From this article about a recent panel of technologists who spoke about overhyped and underhyped technological advances in the present to near-future:

“Kinghorn also hailed unglamorous albeit useful advances. The ability to define and encapsulate best practices in a repeatable way to improve business processes will be big, he suggested. These efforts, he said, will bring real dollars to a company’s bottom line.”

This is hardly a technological advance in the sense of gadgets. It’s more an understanding of what makes systems work. Reproducibility, scalability, stability, consistency. These are all factors that contribute to making a working system with competitive advantage. Two great empires spring to mind, the Roman Empire of the Mediterranean, and the Inca Empire of South America. The principle contributions of both were standardized systems that enabled reproducible behaviour. Henry Ford’s assembly line was another more technologically-oriented example.

Doing things in a way that is reproducible adds value to the organization in a way that individual success does not. On the other side of the coin, it also contributes to individual success. As Zig Ziglar says: “The way to get whatever you want in life is to help enough people to get what they want”, a principle also demonstrated by the Godfather.

It’s also the basis of the old saying: “Give a man some corn and feed him for a day, teach him how to grow corn, and feed him for life”.

Building roads is a good example. Both the Roman and Inca civilizations were built on a network of roads that interconnected the nodes of the empire. If we work at building roads as we go forward then our own individual forward progress may be slower, but others will more easily follow us. The overall effect will be greater.

Of course “trail blazers” also have value in scouting out possible directions and providing inspiration, proof of the possible, and a challenge to comfortable inertia.