Mobile, Big Data and automation turn the world inside out

When people think of inside out they usually mean a perspective from the inside of something to the outside, as opposed to outside in — the view of a customer, business partner, or any third party. Inside out is considered the way of the past, as “outside in” has become a design mantra and a better way to do business.

The other meaning of inside out

But inside out has another meaning in 2014 — it means the insides of your company, your processes, your technology, your personal life, your weaknesses and your strengths are absolutely visible to the outside world, which for business means both customers and partners. While this is the smart way to wash your jeans…inside out means exposing the parts that aren’t normally visible and very often, weren’t designed to be exposed to everyone.

Supply chain model

High tech supply chains are already turned inside out. Companies like Apple, Cisco and others have built supply chain networks that turn what used to be company-to-company, B2B business, into something very different where responsibility lines and ownership are blurred.

For supply chains, inside out means there’s nowhere to hide and things need to work seamlessly.

Privacy and inside out

For privacy matters, inside out is how we feel when governments and companies can see the things we never meant to make visible. Europe is currently going through legal changes to keep the lives of its citizens from being unnecessarily exposed because of past challenges of privacy being turned inside out.

For people, inside out means there need to be strong protections in place and smart governance of personal data.

Monetize inside-out

Inside out can also be a very positive thing that can be used for financial gain. With the current breed of APIs, companies are able to monetize their own applications but also to take advantage of someone else’s. Monetizing APIs is an enormous consequence of companies being willing to turn inside out.

For companies, inside out means there are fantastic new ways to resell functionality and to very quickly and cheaply adopt technology that accelerates development and growth.

Whatever your place(s) in the world, as more and more turns inside out, the focus needs to be on excellent ways to manage information to better share, better communicate, and better protect. Inside out is a whole new game for most of us and needs to be thought through. There are technologies that need to be brought in and techniques to design and deploy that technology. What can’t be exposed may need to be replaced.

Inside out isn’t going away, and will in fact become more the case than ever before.

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Christopher Taylor