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A Non-Procurement History Lesson and Hypothetical Inquiry on Early Modern Germany vs Modern Day USA

A lot of my American friends are celebrating the efforts of the 47^th and his appointees. I’m not going to comment here on if it’s good or bad (because that depends on whether you are taking a short or long term view and whether you are a US citizen or not) and, ultimately, it’s their country and their choice whether they like it or not, but I am going remind them of a history lesson they should have received in grade school (but may not have, since many programs just cover 1939 to 1945):

A Brief History Lesson on Early Modern Germany:

* First came the eco-fascism, favoured and promoted by Nazis and Hitler in the 20s and 30s. (Medium)

* Then came the campaign against homosexuality (inc. queer, trans, etc.) that started when Hitler took power in 1933.

* Then the four-pronged policy of establishing Aryan as the master race and forcing out (and deporting) anyone they could.

* Then, after two years of violence, repression and other scare tactics against non-Aryans, we saw the Nuremberg Race Laws in 1935.

Also, starting in 1933:

* Hitler proclaims “A woman’s world is her husband, her family, her children, her house.”

* Joseph Goebbels explained “it is necessary to leave to men that which belongs to men” and the Nazi party ran zero female candidates, and Germany went from having 37 (of 577) female Members of Parliament to 0.

* School programs for girls were changed in an effort to discourage them from University studies.

* Then, less than three years later in 1936, we saw a law passed that:
– banned women from high level positions in the judicial system
– banned female doctors from practicing

* Then, in 1937, there was the decree stipulating that only men could be named to University posts!

Moreover, on March 23, 1933

The Enabling Act, whose full name was “Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Reich”, was passed that allowed the Reich government to issue laws without the consent of Germany’s Parliament, laying the foundation for the complete Nazification of German society. This was only 53 days after Hitler became Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933.

This is why you are seeing posts popping up everywhere that are saying Hitler dismantled democracy in only 53 days, because this act was the tool he needed to, piece by piece, override large parts of democracy during his tenure.

… and you know what happened next!

Now I’d like you to contrast that to what has recently been happening in:

Modern Day USA

* eco-fascism has been actively promoted for the past two decades (or so)

* the “T” has just been removed from “LGBT” (step one), no pronouns may be specified in government correspondence, and “only two genders” will be recognized (even though the wording of the executive order can effectively be interpreted to say you’re all female)

* not only has DEI been dismantled, but so have equal opportunity laws; furthermore, a Presidential appointee has stated that only “competent white men” can be in charge for “things to work”

* we have seen an increase in immigration raids and use of detention camps
(Out of curiosity, anyone remember where Anne Frank died?)

* women’s reproductive rights are being taken away in many states

Now, I want to ask you:

If the parallel continues, what do you think comes next?

Again, it’s your country and your choice, and as a strong believer in democracy, as long as you understand you’re not getting Canada, as a true Canadian, I will still happily be your neighbour and happily work with you if you want to maintain a strong CUSMA, because North America needs to stand united when you consider what is happening in certain parts of the world today! (And what makes Canada great is we celebrate diversity and differences and believe in working together regardless of what that diversity or differences are. We might feel sorry for you, but, as good neighbours, we will work with you. Though you may have to wait until our leaders get their tantrums out of their system, eh?)

Finally, I want to make sure a few of you are aware that these (and similar) resources are at your disposal, just in case you need them soon:

Why are Big X training so many “consultants” on AI?

Especially Gen-AI? For the longest time, the doctor couldn’t understand why so many Big X consultancies were training so many “consultants” on AI, especially Gen-AI. Most of their junior “consultants” can’t even use advanced functionality in today’s analytics applications (as you need advanced degrees in mathematics, computer science, data science, and/or Operations Research to do so) or deliver significant value on traditional analytics and advisory projects relative to the price they charge (unless they are being led by a more senior person with the analytics knowledge and real-world experience). (Read our previous articles and comments on where this talent ends up [which is typically not a Big X] and where these Big X firms offer unparalleled value [and where you should be using Big X].)

But it was recently all made clear to me. These consultants, who struggle with basic projects (as reflected in the high tech failure rates they are regularly a part of as the typical first choice for a third party implementation team when the vendor does not provide them adequate training and support on the platform they are implementing), are barely up to doing the work (as they are usually straight out of school with no real world experience or deep knowledge of anything not taught in a textbook MBA program), and definitely not up to doing strategic engagements out of the gate!

However, with companies wanting to rapidly digitize across the board (which they need to, but, not all digitization requirements should have equal priority), they need strategic advice and direction, and these firms just don’t have enough senior consultants to handle all the engagements and, most importantly, do the work required to put those book-sized briefs and presentations together.

