Sixty Trends in Sixty Minutes

Rating:
Summary: Compendium of Trends w/o Forecasting or Identification Tools
Review: Sam Hill's Sixty Trends in Sixty Minutes is a panoply of facts and figures related to societal, technological, and business trends. While insightful and quite interesting to read, it guides the reader little on identifying trends and tying together all of the data presented. The author suggests the latter is left for the reader to synthesize. Yet, it is not clear how the reader could apply the large amount of data to any specific objective.

The author does have an "opportunity" section after each trend, which lists voids that can be addressed by new products and services within that particular field. Although, for any one trend example, a subject matter expert in that industry should already have identified the trend and related causes. A skilled product manager may be able to identify a new audience for an existing product using the examples. Likewise, as an investor or someone considering a career switch, you might find some interesting material by which you can base your decision.

As someone obsessed with statistical data and a voracious consumer of business periodicals, I found that most of the material was interesting but not entirely new. In fact, it feels like a collection of Wall Journal Articles with opinions and supplementary explanations. If you haven't had the time to keep up with the WSJ, Forbes, and Business Week, Sixty Trends in Sixty Minutes will fill in your knowledge gap. However, if you are looking for specific tools to forecast trends within your industry, you might want to read other works, such as Malcolm Gladwell's Tipping Point.

Rating:
Summary: A good first step to what's coming next
Review: This book looks at sixty trends the author sees as being one of the next big things. Hill doesn't go for the bigger "mega-trends" but takes those and picks out smaller more manageable, personal trends. Some of these in no particular order are: interconnectedness, Peter Pan-ism and mercenary management. For each trend he gives the factors and factoids, implications and the opportunity. This gives you what he thinks are what the facts are, what it means and how you can use it. This gives the book a usefulness that is good. The problem I have is that I see some of the trends as not that useful or groundbreaking. Some of them also have a duh factor. As in duh tell me something I don't know. I suppose with 60 trends this is inevitable and it does give the book a something for everybody quality. Overall I give the book a B-. A useful first step if you want to see what might be coming next but I wouldn't bet the farm on anything in this book by itself.

Rating:
Summary: A good first step to what's coming next
Review: This book looks at sixty trends the author sees as being one of the next big things. Hill doesn't go for the bigger "mega-trends" but takes those and picks out smaller more manageable, personal trends. Some of these in no particular order are: interconnectedness, Peter Pan-ism and mercenary management. For each trend he gives the factors and factoids, implications and the opportunity. This gives you what he thinks are what the facts are, what it means and how you can use it. This gives the book a usefulness that is good. The problem I have is that I see some of the trends as not that useful or groundbreaking. Some of them also have a duh factor. As in duh tell me something I don't know. I suppose with 60 trends this is inevitable and it does give the book a something for everybody quality. Overall I give the book a B-. A useful first step if you want to see what might be coming next but I wouldn't bet the farm on anything in this book by itself.

Rating:
Summary: More than enough content
Review: Worth 5 stars for two reasons:

1) Something for everyone, and probably something different with each reading, or section. I agree with another reviewer that it can read like the contents of many WSJ articles - but that is the point. The premise is delivering a highly subjective list of trends that have business potential/ impact. There's enough content here for a slew of articles, books and business plans. And I'm surprised that he wrote the book first!

2) Refreshingly honest. In contrast to so many business books, this is basically a personal journal of discovery.

So many books read like the product of a team of consultants and editors trying to support a marginal concept or framework . This reads more like the transcript of a long dinner conversation (and perhaps a bottle of wine or two). Can you imagine Porter, Hamel, Peters, et al suggesting that their books would make a good bathroom read? Or identifying businesses and individuals that are heading for failure? I didn't always agree with his opinions, but must congratulate him for not holding back on any topic.

Full disclosure: I bought the book because I remember working with Sam (many) years ago in a consulting project. Perhaps that's another reason I enjoyed it, like a conversation with him many years later - and clearly he's had a world of experiences since then.

I think a valid criticism of the book is that at times it seems he is (like the old Steven Wright joke) "trying to draw a map of the world - to scale." But he does seem to have succeeded in sketching out some major landmarks. Give the book 60 or even 120 minutes. Worth the effort.