This is the pendulum that divides successful at scale operator companies (most of the Fortune 500 brands) from iconic companies going through a leap (Apple under Jobs) Most of engineering, finance and some facets of business are focused on near-time KPIs and objective line items. They’ll work on cutting costs, improving response times, improving their NPS score. Things that in theory *should* make a business stronger, and even improve a customers experience. But they forget, the irrational nature of human subjective experience. The greatest growth stories, come out of a subjective, emotional identity, tied to the company. It often requires doing things that *do not* make sense on the near term KPIs. It’s why Job’s obsession with every detail worked. It’s why passionate founder driven startups can take off, but as the founder struggles to scale a post-chasm company, a seasoned CEO scales it up one more level only for it to lose its magic and plateau. 99% of the worlds curriculum on business, product, startups, and strategy revolves around the operator business. Very little captures the behavioral economics that create outlier brands. The writings (or speaking) that come to mind across that field: -Dan Ariely (Predictably Irrational) -Andy Bounds (Jelly Effect - only the first half of the book) -Seth Godin (Purple Cow - the rest of his work is meh) -Gladwell (Tipping Point - rest are meh) -Howard Moskowitz (examples on how changing food to be worse on some vectors increased sales) -Rory Sutherland (various talks on how behavioural marketing shifts are often non-intuitive) And that’s about it from the bigger mainstream names. AI will give a great example of this moment. As we automate and replace, people will crave more human experience and touchpoints. Many businesses will overshoot and have to correct because they lose that magic touch. But, many more new businesses will carve out an artisanal sector differentiator of “human touch” Just like the trend of promoting “hand made” post Industrial Revolution. To differentiate from another phone carrier or e-commerce store, in a few years, your brand may only need to be as simple as “need help? Shop with us. The place where real humans answer when you call!”