But the one thing Gen-AI can do is take in millions of pages of strategic plans and presentations, take in instructions of what is desired, then generate pages of text from bits and pieces of these historical plans and presentations for each instruction, amalgamate them all together, and produce a detailed report and presentation that they can present to the client. And do this in a few hours under the guidance of a junior analyst with a (Gen-) AI playbook! Then all the senior person has to do is a quick tweak and review!

We’re not joking! The crazy thing is, with so much free material on the internet, with a little bit of elbow grease, and some very creative prompt engineering, you can do this yourself. And someone on LinkedIn already showed you how — giving you this information for FREE in this LinkedIn article. (And should that article disappear, here’s a link to the author’s article on his site.)

So now you know. It’s not about getting you better results (which may or may not happen, every project is different), it’s to give them the ability to take on more projects that they wouldn’t otherwise have the manpower to do.

And if you really want good results, note that you can always hire a real strategic senior consultant from a specialist niche consultancy who often won’t be on multiple projects at the same time, and who can give the insights you need without wasting trees printing out book sized presentations for you. After al, relative to the value the right consultant will bring, Consultants are Cheap and, in our space, the key to Affordable RFPs!

Yes Jon, “We’re Always Right, No Questions Please” is the new Big X and Big Analyst Firm Mantra

Note the Sourcing Innovation Editorial Disclaimers and note this is a very opinionated rant! Your mileage will vary! (And not really about any firm in particular, although only a few firms have removed our questions and discussion points, and directly aimed at marketing/public relations, as we’re not sure the analysts or consultants behind the firms, research, or opinions would shy from an open, honest, fact-focused debate.)

This originally appeared on LinkedIn. Archiving it here for posterity (and accessibility).

Dear Jon THE REVELATOR, we need to answer your comment handling inquiry in Censorship in the Procurement World with a quadrant, because they (the Big X and Big Analyst Firms) won’t understand the discussion otherwise.

	Personal	Not Personal
No Claim	1. Delete	2. Ignore
Valid Claim	3. Insult, Respond	4. Debate

1. If the response has no claim and is personal, such as “You’re an @ssh0l3 and a gr!nch!“, you can delete. Flame wars are for Facebook and X, not business networking platforms.

2. If the response has no claim and is not personal, such as “Hey, I like the colour blue too!“, then you just ignore it, even if you feel it is totally irrelevant. Maybe it’ll distract from the core message or core conversation in the presence of a weaker mind, but take the high road, even if you are preying on that weaker mind as your next sucker, err, client.

3. If the response has a claim, but also has an insult, respond appropriately. e.g. if you get something like, “You’re dumber than a doorknob for not believing in our messiah, Gen-AI, because early results haven’t disproven that intelligence won’t emerge someday if we just give it more cores and more data.”, then it’s okay to respond with something like “Dear disillusioned cultist, if you look at the underlying science, i.e. the math and algorithms, you’ll see that it fundamentally doesn’t even support the capabilities being claimed now and cannot support support the emergent intelligence you so claim. P.S. Please don’t drink the punch at the X-mas party, your employer is almost bankrupt and since it doesn’t want to fold, it has to cut it’s biggest costs somehow …”

4. If the response is just a claim to the contrary with a reasonable argument, such as “your methodology is no better than anyone else’s, and may in fact be worse, as success rates as a whole have not improved and, in fact, for technologies in your hype cycle, have actually gotten worse so you shouldn’t be claiming to be able to provide visionary leadership to tech leaders“, then it’s a perfectly valid comment and question, should not be deleted, and the poster should respond with whatever evidence they have to back up their bold claims. (And if they are just two wild and crazy guys who are all in all just inept strangers in a strange land, so be it! The truth must come out!)

Basically, what we’ve done with your leadership is to just expose the truth about these Big X and Big Analyst marketing and public relation cults, who seem to all subscribe to the “𝐖𝐞’𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐥𝐰𝐚𝐲𝐬 𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭, 𝐧𝐨 𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞” mantra, as I’ve had multiple comments deleted by all of them too!

It’s sad, because there are a lot of situations when you should use a Big X for big value, and even though I regularly disagree with the methods and opinions of many of the Big Analysts firms on a regular basis, that doesn’t stop me from calling out everything they publish that is good (and sometimes even thanking them for it publicly) or from calling out their senior analysts who are doing a fantastic job.

(And the comments I made, in my view, were quite humble compared to the ranting I do in opinion pieces on this blog. As per the about and disclaimers, I target generalities and classes, not specific vendors, solutions, or people. So when I’m discussing particular vendors, solutions, or people, especially in opinion pieces, I try to be as balanced and fair as possible. And, as per the disclaimers, if factual information is presented to me that I’m not being such, corrections will be made.)