Links for this week (weekly)

  • “In our research and others we’ve subscribed to, 60% of today’s companies fall into the Ad Hoc stage, 30% in the Experimental stage, 9% in the Participating stage, and less than 1% fall into what we consider the Strategic Social Business stage. This 1% has mastered cultural change.”

    tags: socialbusiness enterprise2.0 adoption maturity maturitymodel

  • “Last Friday I had the pleasure to deliver a keynote presentation to the McKinsey BTO team in Frankfurt.

    The keynote focused on two topics:

    1. How to measure the Return on Investment (RoI) by measuring the re-use of content during sales and project delivery and correlate it with the CRM Win/Lose Rate and Project Margin.

    2. How to build a Social Value system – by evaluating the Social Value of users, content and metadata in social network and communities and create targeted value models to answer the question “What’s in it for me” (WIIFM).”

    tags: roi socialbusiness enterprise2.0 value socialvalue equity communities measurement

  • “Arnaud Gien-Pawlicki, responsable recrutement France de la DRH de l’Apec, détaille les compétences indispensables à la fonction RH telles qu’elles se dessinent aujourd’hui, et relève les tendances majeures des prochaines années.”

    tags: humanresources process service chro IT communitymanagement

    • Il s’agit par exemple de gérer le décalage entre les directeurs opérationnels, centrés sur la performance à court-terme, et la vision long-terme impliquant l’employabilité des collaborateurs et l’adaptation de leurs savoir-faire
    • L’avènement de l’entreprise 2.0 collaborative se fait encore attendre, mais le DRH peut d’ores et déjà faciliter la coopération.
    • Le principal enjeu, pour les DRH, est d’intégrer les technologies de l’information et de la communication dans les pratiques d’entreprise.
    • Il faut s’interroger sur la transformation de la relation entre les entreprises et leurs parties prenantes – internes et externes. Le community management va s’imposer dans les missions des DRH.
    • La marque employeur, les réseaux sociaux ou l’impact des nouvelles technologies sur la fonction RH sont des sujets sérieux qui me semblent insuffisamment abordés. Tout futur professionnel RH doit se positionner sur l’ensemble de son spectre en intégrant ces questionnements, le plus tôt possible, pour compléter sa formation de base.
    • Participer au pilotage stratégique pose aussi la question de l’externalisation de certains process RH, pour se consacrer aux sujets fondamentaux – la fidélisation des talents, l’anticipation des besoins de compétences, etc. Les dimensions administratives et légales sont inhérentes à la fonction mais ne s’y résument pas
    • ce positionnement permet à la DRH de passer d’une culture du process à une culture d’offre de services.
  • “Pour tirer profit du social learning, mettez en place une culture qui rend l’apprentissage amusant, productif et familier, une culture où apprendre fait partie du travail quotidien. Marcia Conner et Steve LeBlanc ont cherché où le social learning s’épanouit le plus. “

    tags: sociallearning culture service education attention learning

    • L’apprentissage social (social learning) s’épanouit dans une culture du service et de l’émerveillement. Il est inspiré par les leaders, activé par la technologie et déclenché par des opportunités qui ne se sont que récemment produites.
    • Si une culture se concentre sur le service, la question la plus fréquemment posée est : « comment puis-je vous aider ? » Comment puis-je vous aider à réussir ?
    •  

      Cependant dans la plupart des salles de classe, on empêche les jeunes de s’aider les uns les autres à apprendre et à réussir. Dans certaines communautés, des velléités telles que la valeur de la propriété ou l’intégrité de son terrain empêchent de venir en aide aux voisins.

