Lisa Gansky has published a very important book for business owners: The Mesh: Why the Future of Business is Sharing. You can buy it here on Amazon, in either paper or electronic form.
She is offering all of us a new way of thinking about our businesses. Perhaps she is demanding that we look at them in this way, or reminding us that it is at our own peril if we don't look at them in this way.
She has the credentials to demand our attention. She is the founder and CEO of several internet companies, including GNN (the first web portal sold to AOL) and the largest consumer photo sharing and print service, Ofoto (sold to Eastman Kodak in 2001).
She posits that there are five major trends converging to push all of us towards Mesh businesses,- which is to say, businesses based on access (vs ownership), sharing and intimate, repeated customer interaction.
The trends are:
1. The economic crisis leads to distrust old companies.
2. The crisis is causing us to consider what's valuable.
3. Climate change is driving cost up.
4. Population growth and urbanization gives us the density which favors Mesh, and
5. Information and social networks are making it frictionless.
Lisa also provides a Mesh Directory of 100's of businesses beyond the ones we know, like Zipcar and Netflix.
This book is well worth reading. You will find yourself thinking of how you can use the Mesh to grow and enhance your business or perhaps start a new one.
Let us know what you think of the book.
