So What Was The Best Thing At CES?

A new year. A new decade. A new CES?

After attending the tech confab advising many Fortune 500 companies for over a decade, this year I attended CES on behalf of just one company: Encantos.

Like most attendees, I wanted to see the latest and greatest in technology and consumer electronics. There was the usual stuff - bigger and better TVs, smarter cars and appliances, and glowing gadgets galore. However, while visible hardware was displayed prominently, it was the invisible software that was the real focus. Artificial Intelligence (AI) was omnipresent. So was 5G (or at least lots of talk about it). The Internet of Things (IoT) was a big thing, too. It’s true that these were all intangible technologies that are hard to visualize and even harder to productize. And yes, CES continues to be an incredible hype show where the perennial cynics will ask “so what else is new?”

As for me, I’m just giddy.

I came away from this year’s CES feeling more excited, energized and driven than I have ever been.

I truly believe 2020 will mark the start of the next great innovation cycle. Just like when the first Apple iPhone came out in 2007, I believe the launch of Apple’s first 5G iPhone in the Fall of 2020 will be a similar milestone. No one could have imagined AirBNB, Uber and the plethora of companies, products, services and business models that were enabled by the combination of a supercomputer-as-mobile device, always-on cloud technology and high-speed connectivity that have emerged over the decade since the first iPhone. With 5G’s dual-impact of enabling low latency with high speeds (such as the ability to download a 4K video in seconds), combined with IoT connecting everything and all that data feeding AI to make everything smarter, just imagine how these technologies will impact the way we live, connect, engage, learn and grow! As futurist Roy Amara noted, “We tend to overestimate the effect of technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.” 

As the 21st century will be defined by AI and intelligent machines, I believe we are now at the dawn of the direct-to-consumer (DTC) age. I see DTC and the direct movement as more than just a catchphrase or business model. I see it as a way to describe the power of personalization. It’s more than just cutting out the middleman and delivering something to the consumer directly. It’s about putting the consumer at the center of the universe...at the center of all decision-making. It’s about moving from mass markets to markets of one. It’s about the consumer defining how, where, when and on what they spend their time and money. And most importantly, with who.  

This will be the golden age of personalization and it will impact every company, every industry and every customer experience. Who the consumer will give his/her attention to will make or break companies. Who you are as a brand now matters more than ever. What’s your purpose? What do you believe in? What do you stand for? There is no room for being neutral or average. 

This is not a fad.  One of the most important themes across every category at this year’s CES was personalization.  In fact, I think personalization may be the coolest thing I saw at CES. From avatars, AI assistants and robots to appliances, make-up and medicine, personalization was everywhere. Sure, we’ve seen some hype around early DTC companies and its applications. And yes, privacy will continue to be of paramount concern. Yet, companies both big and small are experimenting and embracing how best to personalize their products and services. Companies such as Disney, Nike, P&G and Walmart are re-focusing and restructuring their whole business around going direct-to-consumer. 

So where do I see the biggest potential for personalization? Without a doubt, it’s in education.

It’s crazy to think that we have developed such powerful applications that leverage personalization from targeted advertising to e-commerce, but we have yet to truly see its impact on education. This is unfortunate, since education is arguably where we need personalization the most! We are not preparing our children to be successful tomorrow in the future we are creating today. 

There is a diversity of intelligence and children learn in so many different ways. What if we could find the best, most personalized way for kids to learn? What if we could use technology to identify the many different ways kids learn. What if the way your child learns wasn’t really a “disability”, but they just learned in a different way? And if it was indeed a disability, what if technology could help identify it early and find the best ways to help that child learn?

What about parents and teachers? What if personalization could help teachers get to know their students better - their natural strengths and aptitudes. What if parents could identify the right habits to reinforce learning, the right skills to go deeper into. What if you could see where kids are most engaged, least engaged and make better teaching decisions and play recommendations? Personalization is the key to making education relevant in the 21st century.

As world-renowned educator Sir Ken Robinson, Ph.D. (who gave the most watched TED talk of all time “Do Schools Kill Creativity?”) outlines in his book “Creative Schools: The Grassroots Revolution That’s Transforming Education”, personalization means:

• Recognizing that intelligence is diverse and multifaceted
• Enabling students to pursue their particular interest and strengths 
• Adapting the schedule to the different rates at which students learn
• Assessing students in ways that support their personal progress and achievement  

In contrast, we all know how today’s current system of mass education that’s built around industrial-era standardization and compliance is the opposite of personalization. In fact, it seems ridiculously outdated and ill-prepared for an AI-driven world. The mantra of machine learning is “anything that can be automated, will be.” So what exactly is being taught to kids today? Are they learning the mission-critical 21st century skills that they will need to not just survive but thrive? I believe these include:

• 21st Century Learning Skills, such as creativity, communication, collaboration, culture and critical thinking.
• 21st Century Literacy Skills, such as civics literacy, environmental literacy, financial literacy, health and wellness literacy, and STEAM literacy.
• 21st Century Life Skills, such as adaptability, entrepreneurship, leadership, responsibility and social-emotional skills.   

Although it’s still early days, we shouldn’t underestimate the long run effect that personalization will have. Consumers will continue to demand personalization from every brand, every product and every experience. Education will be no different.            

 At Encantos, we are using the power of technology and entertainment to reimagine education for the direct-to-consumer age. We believe 21st century kids need to learn 21st century skills.        

Children are natural learners and they learn best when you tailor learning to their personal needs. I’m excited to be building family brands that can leverage personalization in new and innovative ways. I’m excited to amplify the diversity of intelligence and inspire the most digitally native generation of kids ever - Generation Alpha.

This is just the beginning.