    • La dispersion de notre attention est une des raisons pour lesquelles nous sommes si peu capables d’aider les autres à apprendre et à grandir.
    • Nous n’avons pas intégré cette notion d’entraide dans le cycle des affaires, dans notre travail quotidien. Nous n’avons pas non plus détruit le mythe selon quoi la peur et .la confusion motive plus ou moins les gens à apprendre
    • C’est la technologie du social learning, et les medias sociaux en général, qui nous permettent de régler notre attention sur les sujets qui peuvent nous apporter le meilleur rapport sur investissement, et donner le plus de valeur à notre contribution.
    • Plus les outils permettront facilement aux gens de nous dire ce dont ils ont besoin, plus il sera facile et agréable de leur venir naturellement en aide.
  • ” I am starting to question the validity and merit of a good number of motives from companies to become successful social businesses, because in reality they aren’t. They are just grabbing the wrong end of the stick thinking and hoping it will work out eventually, when we all know it won’t, and get away with it.”

    tags: enterprise2.0 socialbusiness job work humanresources humanrelationships sustainability jobmarket

    • here’s another one of those thinking out loud reflections that’s been in my mind for a long while regarding Social Business and which I’m now more and more convinced it may be destroying our current business environment as we know it, more than anything else
    • What if E2.0 and Social Business are the main reasons why we may no longer get the economy to recover as we could, or would, or should, have expected? What if we are all doomed and we are facing The End of a Job as We Know It?
    • Enterprise 2.0 or whatever other 2.0 moniker, was killing the job market and current working conditions, because businesses were adopting this shift for the wrong reasons.
    • HR still hasn’t made that transition from Human Resources into Human Relationships, at least, for the vast majority of businesses out there and this means that if Social Business can help them get their business optimise their resources they would be doing so, ignoring the people, and their needs, once again, and like it’s been happening for decades…
    • because instead of thriving to become more sustainable businesses where people are treated like people, in a much more trustworthy, responsible and valued perspective altogether, we keep seeing how the business decides to go the other direction and optimises resources
    • Shouldn’t we all be focusing on the long term strategy to become socially integrated enterprises where sustainable business growth becomes a norm, more than an exception
    •  

      Can a business nowadays, in the 21st century, become a truly connected, transparent, nimble, successful and sustainable social business while optimising operations with layoffs is still lingering around in the background?

  • “Nul ne peut l’ignorer, les pratiques RH évoluent à vitesse grand V au sein des organisations. Comment les entreprises font-elles face à ces changements ? Il semble que certains DRH voient dans la R&D une alternative crédible pour développer des solutions et produits innovants en matière de ressources humaines.”

    tags: humanresources r&d innovation engagement employeesengagement retention risk motivation competencies talent talentmanagement

    • Les experts s’accordent à le dire, aujourd’hui le potentiel de leadership, les attitudes professionnelles et bien sûr les compétences tendent à s’imposer comme des critères au moins aussi essentiels que l’engagement, l’évaluation, le développement et la fidélisation des collaborateurs.
    • la pénurie de talents s’impose désormais comme une réalité qui implique certes pour l’entreprise de relever le challenge de la fidélisation mais également, plus en amont, de l’identification des collaborateurs dotés d’un haut potentiel.
    • Aujourd’hui, les entreprises prennent de plus en plus en considération les compétences comportementales. Il s’agit de sortir de la dimension purement orientée compétences techniques, pour aller vers des outils permettant de cerner la personnalité, la motivation des collaborateurs
    • les DRH doivent sans cesse renouveler leur panel d’outils
    • Au final, appliquer la R&D aux outils de développement et d’accompagnement du changement dans les entreprises pourrait dans les années à venir s’imposer comme une nécessité absolue pour les entreprises
  • “Près de trois DSI sur quatre (72%) se disent d’accord ou tout à fait d’accord avec la crainte que leurs directions des entreprises considèrent le Cloud comme un moyen de se passer de leurs services. C’est ce que révèle une enquête réalisée par le cabinet Forrester Research auprès architectes et administrateurs d’infrastructure d’entreprise aux Etats-Unis, en Europe et en Asie-Pacifique et commanditée par BMC Software. Pour 81 % des responsables interrogés, l’élaboration d’une stratégie Cloud globale doit être l’une des grandes priorités de l’année à venir “

