Translator: Donatella Gagliano Reviewer: Denise RQ
Hello.
I'm here to share with you
two really important things that I've learnt so far
in how to change the game before it changes you.
One of them is a way of being,
the other is just such a simple tool that I learnt.
The way of being is this - Sorry, mother -
"Illegitimi non carborundum";
in essence, this means to be courageous.
It means to have tenacity, it means to have a huge amount of resilience.
It's the thousand things that go wrong before the one that goes right.
I've been really lucky to bring this philosophy, this way of existing
to a thing that I really love:
I work in sports technology.
The way that I exist in sports technology is to look at the human being as a species
where there are two things that really differentiate us from all other species:
it's making fire, and it's clothing ourselves.
I work in the clothing ourselves bit, so job security is pretty damn good.
And in working at this interface, between the human and clothing technology
I have seen some really amazing things happen.
I've seen that technology can be the difference
between first and second place.
I've seen that with technology,
human potential can get to the highest possible levels,
and human performance can do things that we never realized would be possible.
It's been really a pleasure to work with athletes all over the world
to change the shapes of their bodies
as they move more effortlessly through the water
to make them feel lighter, tighter, brighter.
I've been lucky enough to have products on the backs of athletes
of some of the most competitive leagues on the planet;
world championships, Olympics, world records have been broken,
gold medals have been won.
So I've seen what technology can do.
I've also seen what technology can do to a family
I grew up in a world where obviously my father was my hero.
And I've seen that with technology
growing and changing at the rate that it does,
resistance can be futile.
So my father, who was my hero,
an endurance athlete, a triathlon pioneer,
[was also] one of the last human versions of Photoshop.
He worked in a laboratory where they'd use chemicals, photographic techniques,
a scalpel to sculpture a model's thigh to create the images that you would see
in printed press for the advertising industry.
The digital revolution took hold, I hadn't even send my first email by then.
This industry evaporated overnight, and I realized in that moment
that there are three people or three kinds of people in the world.
There are people that when things like that happen, they perish.
There are people when things like that happen,
they pivot and adapt just like my parents did.
And then there are the people that create those shifts in the world.
I made a declaration, right then and there
- as a petulant 15 year old -
that I would create shifts in the world.
That's what I've been doing ever since living under these words.
Yet, a really interesting thing started to happen.
Because every now and again,
those marginal gains you were so convinced that you're going to achieve
didn't get the results you would expect.
The athlete wouldn't win.
Something else was happening, it's human will.
You all heard of the old adage of "where there's a will, there's a way".
Well, absolutely.
But breaking habits, encouraging people to smash their paradigms
is the most challenging
because also, where there is a will, there is no way.
I've seen many raised eyebrows, "Are you sure?", "I don't think so,"
"How much?"
You realize that being in somewhat of a technical arms race
is no way you see success.
Similarly, in a business environment,
where, after five years and millions of dollars
you have this wonderful, beautiful technology
that you know it could change the world;
you walk gingerly to the edge of the commercial part of the company
where there is that imaginary wall.
You throw it over the wall, listen for the cheers,
now, you'll hear people running away like you just dropped the proverbial bomb.
So again, something else has to happen, and I figured you can get away with it.
I'm British so I can be charming.
(Laughter)
You could be diplomatic as a competitor within,
but something still needed to be done.
You can't just be a good storyteller,
you have to have stories that really mean something.
And that brought me to the tool, such a simple tool.
I discovered this several years ago.
It is Roberto Verganti's tool for technical epiphany.
For me, it represents the beautiful relationship
between fashion and function.
I realized I spent most of my existence in technology,
in the technical arms race trying to be better and better
and realizing I was also being critical
of other technologies that were just better.
I look at a lot of wearable technology that fills our drawers and desks.
The world is not defined by steps and calories
just like the scales in our bathroom don't make us thin.
Neither today.
It's about something else.
Then meaning: there is some incredible, inspirational products in this space
where true artistic expression has created those changes.
Products like the stiletto; I still don't understand the stiletto.
(Laughter)
A rational engineer would never build the stiletto, yet it exists.
This is where, if you get this wrong,
because you can see them going in two completely different directions
you lose authenticity.
You can become responsible
for selling rainbows where there's perhaps not a pot of gold.
So where are you in?
Top right: technical epiphanies
where technology enables a new meaning in the world.
Because with new meanings, you create new perspectives,
and people start to perceive the world differently.
When you perceive the world differently, because perception is reality,
what you feel is what you believe,
the behavior starts to change, the movement starts to shift.
There are some really wonderful examples that are set up here,
some of you, I'm sure, you're very familiar with.
There was a race for some time up and down this vertical axis
between Sony, Microsoft, Xbox, and PlayStation,
graphic processors, processor speed,
volume size, Blu-ray, Wi-Fi;
a technical arms race, and it's always ending stalemate.
Then Nintendo come along.
They find motion sensing, a technology.
They look at gaming and realize
that people don't just want to have mega-thumbs,
they want a physically immersive experience.
So they bring these two things together -- a technical epiphany.
Apple do that all the time with desktop computing, smartphones,
tablets, shifts in the world that create behavior change.
Knowing this and doing this are two very different things;
that's why I come back to this: 'Illegitimi non carborundum.'
the way of being,
which by the way, the literal translation is,
"Don't let the bastards grind you down."
(Laughter)
Because the world of technology will continue to develop
at an exponential rate.
The world will evolve, it's nature's way.
We mutate, we populate, we move on.
The game is always going to change, so you have a choice.
Be the change, enable shifts, and don't let the bastards grind you down.
Thank you.
(Applause)