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•132 The 100 Greatest Business Ideas of All Time

I have picked three applications of the Internet. One illustrates the real benefits that
the Internet can offer companies in terms of building learning organisations – Avoid the
epitaph – ‘They didn’t follow through’ Idea 73; one that is becoming an important part of
retail life and getting towards profitability – Never mind high tech, there’s still money in
books Idea 74; and one that illustrates the point that new technology requires us to think
outside the square and look for ideas that are triggered from seemingly irrelevant events
– An Internet company built on a sweetie dispenser – what am I bid? Idea 75.

Finally, lest we believe that we are cleverer than our forebears I have added the
South Sea Bubble of the early 1700s to illustrate our current and continuing inabil-
ity to learn from experience.

Idea 73 – Avoid the epitaph – ‘They didn’t follow through’

If you talk to consultants and trainers who work with large, medium and small
companies, and get them to talk honestly about the impact their introduction of
new business processes has had on their clients, they will talk in terms of the epitaph
that forms the title of this idea – ‘They simply did not follow through’. However
enthusiastically people leaving training courses are determined to implement the
ideas they have received, and no matter how sure management is that the consult-
ant’s report shows them the way ahead, the fact is that back at the ranch nothing has
changed from the pressures that made all parties act in the way they were doing
before. They leave off implementing the new idea while they get back onto an even
keel and eventually they have forgotten so much about what they are supposed to do
that the organisation becomes guilty of paying for some good ideas but never follow-
ing through. If you don’t believe me ask yourself how often you and your colleagues
have taken training course manuals off the shelf they were put on when you got back
to the office or workplace. Mostly they just gather dust.

A company called SofTools has developed a support platform that uses the
Internet to help with this problem. Using the platform, trainers, for example, can
convert their processes into electronic tools that sit within the platform. After the