    tags: cloud complexity IT security

    • En Europe particulièrement, qui compte pour 34 % du total des réponses :
       – 73 % des sondés sont d’accord ou tout à fait d’accord avec le fait que leur entreprise considère le Cloud public comme un moyen de contourner leur service informatique. 
       – 65 % dans la même région à se dire d’accord ou tout à fait d’accord avec le manque de contrôles de sécurité des services Cloud publics.
    • Sans surprise, la réduction des coûts est la priorité numéro 1 des services informatiques pour les douze prochains mois, la simplification étant la stratégie envisagée en premier pour réaliser des économies.
    • Les services informatiques ont de plus en plus de mal à satisfaire les attentes simultanées de réduction des coûts et de simplification, d’un côté, et de meilleurs services, moins chers et plus rapides, de l’autre côté. Les DSI craignent de plus en plus que le Cloud mette à mal leurs stratégies de simplification et de réduction des coûts.
    • En se procurant des services Cloud publics directement, sans passer par les services informatiques, les collaborateurs de l’entreprise ne font qu’aggraver la complexité informatique.58 % environ des sondés reconnaissent exécuter des charges de travail stratégiques dans le Cloud public non géré, faisant fi des règles, tandis que 36 % disent le faire dans le respect de règles régissant cet usage
    • Les services informatiques reconnaissent tacitement ne pas pouvoir faire cesser ces pratiques de recours aux Clouds publics
    • s services informatiques estiment devoir gérer les services Cloud publics, mais se rendent compte de la difficulté à garantir des niveaux de service élevés.
    • L’intérêt croissant pour les stratégies Cloud hybrides légitime la nécessité d’une gestion unifiée.
  • tags: byod security costs productivity IT

  • “By tapping into the knowledge and enthusiasm of thousands of longtime users of its products, Lego has been able to enhance its product offerings — without increasing long-term fixed costs.”

    tags: communities lego casestudies collaboration customer innovation

    • As Lego managers became more aware of innovations by the company’s adult fans, the managers realized that at least some of the adult fans’ ideas would be interesting to the company’s core target market of children
    • In 2005, Lego created the Ambassador Program to provide a fast and direct way for the company and its fans to get into contact with one another. The program has provided considerable value to both sides.
    • Management saw that not everything needed to be developed internally. Indeed, the company has found ways to expand into new market areas without having to sustain long-term fixed costs.
    • For the adult fans, collaborations have allowed them to influence Lego’s business decisions and encourage the company to develop products targeting teens and adult
  • “Part of the reason is simply a function of how difficult it is to do two things well at once — successfully managing the existing business and exploring a new direction. “Although many executives recognize the need to exploit current capabilities while developing new ones, few are very effective at managing this conflicting set of activities,” Johnson, Yip and Hensmans write. “

    tags: business businessmodel lego valuecreation innovation businessmodelinnovation

    • Propositions that may once have been true almost always become less true or even false over time. Market tastes and preferences change. Technology makes new things possible. Values and features customers once found attractive lose their luster. Companies steal ideas from successful competitors. Pioneering practices become best practices, which in turn become accepted standards. The playing field is forever being leveled. Thus, there is an ongoing need for thoughtfulness, reflection, experimentation and discover
    • However, one thing that is universal about Lego’s experience is that the company had to change to develop a new way of doing business; historically a very private company, Lego had to become much more open to outside ideas to innovate effectively with its communities of adult fans.
  • “What will be required is a completely new range of services – which we might call non-training services – that are focused on supporting continuous performance improvement and learning in the workflow as people do their jobs.

    The Workplace Development Services (WDS) framework has therefore been developed to help organisations understand the range of new services and activities that will be required, as well as the tools and platforms to power these activities, and the new skills and mindset involved.”

    tags: learning training support collaboration performance socialsoftware enterprisesocialsoftware skills mindset

    • 1 – Training/Instructional Services

       

      This service area will continue to design, deliver and manage training, e-learning and/or blended learning events. However the amount of this type of intervention is likely to reduce over time as other forms of learning are seen to be more effective.  

    • 2 – Performance Support Services

       

      This service area will focus on providing access to, and supporting an individual’s use of a range of resources (content and people) for performance improvement.  Activities will include creating (top-down) resources like job aids, e.g. by re-purposing courseware, but will also involve supporting the creation of employee-generated content,

    • 3 – Social Collaboration Services

       

      These (non-training) services will focus on supporting collaborative working and the building of internal networks, communities and collaboration spaces.  These will become key elements of building and supporting the collaborative culture of a social business – where informal, social learning is its bloodstream.

