TSOS The Invisible Hand FINAL

As I crouched in the snow, the “invisible hand” changed my life: I could’ve walked back to the house and brushed it off — but instead something said pack and go back home.

The Invisible Hand is a term used most often to describe how free markets work — unrelated individuals working towards a common outcome…but I’ll refer to it is a chance to CHANGE an outcome…

• It’s not an aHa moment o r epiphany: where you have facts swirling around and at a moment in time it all coalesces and you have the answer: “Leora” –answer to the question: In Sinclair Lewis’ novel Arrowsmith, who was Martin Arrowsmith’s wife?
• It’s not Opportunity Knocking: Hello, here is a job or money or whatever that has appeared: take it you fool.

It’s a fleeting, faint whisper that gives you pause: hmmmm. It may often be lost in the moment, but if you detect it, it can be a major change for the better..

I gave one example that sent me back on course to finish college; there have been others:

• I started work at McDonalds and late one Friday evening I was about to leave when an admin rushed into the mailroom and she needed to get a package to an exec – the CIO. We normally weren’t around at this time of day and it could’ve waited: but for some reason I delivered it — a few weeks later I was asked to join an experimental real time computing project. This changed my professional career for ever.
• My tech rep and I were at a division of DuPont — first meeting on a workflow product that used email to manage forms: such as expense, purchase orders etc. As we asked a few questions, we realized not only did they not have email (this was circa 1994) but they also did not have computers. My tech rep stood up and was headed for the door
  https://youtu.be/B-hGmXii0XA
  …but the invisible hand had me pause — and I asked, “Why not?” — and he described the ROI — he needed more than hardware – he needed something to help the business — a killer app — that led to a discussion of how we could speed up processing of all their forms, eliminate paper costs, warehousing and improve service. And with the network justified (or almost all) he could add other apps like email, word processing.
  it ended up a quarter of a million dollar deal — and we helped them innovate. No…indeed.
• A personal one: I was about to start law school when my housemate informed me that he was moving downtown. Ugh, I’d have to move again and quickly. Then, the invisible hand intervened: “Paul, you should buy the house” he said. Hmmm, I paused… and realized that that was what I needed to do. it was the best investment I ever made.
• One more: we had done all the work at AMOCO — large Chicago based oil company (now BP). our solution was a good fit, we had a good working relationship and internal sponsors … but no deal. As I sat in the waiting area of the executive floor I pondered my upcoming meeting with the Chief Administrative Officer. What to do? then one of the admins, whispered — “you want to get approval you should be talking to us”. Yeah, right — but I paused, took a breath, and asked “Why?”. she said the execs never turned on their monitors so never used PROFS (IBM’s clunky email system) — the admins printed out the emails. so, I was barking up the wrong tree… I cancelled my meeting, and basically did an ad hoc lunch & learn for the exec admin team — and later that week all 6 admins told their bosses that they should do the deal. I got the order, an invite to the Christmas party, and a knowing wink from them. it was a half million dollar deal, my first enterprise license — Cost of Goods: a 3.5 floppy for about $2.50.