Links for this week (weekly)

  • “With industrialisation we had another leap forward, the productivity increase was again dramatic and the whole world gained. Enormous excess wealth was produced, and even more people could spend time on services instead of producing food and goods. More healthcare, more support services, we could even afford to universally support the elderly with pensions.

    Now we say we have entered the “information age”, and expect similar results. But is it comparable? “

    tags: informationage knowledgework effectiveness IT

      • In other words – there are two phases each time we go from one “age” into the next:  

         

           

        1. The first efficiency phase, the “how” we do things is all about technology: Pruning, clearing, engines, calculating, storing.
        2. The second effectiveness phase, the “what” we do is all about process: Concentrate all in one place, automate the workflows so managing (own or other’s) time can be freed towards real value creation work.
    • And note the important learning that phase 2) did not happen until the marginal gains from 1) begins to flatten out.
    • Information technology has mostly produced faster ways to do exactly the same we did two thousand years ago.
    • The “what” we do has not changed much; still we have meetings with action items, still we have to write reports, still we have an accounting department to organise the results, and the good old hierarchy is still there to channel the information- and work-flows.
    • The figures are rather simple – knowledge work stands for about 60% of the world’s value creation while knowledge workers spend on average about 2/3rd of their time on managing the flows. I
  • “Timing is critical for successful organizational change. What you do first and the sequence of actions that follow can make or break your effort. But in many cases, it’s not completely clear whether one step causes another or vice versa. Like the classic “chicken or the egg” dilemma, you’re left asking yourself: Which should come first? “

    tags: change organization organizationalchange structure changemanagement behaviors

    • Prioritize the goals. In the cases described here, as with many change efforts, there are multiple goals. While all are important, one of the best ways to find a starting point is to determine which of the goals is most critical.
    • Rely on structural shifts to change behaviors. The next principle to consider is that structural change usually drives behavioral change, and not vice versa. In other words, training people in new ways of working — without modifying job responsibilities, reporting relationships, and incentives — is often a prescription for failure.
  • “When it comes to operational improvement, organizations today are light years ahead of where they were two decades ago, but there’s no time to celebrate yesterday’s wins. They won’t immunize your organization against this decade’s march of ongoing progress. That’s because information technology — not just the Internet, but also mobile devices, “big data” for intensive data-crunching, and other computer hardware and software — will render even some of today’s most proficient business processes obsolete by the end of the decade.

    The question for top management is no longer whether your organization’s processes need to be improved, but rather which ones, how much, and when. “

    tags: processes bigdata collaboration knowledgework speed

    • organizations continue to use information technology to redesign work across organizational and global boundaries
    • Organizations are redesigning processes that cross organizational boundaries with now-primitive technologies like e-mail and teleconferencing. And they are using long-established approaches such as sharing data, online standards and templates, and using teams that map processes.
    • 2. Knowledge work redesign. Highly structured work that requires lower skills and education — transactional work — is going away in many Western companies, supplanted by automation, outsourcing, and offshoring.
    • But knowledge work requires, so workers must get involved in redesigning their work. They then must help define the support they need and ways to develop their skills. Employees whose jobs are going away need help too if they are going to tell you how to improve those jobs, as I described in a previous post; they need a motive, an upside.
    • 3. Speed. With accelerating changes in technology, competition, regulation, and globalization, so too has the half-life of any business process.

        

      Managers must speed the flow of information so that decisions can be made faster at all levels

    • Companies today must be able to make process changes in days or weeks, not months or years
  • “Josh told us how their research data was showing that leadership from the western world is not working so companies need to train their people for these new economies. Effective leader traits vary across countries so what my be right for the US is not right for China. But, it has become easier to find these specialists both internally and externally so in essence there is no excuse.”

    tags: agility hr recruitment talentmanagement change mobility

      • So (in a survey) which departments contribute most to being agile? (in order)

          

           

        1. Sales.
        2. Marketing.
        3. Customer Service.
        4. Operations.
        5. And last but not least languishing at the bottom of the pile of 14 departments was (of course) HR!
      • Some key points though about agile software development are:

          

        • People over process.
        • Working software over documentation.
        • Customer collaboration over customer research.
        • Respond to change over following a plan.
    • Talent mobility is totally unpredictable and key to the CEO view of what makes an agile organisation.
      • Myth: Talent acquisition is recruiting.

