Archive for the 'Analysis and Opinion' Category

How Information Overload and Hyperactivity Destroy Leadership

Posted on January 21st, 2013 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

Guest Post by Ian Price The recent temporary departure of Antonio Horta-Osorio from his role at Lloyds Banking Group was unusual in the candid use of the ‘S’-word – “stress” – in the bank’s announcement. For any number of reasons, leaders, their boards and investors are keen to avoid the word as part of the narrative in a leader’s exit. However, there have, in the last year or so, been a number of sudden, unplanned chief executive resignations that the press has attributed – at least in part – to stress. These include Masataka Shimizu of Tokyo Electric Power, Jeff.. Read more

The Case for “Internet Glue”: Why We Need a Stable User Experience!

Posted on January 17th, 2013 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

A sorely needed product Here is a winning product I sometimes dream of producing: I call it Internet Glue. What is it, you ask? Well, it’s for use when you have a web site or a software application that works great, that you find truly useful. You pour the Internet Glue on it, and when it hardens it keeps the site or application just as it is, so it can’t change, so the user experience you love abides. Get it? What it’s good for Why do I want this admittedly fanciful product? Why, to fight that bane of computer tools:.. Read more

The CIO Role and Driving Innovation: Gap or Opportunity?

Posted on January 14th, 2013 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

Ask yourself: is the CIO a driver of Innovation in your enterprise? The gap: are CIOs missing the Social Media boat? The MIT Sloan Management Review recently published results from a survey of business executives, managers and analysts from organizations around the world, aiming to understand how companies apply Social Media. I was intrigued by the following excerpt: 48% – Percentage of CEOs who believe social media is important or somewhat important to their business today. 24% – Percentage of CIOs who believe the same thing. Now, in general it’s a good thing that CEOs have more vision; standing on.. Read more

Why Cutting Corners in Risky for Knowledge Workers

Posted on December 24th, 2012 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

Cutting corners: the special case of Knowledge Work The Wiktionary gives the following usage example  for “Cutting Corners”: The guy who built the fence cut corners when sinking the posts, and the fence fell over in the last storm. Not surprising: when we think of the risks of cutting corners, we naturally turn to construction and manufacturing, where any use of substandard materials or processes can easily lead to catastrophic failure. But in Knowledge Work, that wide domain many of us spend our careers in, cutting corners can be just as risky, and the outcomes can be harmful in insidious.. Read more

How to Improve Your Company Culture by the Judicious Use of Coffee

Posted on December 3rd, 2012 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

How coffee is provided and used in a workplace is intimately linked to the local company culture, and can be used to assess it and to steer it for better or for worse. Coffee is used universally by workers of every kind, and you’d think it doesn’t matter how it is consumed. But looking back over a long career in a variety of workplace scenarios, I realize just how much you can learn from observing how coffee is served in a company, and how the choices that you – as a manager – make in this matter can influence the.. Read more

Okay, You Got Workforce Diversity… Now What?

Posted on November 19th, 2012 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

Every serious company these days is committed to promote workforce diversity. Too bad not all of them know what to do with it once they have it… Missing the whole point of workforce diversity One day I bumped into an American manager  who was his corporation’s Chief Diversity Officer or some such title. My interest was immediately engaged… I’d never had occasion to chat with a CDO, and it sounded like a fascinating job that would allow one to initiate many worthwhile programs. We started talking, and he asked me what the Diversity situation in Israel was. I happily shared.. Read more

How the Shape of the Earth Dictates Email’s Longevity

Posted on November 15th, 2012 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

Check out my guest post on the Mesmo Consultancy Blog: If we all hate coping with email, how come it’s still here? In this post I consider the paradox of email’s extreme longevity  (over four decades), considering how much we love to hate it. Like the Fax machine, its antiquity doesn’t stop it from remaining alive and well. In my view this has to do with the earth being (with all due respect to Thomas Friedman) a round planet. Those of us who help reduce email overload had better understand the mechanism underlying the allure of email, so this is.. Read more

If Knowledge is Power, Does it Corrupt?

Posted on November 1st, 2012 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

Does knowledge corrupt? The phrase “Knowledge is Power” has been around since biblical times, and is no doubt well founded. The phrase “Power Corrupts” is newer, and just as true. But what if we put these two together? Does it follow that “Knowledge Corrupts”? More specifically: does knowledge, in excess, corrupt personal or organizational effectiveness? I can see a number of mechanisms that may make it so. Hoarding of knowledge to secure power One way that knowledge corrupts is when its owners fight to retain the power it represents. This is well known as a concern when you try to.. Read more

Handling Obsolescence of Knowledge in Information Work

Posted on October 18th, 2012 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion, Individual Solutions

We need food to survive. Old food can do us harm. Therefore, we have a range of defense mechanisms – from our noses and taste buds to mandatory “best use before” dates on food packages – to detect and eliminate obsolete food. We need information to survive in today’s workplace. Old information can do us harm. Where are the defense mechanisms to detect and eliminate obsolete knowledge? Help! We’re drowning in old information! Everybody complains about drowning in information overload, be it incoming email overload, social media addiction, too many RSS feeds, and so on. We also complain about useless.. Read more

Why Business Travel Freezes are Bad for Your Business

Posted on October 15th, 2012 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion

A familiar knee-jerk reaction We’ve all been there. The economy goes into the down side of one of its never-ending spasmodic cycles and the word comes down: Freeze all business travel! The urge to batten the hatches when times get rough is understandable and necessary; that’s how responsibly-managed companies survive the hard times. It’s just that a sweeping ban on business travel makes no sense at all in the context of survival, because such travel has an important role in securing the future of the very company you’re trying to help. It never ceases to amaze me how the significance.. Read more