Daily Inspiration: "You'll never find your opportunity in the depths of your despair!" - Futurist Jim Carroll
I'm down in Silicon Valley in California today, where I've got a last-minute film project with Intel and HP on what else - artificial intelligence! More to come on that project in the days to come.
But while walking around yesterday after our flight in, I was reminded of the 80s song that features the phrase "Always something there to remind me" - because it seems anywhere I go, there's always something there to remind me! That's certainly the case with the world's hi-tech hotspot here in the Valley because I've certainly done my share of keynotes and talks in these parts over the years.
One, in particular, is the genesis of today's quote. It involves the time when SAP and EDS - which is now part of HP - invited me down to the Valley in November 2008 to speak to a small, intimate group of CEOs and tech executives from the region. The dinner menu was sublime!
I think I had the lamb.
In any event, EDS (which is now fully part of HP), brought me in for this small, intimate dinner event to provide a reality check on the mindset that was then pervasive throughout the Valley as the recession took hold - despair and pessimism suddenly ruled the industry! You need to remember where we all found ourselves at that period - Lehman Brothers had collapsed, car companies were on the brink, banks were being bailed out as the great recession of 2008 unfolded.
In the tech sector, an immediate mindset unfolded that the downturn was going to bring a crashing halt to the success the industry had enjoyed since the dot.com collapse of 2000-2001. My mindset? I always beg to differ!
And that's the story I shared at this event...and I proved to be prescient, as the Valley entered into it's most prolonged period of growth after that small moment in time.
