Digital Musings

Marchés financiers, globalisation et croissance

Les marchés financiers ont souvent mauvaise presse. C'est bien dommage et souvent infondé. Au risque de paraître paradoxal, on peut dire que nous ne souffrons pas d'une hypertrophie de marchés financiers. Bien au contraire! L'économie mondiale pâtit d'un nombre insuffisant de marchés financiers, insuffisance qui nuit à la croissance économique.

Croissance et richesse sont les deux versions du même Saint Graal. Ce Graal économique est aussi difficile à cerner que celui de la Geste Arthurienne. Sa quête a mobilisé les talents d’économistes, d’historiens, de sociologues, d’anthropologues. Pourtant, la brûlante question posée par David S. Landes : «Pourquoi sommes-nous si riches et pourquoi sont-ils si pauvres?» reste sans réponse convaincante. Les inégalités de richesse sur la planète restent criantes. L’économiste Péruvien Hernando De Soto a récemment suggéré que le vrai problème n’était pas l’absence de capital dans les pays pauvres mais bien plutôt l’absence de droits de propriété sur ce capital dûment définis et applicables. Dans les pays pauvres, le capital, quel qu’il soit, est mort et le reste.

Dans cet article, nous proposons une explication complémentaire à celle de De Soto : la fracture du partage des risques («the risk-sharing divide»). Le destin de trop nombreuses populations, de trop nombreuses entreprises, de trop nombreux pays demeure dicté par un immense jeu de hasard, particulièrement dans les pays défavorisés qui ont souvent la particularité d’être sous-diversifiés. Ce jeu de dupes est perpétué, entretenu par les louvoiements de nombreuses élites gouvernantes, tant dans les pays développés que sous-développés, qui privent trop souvent les individus, les collectivités, les entreprises des libertés financières les plus élémentaires. Ceci engendre des inégalités injustifiables et inacceptables. Ces inégalités empêchent les individus d’accumuler du capital. Ils en sont contraints à «vivre au jour le jour»

Contrairement à ce que l’on entend trop souvent aujourd’hui, priorité doit être donnée à la libération des forces financières. De nouveaux modes de partage des risques doivent être promus. Dans l’acception habituelle, les marchés financiers garantissent l’ouverture (« Openness »). L’ouverture ne suffit pas. Nous avons besoin de ce que nous appelons dans cet article «d’excentricité responsable». En d’autre s termes, il est impératif que les talents (initiative individuelle, entrepreneuriale) puissent se marier au capital sous ses formes les plus créatives (fonds propres, dettes, titres hybrides, dérivés, titrisation etc…) et que chacun des deux éléments de ce mariage soient tenus de rendre des comptes – privés et publics (justice, police etc.. ) à l’autre partie à tout moment.

Voici les liens vers la version française Haiti.doc et la version anglaise Haiti2.doc de l'article mentionné ci-dessus.

Les vues exprimées dans cet article sont similaires à celles développées par Frédéric S. Mishkin dans son dernier ouvrage "The Next Great Globalization: How Disadvantaged Nations Can Harness Their Financial Systems to Get Rich."

A new breed of future managers: Video Gamers!

Most parents worry about their kids spending far too many hours playing video games. Teachers complain that this game time is taken at this expense of proper studying. Medical doctors argue that this video game addiction may not be good to kids' health.

So, is that true the video gamer generation is doomed? Well, according to John C. Beck and Mitchell Wade, co-authors of Got Game: How the Gamer Generation Is Reshaping Business Forever (HBS Press 2004), the issue deserves more careful consideration. They depict a situation which is far more balanced and promissing than what conventional wisdom would suggest. Video gamers are not loners, they are team players. Video gamers are creative, they permanently look for innovative shortcuts. Video gamers are familiar with new technologies, they use them intensively. Video gamers are not afraid to talk to people they don't know, cold calls are not an issue for them. They share knowledge. Video gamers know that heavy hierarchies are not conducive to problem solving, quite the opposite. Video gamers know the power of networks, they use them to overcome difficulties. Video gamers are not lazy. They are resilient, hard-working provided the environment (the game) is fun and challenging. Video gamers do know what failing means even if you can argue they only know about virtual failures. None the less, they feel the pain and know how to rebound.

Again, as usual, Cassandras tend to talk too fast. Not to say that all is rosy, with no negative points whatsoever. But, overall, I tend to agree with Beck and Wade that the punchline is rather positive (my son and my daughter do surprise me everyday!) and firms won't be and act the same with this new breed of video gamers-managers.

By the way, the book title could have been: Got Game, Got Blog: How the Gamer/Blogger Generation is Reshaping Business Forever. Maybe for the next edition!

An interesting interview of the two co-authors is here.

To give you a first flavour of the book content, I extracted two questions/answers from an HBS Working Knowledge interview of the two co-authors:

"Q: How have video games changed the way this generation views the business world?

A: Gamers approach the business world a bit more like a game. They see the different companies—and maybe the people they work with—as "players." They're way more competitive and are very passionate about "winning." They are both more optimistic and more determined about solving any kind of problem you can imagine; they think there's always going to be some combination of moves that will result in success. That drives them to be incredibly creative. They're a bit suspicious of company leaders: The game world is not big on following hierarchy. Plus, they are very confident. Like entrepreneurs, they would rather rely on their own abilities to succeed or fail. They're also more comfortable with risks, but aren't reckless.

Q: What's the danger for boomer managers who don't understand the gamer generation?

A: Boomer managers are leaving a LOT of value on the table, value that their competitors may not have seen yet, either. Gamers aren't just OK; they have some strengths that weren't standard in our generation. They can be almost maniacally dedicated and productive; for them, solving the problem can be a pleasant obsession like games were.

And as they come to dominate the workforce, anyone who doesn't understand them will become increasingly isolated. Imagine Ward Cleaver trying to manage in today's boomer-centric world. We're moving towards a more gamer-centered universe, both from a marketing and a management perspective. Boomers who don't understand the transition will run the risk of being left behind, unable to adapt. They'll either be trying to sell to people using completely wrong language, or they'll be trying to train using boring old methods like in classrooms and lectures. Either way, if they fail to adapt, they're going to waste a lot of the shareholders' money sticking to methods that don't work anymore. "

If you'd like to read more but don't know whether you are willing to buy the book or not, here is a Download preview.pdf

If you are convinced this book is a good/must read, the purchase link is here (I should think getting some commissions from the Harvard guys!).

More on kids, video games and gamers in Cyberlibris:

BRANDchild: Insights Into the Minds of Today's Global Kids, Martin Lindstrom, Kogan Page, 2003

Generations at Work: Managing the Clash of Veterans, Boomers, Xers, Nexters in your Workplace, Ron Zemke et alii, AMACOM, 1999

Differentiate or Die: Survival in our Era of Killer Competition, Jack Trout and Steve Rivkin, John Wiley & Sons, 2000

Future Marketing: Targeting Seniors, Boomers and Generations X and Y, Joe Marconi, McGraw-Hill, 2000

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