    • 4 – Performance Consulting Services

       

      This service will focus on finding the best solution to a learning or performance problem, which may well be a training/instructional solution but is more likely to be a performance support or social collaboration solution.  These services will focus on identifying the root cause of performance problems and proposing appropriate solutions

    • TOOLS & PLATFORMS

       

       

      Click image for full-size version

       

       

      Although authoring tools and Learning Management Systems have gone “social” – i.e. by adding the functionality for social interactions within courses, like blogging, discussion forums and real-time activity streams, instructional tools won’t be the right tools for the new activities

    • SKILLS

       

       

      Click image for full-size version

       

       

      Supporting new ways of working and learning will require a wider skillset than is currently the case. It won’t just be about instructional design or LMS administration, but will require performance consulting skills, business skills, social media skills, collaboration skills and community management leadership skills

    • MINDSET

       

       

      Click image for full-size version

       

       

      A key aspect of this Framework is that it requires a new mindset. This means recognising it is no longer just about using traditional “command and control” approaches (that are employed in most training solutions to try and force people to learn), but will also involve encouraging and supporting people to engage in new collaborative activities to support one another as they wor

  • “According to Jackson (and, again, I agree with him) top talent does indeed leave for the same reasons everyone else does. If I were to distill his ‘top ten reasons’ down to one, it’s this:

    Top talent leave an organization when they’re badly managed and the organization is confusing and uninspiring.”

    tags: humanresources talents talentmanagement management purpose

    • 1) Create an organization where those who manage others are hired for their ability to manage well,
    • 2) Then be clear about what you’re trying to accomplish as an organization – not only in terms of financial goals, but in a more three-dimensional way.
    • What’s your purpose;
    • What will the organization look, feel and sound like if you’re embodying that mission and culture?
    • How will you measure success?
  • “The race for skilled talent is picking up speed and could have long-term implications in the job market. A Human Capital Zeitgeist, is emerging as companies big and small are getting smacked with the realization that talent management is SO critical to competing in a volatile marketplace, they might actually have to throw a bit more respect at the “human” in the human capital equation.”

    tags: humancapital recruitment humanresources attraction talent engagement loyalty stress wellbeing worklife worklifebalance talentmanagement resilience

  • “What exactly is Big Data? It’s a product of the Internet combined with all the new ways that are emerging to gather, discover and make sense of data. “

    tags: bigdata data discovery internetofthings decisionmaking analytics

    • The promise of Big Data is truly mind-boggling. If we can harvest insights from all of those sources of information, rather than being overwhelmed by data, we have the capacity to understand with greater precision than ever before how our world actually works. By applying analysis to data, we can see once-hidden patterns unfolding before our eyes so we can make better decisions about everything from personal financial planning to a company’s strategic direction.
  • “Everyone talks about collaboration in the workplace today but what does it really mean? How do you get from here to there? Every snake oil salesman is selling social something: enterprise social; social learning; social CRM; etc. For me boils down to three principles.”

    tags: narration collaboration socialbusiness enterprise2.0 collaborativeenterprise transparency power

    • Narration of Work: This means actually talking about what you are doing. It’s making your tacit knowledge (what you feel) more explicit (what you are doing with that knowledge).
    • Shared Power: Jon Husband describes wirearchy as; “a dynamic two-way flow of power and authority based on information, knowledge, trust and credibility, enabled by interconnected people and technology.” This is the desired state, but getting there is difficult.
    • “You have to have an idea of what you are going to do, but it should be a vague idea.”  ~ Pablo Picasso
  • ” many Millennials are inhibited by anxieties peculiar to our time. I’ve already spoken of the FOMO problem. In this post, I want to share some of the other blockages that Millennials tell me afflict them. Next week, I will share techniques that I’ve found helpful in overcoming FOMO and these other inhibitors of building, creating and doing.”

