Overchoice, Automation and Service Futures

Overchoice is a concept that Alvin Toffler used in his book Future Shock to describe the problem of having too many choices – a common problem faced in the postindustrial world.

Attention is one of the scarcest resources available in business today. The plethora of choices is one element that dilutes our attention and ability to quickly resolve problems. Addressing thisscarcity of focus is one of the greatest opportunities for innovation today. Forward thinking organization can apply the technological abundance available to tackle overchoice as part of a strategiceffort to generate value and increase flexibility.

Some of my earliest blog posts back in 2005 dealt with the attention deficit and how to address it — yet this remains a real challenge. Granted there can be unintended consequence on the path to automation, but there is no doubt that part of the future of services is enabling an organization to perform more agile decision-making: addressing issues like consistency, latency…

The concept of overchoice happens throughout our lives – just look at the number of entertainment sources available today. The concept of TV channels starts to feel quaint. We are definitely starting to tackle overchoice in our personal lives (what to watch {and where to get it}, what to eat). That same level of ingenuity will be applied to businesses, as well.