Green bananas and university graduates are like two peas in a pod

University graduates ripen like green bananas - on demand;
Vocational training schemes produce ripe peppers that ripen no further.
George ILIEV

It is tempting to compare corporate employees with pumpkins but I will limit the analogy to bananas and peppers. The two crops are hugely different in one respect: bananas are picked green and will then naturally ripen over time, while peppers cannot ripen once detached from the plant. Furthermore, the ripening of harvested green bananas (or green tomatoes by the same token) can be accelerated if they are exposed to ethylene gas, which is a plant hormone. Placing an apple next to a bunch of green bananas can do the trick, as apples emit ethylene. Peppers, grapes and strawberries, on the other hand, lack the ethylene receptors and genes that trigger this ripening process and can only ripen on the stalk.

Back to the analogy with employees: broad university education churns out green bananas. University graduates do not need to be perfectly ripe for the labour market - different companies will use various doses of human ethylene (i.e. training, mentoring, etc.) to make them fit for purpose. The important thing is university graduates are malleable.

On the other hand, vocational training systems (widespread in Germany and  Austria) deliver perfectly ripe employees to the labour market. However, over time these employees are not malleable. According to The Economist (June 1, 2013) "early [vocational] training can turn into a disadvantage by the age of 50. It appears that skills learnt in vocational training become obsolete at a faster rate." Once detached from the vocational training scheme, these employees cannot "ripen" much more.

The old George Bernard Shaw once said: “At my age, I don't even buy green bananas.” However, if a company or an economy can wait for the green bananas to ripen, that might be the optimal long-term choice, despite the swinging of the pendulum towards vocational training these days.

(Photo: Green bananas, Wikipedia)

Low-cost airlines: competitive advantage derived from evolution of turtle shells

Turtle shell and low-cost model both arose internally
George ILIEV

It is often the case that an internal trait can become your biggest external competitive advantage. Here is an analogy between present-day low-cost airlines and the evolution of the turtle shell 260 million years ago. The latest fascinating research by Yale and Smithsonian scientists shows that the upper and lower turtle shells have evolved from, respectively, the fused elongated vertebrae and broadened ribs of the turtle's prehistoric ancestor. Thus, two structures that were meant to provide support inside the animal's body became a signature tool giving it protection from the outside world.

In a similar way, low-cost airlines stumbled upon the low-cost model as an internal operational efficiency tool but are now thriving on it as their most distinctive marketing trait.

(Photo: Turtles from the western Black Sea coast, Aug 2011)