6Evolving to the Personalized Phase
In retrospect, evolutionary changes in business and technology can seem preordained. For example, it may seem inevitable today that once humans invented the wheel, they would soon attach axles to the wheels, which they would then attach to carts powered by draft animals, which animals they would later replace with mechanical engines. (On the other hand, as comedian Jim Jefferies noted, nobody thought to put wheels on suitcases until 1971. Said Jefferies: “I remember my father being at the airport carrying two bags with another one under his armpit, like “There's no better way to do this!” We went to the airport in a [bleepin'] car. He saw wheels in motion. He was holding a wheel the whole [bleepin'] time. Couldn't piece it together.”1)
On paper, the evolution from horse‐powered chariots to EVs powered by lithium‐ion batteries looks like a neat and linear progression—one we “naturally” divide into different phases. But in real time, such evolutions are rarely so neat and tidy. To people who live through periods of disruptive technological change—from the invention of the wheel to the development of the internet, B2B cloud computing, and generative AI—“progress” doesn't always appear linear ...
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