    tags: humanresources millenials gtd productivity purpose skills

    • But there’s a tendency among those I work with to forget to ask why they are doing it in the first place. We often prioritize productivity over purpose.
    • With the rise of personal branding and an increased ability to get your message out sooner, the networking mentality of “it’s who you know” has all but replaced “it’s what you know.
    • they allocate more of their time to deepening their networks through coffee meetings and phone calls and such than to spending time alone developing an actual skill or craft – something they can strive to do better than anyone else alive
    • The question that drives their work is “What do I need to respond to?” rather than “What should I create today?” They swat back emails that fly at them, sit in meetings that they unthinkingly agreed to two months earlier, take phone calls seeking their approval or advice. But they don’t build. They don’t sit and think. They don’t ask: “How could I redefine and reinvent what this job is?”
    • The majority of those I work with are “intaking” at much higher rates than they are creating. Most doers and entrepreneurs are the opposite.
    • However, when it came to advising us on policy ideas, the only real advice was not to put anything controversial in writing. It was not to be bold or think freshly. It was to crouch.
    • But many of us spend more time writing emails and staying in touch than developing daring, imaginative, controversial ideas and testing those notions in the real world.
  • “Frequent airplane passengers are likely to have read the following message prior to watching an in-flight movie: “the following film has been modified from its original version. it has been formatted to fit this screen.” for purposes of this airborne analogy, let’s fasten our seatbelts, power off any electronic devices, and firmly adjust our trays to the upright position. Better yet, let’s substitute the word film for new employee and the word screen for organization so it reads as: “the following new employee has been modified from its original version. it has been formatted to fit this organization.””

    tags: organization employees leadership onboarding culture behaviors learning operations engagement audience transformation change competencies

    • New employees enter into an organization with two things in mind. First, they want to perform well in the eyes
      of those who have made the hire in the first place.
    • Second, the new employee yearns to do well for himself. He also has made a decision, in this case accepting the job offer. It’s important for this new employee to do well in his own eyes. No one wants a sketchy past of poor career decision
    • Simply put, new employees will conform to the situation that presents itself in the tribe to impress their manager and fellow employees at the risk of their own personal beliefs and career needs.
    • They don’t want to become part of a company where there are rules that are not applied consistently to all. New employees don’t want to be locked in a cubicle only to have human contact at the annual performance review. And new employees certainly don’t want to be voiceless, bullied by other employees (or particularly management), or lacking input on anything that might move the business forward.
    • All too often, organizations are missing the point of leadership, and new employees are forced to conform to an overly hierarchical and closed paradigm that ensures they are “formatted to fit the screen.”
    • Therefore, the question for many organizations is not how to prevent turbulence, but rather why they haven’t instilled a systemic and enterprise-wide leadership framework that unites the employee base and is used to address the turbulence itself.
    • ou may want to take into account existing HR competencies. The term competency itself, however, seems to have been devised during the era when smoking was still allowed on airplanes, so you might want to explore vernacular options. Examine whether you need to develop updated or new behaviors, attributes, or disciplines for the leadership framework.
    • Consider how learning fits into your leadership framework. Are you still stuck on the classic “spray and pray” classroom-only model, or do you recognize that learning is continuous, connected, and pervasive? Learning can be part formal, part informal, and part social, but it also could be argued that leadership is part formal, part informal, and part social as well.
    • The leadership framework must take into account an operational methodology that sets the stage for employee input and engagement before activity or execution commences.
    • Growth of an organization cannot occur solely via the ideas of a select few. The leadership framework of any organization must take into account the expressions of interest, the inventions of tomorrow, and the imagination of all members of the tribe.
    • Have you thought of your partners? What about your customers? Do you possess a philanthropic arm in your organization, and if so, should your community become a target stakeholder in your leadership framework as well? By including the target audience for each phase or level of the leadership framework, context is being provided for employees as they wade through the concourse level of the departures lounge.
    • A leadership framework that helps upgrade an organization’s level of collaboration, by redefining the situation and instilling new language and behaviors, is a ticket all tribes should be purchasing. It’s a ticket to debunk the status quo.
  • “In March 2010, CEO Hiroshi Mikitani (HBS MBA ’93) stood in front of his employees at online retail giant Rakuten’s Tokyo headquarters and dropped a bomb: all 7,100 workers would have two years to become proficient in English—the “language of business”—or risk demotion.

