Hypecycle of Everything — The Daily PPILL #387

If you are involved with the Tech industry in any way, you are probably familiar with the “Technology Hypecycle”. It’s first cousin is the “adoption curve”, and it looks somewhat like this, with its very creative phase names:

SOURCE: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hype-Cycle-General.png

The hypecycle attempts to explain some of the dynamics of introducing a new technology. In the beginning, few people have heard about it, understand its benefits. Some people may not even trust it. Slowly, people start to warm to it.

Eventually, marketers and pundits oversell the benefits, reaching the “peak of inflated expectations”.

Then, when reality sets in, comes the “trough of disillusionment”, until things become more practical and we settle on the “plateau of productivity”.

For me, this model had resulted extremely useful, not only for its originally intended purpose, but to understand other dynamics.

In particular, partner relationships, excitement created by a new project, and a long list of etceteras.

When starting something, I keep this in the back of my mind, recognizing also that most phases sustain themselves, with the exception of the “through of disillusionment”. This is the most tricky phase, and if you can make it through it when it comes (and it will come!), you’ll succeed.

As published on The Channelmeister.com