“Drafting” in technology

As I watched bits of the Daytona 500 it hit me how adept the drivers are at taking advantage of the aerodynamics of the car ahead of them, while balancing the overheating from breathing the fumes of the car ahead. It’s called “drafting” and drives home the adage “You don’t need to be the lead dog all the time”. And it hit me, how in technology we could use the principle in some ways.

Workday has been adept at organizing analyst meetings around other vendors’ conferences. I was part of an Appirio event – morning at Google HQ, afternoon at a conference room in Giants stadium, evening at a suite at the Giants game. I have met with Rimini execs several times - in a hotel near somebody else’s event. Think how much more could be organized around “magnet” events – CES, Gartner IT Symposium, Google IO, Oracle Open World, Dreamforce etc.

Even more opportunity lies around what I call public calendars. Every year, for New Florence I have about 50 posts around dates like St. Patrick’s Day and Cinco de Mayo and innovative technology around them. This weekend I had posts around the Oscars, Daytona 500 and the NBA All Stars. While many of those dates require expensive event sponsorship rights, many of them do not.

Readers can you share some creative “drafting” you have taken advantage of?