to be 60 decibels for ambient noise. This is why coffee shops are an ideal work environment for creative people – like satirical bloggers!

We’re all Spider-Man deep down

In our re-branding of the solar system from ancient gods to modern ones, we heard a compelling argument that Earth should really be renamed Spider-Man, because Spider-Man is the Every-man that we all want to be and would be if we could…because deep down, we all want to be from Queens.

Cheers to our readers for the thoughtful feedback!

March 26, 2018January 17, 2021

The Freakonomics edition: can parking tickets be a good thing?

Parking tickets are almost a right of passage for drivers in New York. An estimated $440 million in revenue is collected by NYC annually via parking tickets. Put another way, that’s ~$50 per New Yorker. This raises a question about incentives: are New Yorkers incentivized to violate traffic laws by the City of New York? Do ticket recipients usually feel pangs of angst and injustice at the site of the orange envelopes, or are they more often calculating whether it’s the lesser of two evils?

Let’s look at the specific example of street parking. Is it, in fact, often cheaper to rack up parking tickets than to pay monthly parking garage fees?

Suppose you are choosing between free street parking and a parking garage. Let’s assume you live above 96th Street. Parking garages above 96th cost a minimum of $300 per month, plus tax.

Let’s suppose also that you only use your car on the weekends, and that it is easier to find street parking on the weekends, so you leave your car in its spot during the week. But during the week is when street cleaning is happening where you parked. That’s a $45 ticket for each Alternate Side Parking violation. Yet even if you do this week in and week out, you may still find that your pile of tickets adds up to less than a garage.

Below 96th St, at $65 per ticket, your violations would add up more quickly, and yet still may be less costly than many garages. As the image above depicts, the expensive park-front garages seem to be anchoring around $700 p.m.

It is entirely possible this dynamic is a total unintended consequence in the NYC system. And the Department of Transportation is certainly making strides to create a better user experience: they recently made it easier to dispute tickets with a user-friendly app! No need to see a judge to raise a dispute now. This could be especially helpful for out-of-town friends who get slapped with the other NYC traffic police trope – towing.

This article contains personal opinions and observations only. The above analysis is not legal advice or advice to break the law.

March 12, 2018January 17, 2021

The Slow Shipping Movement

Had it really only been five days? It had felt like aaages (and by ages, I mean at least a week), as I wondered where my special edition collectable bobble head set was. And then it dawned on me, this company must be part of the Slow Shipping Movement! After all, why do I need those bobble heads in two days? Slow Shippers know customers will appreciate items more once they arrive because of the delayed gratification.

Like the Slow Food Movement, Slow Shipping gets you to appreciate where your products are coming from, the “ingredients” of what are being shipped to you.

I wrote in my gratitude journal that evening, still awaiting my package, that I am grateful for all the hands that have touched this unique product, to deliver it to my shelf.

March 5, 2018January 17, 2021

Adventures in re-branding: Hotel execs get wrong what Airbnb gets right

Hotel execs must be reading my blog; I think they loved the re-branding of the solar system so much, that they’ve decided to keep doing what they are doing, but re-brand it as giving a “feeling of home comfort”. Now at hotels like The Standard, the concierge is labeled the “personal concierge”. You can have laundry access, just like a home – but limited to two items per day. Some tasty snacks will be ready in your room – all for the already rolled in $100 surcharge. And at a week or longer, you can get up to 40% off of your rooms (already a common practice among hotels).

These hotels marketing a homey experience are doing nothing different to what they’ve always done; the ingredients to their conception of a “home stay” are not so earth shattering as is their marketing. And this is also where they reveal a fundamental misunderstanding of their unique selling point.

What differentiates hotels from coach surfing and home sitting is the guarantee of comfort – a good night’s sleep in a clean room and a comfy bed, and your own personal space with no house rules to follow. What makes Airbnb competitive is the lower prices and good locations, more so than the home-made experience. So unless a hotel grows legs and moves to a more optimal location or slashes prices, fresh muffins in the morning ain’t gonna win those customers back.