          

        Reality: Talent acquisition is continuous.

          

        • Managers lead business not HR.
        • Empower and foster teamwork to achieve success.
        • Create new models of recruitment, leadership, recognition and mobility.
        • Become data driven decision makers.
  • “Aujourd’hui, les entreprises qui n’ont pas une réelle présence sur les médias sociaux grand public sont l’exception. Les sociétés explorent même les bénéfices des réseaux sociaux internes pour leur organisation. “

    tags: socialmedia socialnetworks goal culture adoption sharing

    • Un récent rapport de McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) estime que les réseaux sociaux pourraient représenter une valeur annuelle de 900 à 1300 milliards de dollars américains rien que pour quatre secteurs d’activité.
    • , jusqu’à présent, la plupart des entreprises ont surtout utilisé les réseaux sociaux pour l’externe, le rapport de MGI indique que les deux tiers de cette valeur potentielle se trouvent dans l’entreprise.
    • des entreprises enregistrent des échecs répétés sur différentes plates-formes technologiques. Il est souvent plus évident de blâmer les logiciels que de s’interroger sur les raisons plus globales de difficultés d’entreprise.
    • L’une des principales raisons pour lesquelles un projet de réseau social interne échoue est l’absence d’un objectif clair pour le réseau créé.
    • la réalité du travail de tous les jours” rattrape les collaborateurs et les détourne des réseaux sociaux pour les ramener à leurs “tâches quotidiennes”, où ils retombent dans des schémas de travail et de communication conventionnels
    • Les éditeurs de logiciels sociaux sont en partie responsables de cette situation car ils ont encouragé cette adoption par le bas, la voyant comme un moyen facile de s’inscrire dans une activité en cours sans être “repéré par le radar”,
    • De plus, de nombreux éditeurs décrivaient les réseaux sociaux internes comme des “machines à café virtuelles”, renforçant ainsi l’impression que c’était un lieu pour les conversations parallèles, et non pour le vrai travail.
    • Il doit Ãªtre le lieu où le vrai travail est effectué, dans un environnement social offrant des fonctionnalités de communication et de collaboration riches pour accompagner les processus opérationnels, que vous auriez de toute façon dû améliorer. 
    • Ils doivent donc changer la mentalité traditionnelle de “la-connaissance-est-le-pouvoir”,  du “besoin-de-savoir” en une attitude du â€œbesoin-de-partager
    • Cette modification de l’approche est caractérisée par le passage d’un flux d’informations “poussées” (push) à un flux d’informations “tirées” (pull).
    • Toute personne n’étant pas inclue dans la liste des destinataires de l’e-mail pourrait ne jamais découvrir qu’elle a été oubliée; toute personne faisant partie de la discussion sans le vouloir pourrait avoir beaucoup de mal Ã  s’en extraire.
    • Pour nombre d’entreprises, cette sorte de changement culturel est un défi bien plus ample que celui de choisir les bons logiciels et d’obtenir l’approbation des dirigeants.
    • C’est un changement que les dirigeants ont beaucoup de mal à réaliser mais, s’ils ne le font pas eux-mêmes, ils auront beaucoup de mal à convaincre leurs départements de s’exécuter.
  • “The agenda for the digital workplace is becoming established from an architectural perspective, but what are the things we need to preserve from the employee \ worker point of view? Inspired (like so many) by the market-driven Cluetrain manifesto, here is our take on a manifesto for employees, contractors and freelancers.”

    tags: digitalworkplace intranet intranet2.0 adoption

    • Work is no longer a place.
    • Manage the outcome, not the process.
    • The digital workplace should be a pleasure to use.
      • Let me be myself online
    • Learning is good for me and the company.
    • Not everyone is an early-adopter.
    • Work doesn’t stop at the firewall.
    • Everything should be geared to helping me do the work that matters
    • Working relationships involve understanding each other.
    • Collaboration only works if we do it the same way.
    • If I don’t like it, I can always leave
  • ” there’s a world of difference between merely working together and truly collaborating with one another. Collaborative activity is the “secret sauce” that enables teams to come up with innovative new products or creative, buzz-worthy marketing campaigns. But people can also collaborate creatively around a seemingly mundane project — like the installation of a new accounting package — and use that initiative to transform the way in which an organization does business.

