From Wall Street to Dubai: How Infusion is evolving

When the Wall Street herd began to stumble over their own their mortgage inventory, there were signs of rockier times ahead. Now that several giants lay collapsed, people like our CEO Greg Brill are writing about what it was like to watch the race to self-destruction unfold, and how they read the signs that clearly said, "now is a good time to evolve."

Read it here: From Wall Street to Dubai: Diary of a tech entrepreneur's adventures in the hot zone

A good adjunct to Greg's article is the lesson that that there were people who had the common sense to get out of the sub-prime mortgage business. A Bloomberg article (Toronto-Dominion Avoids Subprime as Banks' Costs Rise, May 2008) describes how Ed Clark, CEO of TD Bank sold off TD Waterhouse's exposure in 2005. "'I'm an old-school banker,' Clark told reporters last month in Calgary after the annual shareholder meeting. 'I don't think you should do something you don't understand, hoping there's somebody at the bottom of the organization who does. . . . The whole thing didn't make common sense to me.'"

So there's the lesson for the day, it's ageless, and it takes many forms. There are no dumb questions. When something doesn't make sense, resolve it. Traditions and so-called "best practices" come into being because they work for us, but they should never be frozen or used in place of thought and common sense. Each of us in responsible for our own actions and their effects. Traditions, including best-practices and business rules, must be continually questioned and allowed to evolve. A tradition without a means to evolve is merely a symbolic gesture that has lost its original purpose. Many would say, "assess the risk and resolve the question in accordance with that risk," but my mantra remains, "If it's worth doing, it's worth over-doing." Miyamoto Musashi wrote in 1643, "If you do not pursue a genuine path to its consummation, then a little bit of crookedness in the mind will later turn into a major warp. Reflect on this" (The Book of Five Rings, Thomas Cleary translation).

Infusion's path is great technology, not financial services, not the Microsoft stack. It's great to work in a company that evolves and asks the questions it takes to keep us on that path. What's your path?