Last day one of the news showed a demonstration in one of the major centers of our Capital City. Known with it's Bar's offering various kinds of music with relatively cheap prices the Sakarya Avenue has always been an attractive choice for especially students. Most of them having a bad habit, smoking, which is now the major concern for the managers of the entitys because of the new law prohibiting smoking in all kinds of indoor locations caused the demonstration. The pictures related in my mind instantly to Spencer Johnson's fabulous story, " Who moved my cheese" and i thought what a good case it was presenting the characteristics of Hem.

In the story 2 mices Sniff and Scurry and 2 little humans Hem and Haw were living in a labyrinth containing in different paths stations some of them having cheese which represented all kinds of needs for those characters. While Sniff and Scarry were only simple rats acting according to their instincts they were always smelling the cheese and realized the change earlier than Hem and Haw. So they started to search for a new cheese in a different station much earlier. The hitting point of the story is how Hem and Haw realizes the change and in which ways they respond, which indeed represent the attitude of most of us. Actually we are acting either like Hem or Haw in all parts of our lives (worklife, relations, etc.)

Back again to our demonstration the correlated facts were;
  1. The center consists of a lot of entitys with very similar business processes. The only difference is the kind of Music they play but there is no differentiation in the service they provide. The only advantage, their prices makes them attractive for their target segment students who lives in dormitories and normally can allocate a lower budget for entertainment.

  2. The basic business structure with a lack of efforts to differentiate services or create any innovative processes, made them act like Hem and Haw. The routine of the business created a comfort zone for the Bar's which prevented them from smelling the cheese i.e. to see the changes outside of the box. They even couldn't smell the change of the new law which was indeed declared one year ago (That suprised me the most!)


So in the news i saw a lot of Hem's shouting "That's unfair, I WANT MY CHEESE BACK !!!!)


I couldn't believe it. They were asking the government to allow the people smoke in indoor places again which is an extreme level to resist to change. So i think it will be unlogical to expect the people to figure out that there is always new cheese out there which in fact made me think for the last couple of hours. I would like to discuss what the new cheese could be for Bar's which are loosing customers due to the smoking prohibition. And i would like to hear your ideas what they can offer for the changing environment...