Sculley, an early IntraLinks backer and advisor, reminded the audience that the Internet was reinventing how work gets done, much like Ford had reinvented how work got done a century ago. In the Ford redo, work rules were hierarchical, information available only as and when needed. Corporations tried to control and drive customer desires. The situation is now the reverse, he said. Decisions are closer to customers, and they are more in charge.
Information is there in abundance, for anyone who cares to get it.
Companies that adopt the Internet standards in the workplace will thrive. Companies that do not will be left behind by the competition, just as the old Ford model zoomed by businesses which did not take advantage of the organized mass production features of that era s economy. Look at Sony, Sculley pointed out. Anyone can stamp out cameras these days. Sculley reminded his listeners that this kind of business transformation makes companies communications-centric, within and without a condition that the founders of IntraLinks recognized four years ago.