    “I was simply astonished,” said an engineer interviewed after the announcement. “Many Rakuten employees are allergic to English.”

    In a company where just 10 percent of all workers at the time spoke English, Mikitani’s move was radical and divisive. He even coined a term for the conversion: “Englishnization.””

    tags: french english language change humanresources communication collaboration stress anxiety

    • Even American-based companies with operations overseas need a language strategy
    • teaching non-English speakers a new language risks drops in productivity, causes some employees to lose status, and can engender belief that they aren’t as effective in their second tongue
    • Neeley, who speaks five languages, conducted in-depth interviews in English and French with workers at all levels of Frenchco, in particular studying status loss among workers learning a new language. She searched for key words in her interviews with workers such as “diminished,” “devalued,” “reduced,” disqualified,” and “less sophisticated.”
    • o no matter how fluent some people are in English, they believe they’ll never be as sophisticated, as influential, or as articulate as they are in their native language.”
    • If you cannot express your ideas because you lack language skills, the collaboration becomes a nightmare. You lose interest to continue, and you feel you are being devalued.”
    • These problems created an “us and them” class of native and nonnative English speakers, which sometimes led to resentment and distrust among nonnative speakers toward the native speakers.
    • “A real English person is in a stronger position, and I find myself justifying myself much more in those interactions.”
    • a small number of highly fluent workers viewed the change as a chance to perfect their English by asking for feedback from native speakers, participating in meetings as often as possible, repeating key phrases, and seeking out English speakers in their groups.
    • Future research, Neeley says, includes exploring the role of language as the mechanism by which companies transform from a domestic to a global player-the fulcrum of language.
    • In English I am not myself. My personality is much smaller in this context.’
  • “Questions such as the ones above are evidence of technology-centric thinking, and as such they are more dangerous than they might sound at first. We really don’t help to make it easier for users to do their job by asking these questions. We might get all excited about a new feature, tool or design, thinking it will really help to increase the users’ productivity, but unfortunately the opposite often becomes true; for every feature we add, we add to their burden. The simple reason is that we use the wrong starting point for our questions – the technology.”

    tags: enterprise2.0 technology socialbusiness socialsoftware enterprisesocialsoftware collaboration information digitalworkplace communication

      • The questions we should be asking are such as the following:
         

        • How do we help users create workspace awareness? How do we help them know what is happening and when it’s their time to contribute? 
        • What information do users need in different situations? What information would be relevant to them? 
        • How can we help users share their opinions, ideas, experiences, knowledge with each other? 
        • How can we help users do their job whenever they need to, wherever they are? 
        • How can we help users who collaborate communicate better within their teams as well as beyond? 
        • What kind of technical capabilities do users need to perform their tasks?  
    • We should stop asking questions about intranets, SharePoint, mobile devices, blogs, and wikis. Instead, we should ask ourselves and others what users need in order to do their job in different situations
  • “”Leadership” has changed when a decentralized group of people can take down a government. “The Value Chain” has changed when the customer is no longer just the “buyer” but also a co-creator. “Human Resources” have changed when most of the people who create value for your organization are neither hired nor paid by you. “Competition” has changed when individuals can create value through a centralized network of resources: for example, designing a product from anywhere, producing it through a 3D factory, financing it through community and distribution from anywhere to anywhere.

    Yet our business models have not changed to keep pace with these shifts. “

    tags: enterprise2.0 socialbusiness leadership humanresources businessmodel valuecreation purpose communities organization centralization distributedwork

    • From paid to purpose-driven. In the social era, purpose precedes scale. And as we discussed in part two of the series, shared purpose allows many communities to engage with you — without you having to invest resources in controlling their actions.
    • From isolated organizations to communities. The social era will reward those organizations that understand they can create more value with communities than they can on their own.
    • From centralized to distributed. While management often espouses the notion that good ideas can come from everywhere, in practice there are “thinkers” who create strategies and designated “doers” who execute those strategies.
    • Rather than making command and control a “bad” thing, discuss what areas needs which controls. Then examine how more, if not most, areas and decisions can distributed (and thus made radically more flexible).
    • Disrupting How We Work
       Many of you know of Clay Christensen’s iconic work the Innovators Dilemma. Small newcomers eat off bits of an established leader’s business through lower cost structure and a willingness to accept lower margins. T
    • I think there is an analogous process going on with the organizational structure of businesses themselves; that aside from market-specific competition from below, there is also competition from disruptive organizations that are finding new ways to get work done
    • Applied to today’s business giants, the analogy probably holds. The “species” that adapt to the changes in the environment faster will do better. That is for sure. What is less clear is what they will become as they adapt.
    • The world has changed; how we create value has changed. Organizationally we have not
  • “If you’re a digital native, you should be aware that the internet may have partially rewired your brain in such a way that when you meet people face to face, you’re less capable of figuring out what they’re thinking. “