    Achieving true collaboration — in which the whole is definitely more than the mere sum of the individual parts — is difficult in any environment. People have to set aside their egos, trust one another, and share their expertise willingly. In a virtual workplace, collaboration can be all the more difficult to attain, especially when team members work for different companies, are essentially strangers to one another, and have different cultural and professional backgrounds. We have interviewed a number of researchers on this topic and have also studied dozens of virtual teams, some that possessed that magic of collaboration and numerous others that didn’t. Here are some of the lessons we’ve learned.”

    tags: teamwork collaboration socialmedia size teamsize gamification training uncertainty

    • Adjust for size. Teams have been getting larger and larger, some even exceeding 100 people for complex projects, according to one study. This trend has made true collaboration increasingly difficult to achieve. One solution is to use a flexible, fluid team structure that consists of three tiers: a core, an operational level, and an outer network.
    • Don’t be afraid of social media. People are more prone to collaborate with others who are similar to them. So how, then, do you get dissimilar people to collaborate? The trick is to find the common ground between such individuals, and social media — blogs, wikis, online collaboration tools, etc. — can play a huge role in doing so
    • Play games. Another effective way to get team members in the right mindset for working together is to have everyone play virtual games that encourage collaboration. In one study, team members played an online version of “scavenger hunt.” Such games can be customized to a particular company so that players have to pool their knowledge and internal connections to find, for instance, examples of the most offbeat uses of the firm’s products
    • researchers investigated how companies could use online role-playing games like “World of Warcraft” and “EverQuest” to build leadership and teamwork skills.
    • PricewaterhouseCoopers, for instance, has had great success in training employees to collaborate by targeting communication skills, emotional intelligence, teamwork, and networking
    •   

      Have role clarity but task uncertainty. Many managers believe that teams collaborate best when the roles of members are flexible but the group has a clear idea of how to get from A to B.

    • But the reverse is actually true, according to a study of more than 50 teams in different industries. That research found that collaboration increased when people had clearly defined roles but were uncertain about how to achieve the team’s goals. The uncertainty encouraged everyone to collaborate and
  • Center for CIO Leadership: Our CIO members tell us they are facing an explosion of data from an increasing number of sources, including Social Media, and sometimes struggle to make sense of it all. How does the availability of so much data impact the marketing arena?

    tags: CEO CMO leadership marketing customerexperience bigata socialmedia predictions realtime

    • More than 1,700 CMOs interviewed by IBM said that the top three forces changing marketing are, in order of importance, the data explosion, the rise of social media, and new choices of channels and devices
    • We can use real-time information to predict what they’ll do or buy next. Forward-looking CMOs are beginning to move in this direction. They are changing the practice of marketing.

       

      However, the CMOs we surveyed also said they are least prepared for these shifts. They lack the capabilities, skills and tools required to address them.

    • Traditionally, marketers have made decisions based on historic data – what was sold, what market research told us, how campaigns performed. Today we have the tools to take advantage of real-time data – what
    • from the perspective of the customer, we will be much more relevant and personalized when we touch them with information, an offer, an answer. They will experience marketing as a service rather than noise.
    • As technology moves to the front office, the CIO will be expected to help the CMO, the CHRO, the CFO and line-of-business leaders take full advantage of these new capabilities.
    • The solution to most of our business problems today relies on a strong ability to integrate — to see the bigger picture, and the perspective others bring to the table
    • CIOs and CMOs will be the co-designers of their company’s total customer experience.
    • we’ve seen great success when IT experts are actually embedded in marketing organizations so that the two groups of professionals can better communicate and collaborate.
    • “how you are is who you are.”

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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