I recently read Prof. Shoshana Zuboff’s article “Creating value in the age of distributed capitalism” in the McKinsey quarterly, which is subtitled “As mass consumption gives way to the wants of individuals, a historic transition in capitalism is unfolding.” Honestly, a large part of the article is so abstract and academic that it doesn’t mean a whole lot to most practicians, but some of the points are great and I wanted to summarize them here, since what she’s talking about (without ever mentioning the words) is: Mass Customization!
The time is ripe for mass customization to be the next T Model
Prof. Zuboff essentially compares our situation in capitalism right now with the shift created by Henry Ford’s T-Model - a view with which I’d like to agree. I quote: “Sharp increases in higher education, standards of living, social complexity, and longevity over the past century gave rise to a new desire for individual self-determination […]”, and she argues that this creates demands that a new class of competitors will fill - “creating individualized ways to consume goods and services at radically reduced costs”, which I’d like to translate to “offer customized goods and services at prices similar to mass produced goods and services = mass customization”.
We might not realize yet how big this shift is, but there are signs
These “shifts” in capitalism are at first subtle, she says: “At first, the Model T was simply regarded as the affordable car that finally made Ford Motor Company profitable.” Yet it brought something that was previously only accessible to the elite - a car- to the masses. Now, she argues, we’re turning from mass to individual. Another shift she mentions is the Apple iPod, which dramatically changed how music distribution changed and music consumption became more personalized. I would have rather seen social media as an example - in my eyes a major change of how information is distributed and consumed in a personalized way, but the point is the same - we’re in the middle of a big change towards personalization and “individualization”. Although I made a conscious choice not to go work for McKinsey after Business School, it’s great to see them agree.