    tags: digitalnatives nonverbal skills millenials generationy humanresources

    • Compared with people who didn’t grow up using computers and the internet, you may be slower to pick up on nonverbal cues such as facial expressions, tones of voice, and body language.
    • On the plus side, it suggests that digital natives have higher baseline activity in the part of the brain governing short-term memory, the sorting of complex information, and the integration of sensations and thoughts — so, in certain respects, computers make you smarter.
    • But other research suggests that excessive, long-term exposure to electronic environments is reconfiguring young people’s neural networks and possibly diminishing their ability to develop empathy, interpersonal relations, and nonverbal communication skills
    • They seemed unable to empathize. So the firm let these employees go, replacing them with older advisers who were willing to sit down, look clients in the eye, and discuss matters face to face.
  • “Yesterday I was part of an excellent discussion on why customers are mad as hell. This Focus.com Round Table was moderated by Josiane Feigon featuring Koka Sexton, Matt Heinz and Rebecca Morgan.

    Current customers are angry because the environment has changed. People expect timely help and especially when they are in a buying cycle or already customers.

    Rebecca Morgan pointed out that people are already irritated with the economy, their jobs and any number of other external forces that add stress to their lives. Having a bad experience with a company or a sales person just gives them an outlet.”

    tags: customer socialcustomer customerexperience salespeople sales inteliigence salesintelligence buyingprocess salesprocess

    • Customer 2.0 has had it with outdated sales tactics, and they’re just not going to take it anymore. This independent, busy, distracted, and opinionated buyer has something to say and it’s time for salespeople to listen, understand, and know how and why they make decisions.
    • 70% of the buying process happens online. What this tells us is that customers are doing their own research, starting and engaging with conversations online that can help them with their issues.
    • The fine line is that a sales person needs to be more intelligent about the context and relevance of the communication. This sales intelligence means that you shouldn’t initiate a conversation by talking about their wedding pictures on Flickr. Instead find some relevant information or mutual connections from social networks to get into the door.
    • When the sales is more complex and needs some direction and support, sales people will always be needed. The difference I see happening is that te direction and pre-sales support will usually happen through social networks and be supplemented with phone calls and more engaging platforms like web-conferences.
    • Sales-support staff will increase over the next decade. New job titles such as chief listening officer, sales transformation manager, sales operations manager, and sales analyst will expand
    • The bottom line: If we don’t find and fill a need faster than a computer, we won’t be needed. computer, we won’t be needed. – Gerhard
    • A company should put some focus on turning their sales people into the thought leaders
    • The exponential mind share your company would get goes well beyond whatever marketing campaigns you are currently running.
  • “Race Against the Machine deserves praise for jump-starting an important discussion about the effect of technology on our economy. As the authors point out, the impact of computers and information technology has been largely left out of most analysis regarding causes of our current unemployment woes. This book, therefore, is an attempt to “put technology back in the discussion.””

    tags: IT work employment unemployment organization organizationalinnovation humancapital value valuecreation scarcity creativity education

    • A human-machine combo has the potential to be much more powerful than either a human or machine alone. So therefore it’s not simply a question of machines replacing humans. It’s a question of how can humans and machines best work together.
    • Moreover, as I’ve written about before on this site, the human-machine partnership can sometimes be less than the sum of its parts.
    • The authors go on to discuss the importance of “organizational innovation.” In particular, they discuss the creation of new business platforms that might empower humans to compete in new marketplaces.
    • But this idea also has its problems. How many niches can there possibly be? Enough to provide employment for the legions of truck drivers and supermarket checkers who may soon be exiting the workforce?
    • n general, I would agree that the unemployed represent a huge slack resource, and quite possibly somebody is going to come up with some previously unimagined way to harness this large pool of people. But at the moment, such organizational innovation is just a theory. I do not see the seeds of a workable solution in the current crop of platforms.
    • More importantly we should examine the term “value-creating fields.” Value under our current system is closely tied to scarcity. Digital abundance directly undermines this source of value. So once again we are confronted with an intellectual property challenge. If we are going to have an economy where everyone is an expert in a different field and produces “bits,” we are going to need a mechanism by which these non-scarce bits translate into an income
    • Yes of course. Human creativity is astounding, and everyone has something to offer. But peoples’ output—however unique, interesting, and valuable—will not necessarily be monetizable. Especially in an abundant digital environment.
    • Any jobs that depend upon having exclusive access to knowledge that no one else has are potentially at risk in a world where increasingly everyone is connected and data is widely shared.
    • Education seems like the most straightforward solution to our problem. If our skills are falling behind, then we’d better acquire new skills right?
    • But all of these considerations aside, there is a much bigger problem. One cannot escape the simple truth that humans learn slowly and technology advances quickly.
    • Most of these suggestions are great, and might lead to a better society, but it is unclear how any of them will create jobs.
    • The authors repeatedly state that our institutions are losing a race with technology. But they do not consider the possibility that our economy itself might be one of these trailing institutions.
  • “I guess it’s time to talk about Accounting for Intangible Assets: There is Also an Income Statement by Stephen Penman. When this new paper first came out from the Center for Excellence in Accounting & Security Analysis at Columbia University, I decided to ignore it as an apology for current accounting standards–which are completely inadequate for the knowledge era.

    But now the paper is getting more attention so I feel the need to answer it.”

    tags: accounting intangibleassets investment humancapital relationshipcapital

      • Penman’s argument explains all the reasons that intangibles cannot and should not be booked to a balance sheet today. These include:

         

        • Intangible asset  is a “speculative notion” – This is a common problem for accountants. They cannot see an intangible so how can it be real?
        • “Intangible assets involve using assets jointly” – This is a related problem. The utility of intangibles is related to their use in a system. (This is why we help companies model their IC as a system)
        • The cost of intangibles “would be hard to identify” – This I don’t buy. Every day, accountants make a distinction between money spent on current operations (an expense) versus money spent on building future capacity (an investment).
        • “Establishing an amortization schedule would typically be quite speculative” – He’s right. It would be. It’s one of the key reasons why we cannot create new accounting standards…yet.
    • But if I were an investor or an analyst, I would still ask the question: How are you spending your money on future capacity? How does your annual intangible capital expenditure break down?
  • “Dans Au Delà Du Capitalisme, Peter Drucker offre une formidable synthèse de sa réflexion sur la société de la connaissance.

    Dans cet ouvrage publié en 1993 (sous le titre original de Post Capitalist Society), le pape du management moderne propose un cheminement intellectuel passionnant, visionnaire et dont la pertinence semble être confirmée par le 21ème siècle.

    #hypertextual étant drôlement sympa, ce blog vous en offre les 10 idées majeures :”

    tags: peterdrucker knowledge knowledgeworkers knowledgeeconomy innovation productivity

    • 3/ Appliquée aux tâches que l’on connait, la connaissance devient productivité. Appliquée aux nouvelles tâches, la connaissance devient innovation.
    • Dans le monde post capitaliste, qui est la société de la connaissance, le savoir s’applique au savoir lui-même.
    • Le savoir exige la formation continue car son contenu évolue en permanence.
    • Les travailleurs disposent des moyens de production : leur savoir. Les organisations disposent des outils de production
    • a planification et la centralisation sont aussi néfastes à la productivité du savoir qu’elles l’ont été à celle du capital
    • chacun prenne la responsabilité de ses objectifs, de sa contribution et même de son comportement.

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Head of People and Business Delivery @Emakina / Former consulting director / Crossroads of people, business and technology / Speaker / Compulsive traveler
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