I recently interviewed Martin Roll, the founder and CEO of VentureRepublic, a leading strategic advisory firm out of Singapore. Roll is the author of the ground-breaking bestseller Asian Brand Strategy: How Asia Builds Strong Brands.
Here are his 10 steps to building an Asian brand:
1. The CEO needs to lead the brand strategy work
2. Build your own model, as not every model suits all
3. Involve your stakeholders including the customers
4. Advance the corporate vision
5. Exploit new technology
6. Empower people to become brand ambassadors
7. Create the right delivery system
8. Communicate!
9. Measure the brand performance
10. Adjust relentlessly and be ready to raise your own bar all the times
For details, read the interview at the Zyman Institute of Brand Science website >>
Jonathan Schwartz on Open Source
“…fighting against things like open source is, in a way, fighting gravity.”
in this article on Always-On >>
Carr’s Sixth Force: Public Interest (Are you listening, Wal-Mart?)
Since we’ve been talking about Wal-Mart this week, I figured we should look at the big picture. Nicholas Carr’s article on the 6th force (take that, Michael Porter!) is a good start:
“What’s the greatest strategic challenge facing Wal-Mart today? It’s not competition from other retailers. Although the world’s biggest merchant certainly keeps a close eye on rivals like Target and Best Buy, its domination of the industry seems secure for the time being. It’s not pressure from suppliers. Wal-Mart has most makers of consumer packaged goods at its beck and call. And it isn’t the whims of buyers. Shoppers show little desire to abandon their favorite store and its dirt-cheap prices.
No, Wal-Mart’s biggest worry today is the public interest.”
Great insight:
“As the experiences of Wal-Mart and other companies reveal, this traditional approach ignores the changing nature of the public interest and its expanding influence over companies’ financial results. The public does not want a company’s charity. It wants a chunk of its profits. The public interest, in other words, now expresses itself as an economic interest — the public has become an active competitor in the struggle to seize the bounties of the marketplace. As a result, the way businesses think about strategy needs to change. If a company clings to the old assumptions, it may be putting its future at risk.”
I don’t think the public wants “a chunk of its profits” tho; I think the public wants businesses to be fair- fair to the community and country it is in. Think economic justice. Not just social justice.
Read Carr’s essay >>
PS – Does your company have an active ecoimagination?
Nicholas Carr: The Editor beats the Wisdom of the Crowd
Nicholas “IT Doesn’t Matter” Carr talks about human editors versus algorithms in his post, “The editor and the crowd“:
“As the comparison of Memeorandum and Slashdot shows, the software-mediated crowd is a poor replacement for a living, breathing, thinking editor. But there are other things that the crowd is quite good at. The crowd tends, for instance, to be much better than any of its members at predicting an uncertain future result that is influenced by many variables. That’s why stock market indexes beat individual money managers over the long run. It’s easy to understand why. First, there are limits to the ability of any single individual to understand the complexities in how a large number of variables change and influence one another over time. Second, every individual’s thinking is subject to idiosyncracies and biases – some conscious, some not. The crowd aggregates all individuals’ knowledge about variables while balancing out their personal biases and idiosyncracies. It’s not the “wisdom” of crowds that makes crowds useful, in other words; it’s their fundamental mindlessness. What crowds are good for is producing average results that are not subject to the biases and other quirks of human minds.”
and
“That’s also why search engines work pretty well with algorithms (until, at least, they begin to be gamed by individuals using their minds): They produce the result that best suits what the average searcher is looking for. You don’t want generally used search engines to reflect individual biases. Indeed, one of their main jobs is to filter out those biases – and revert to the average.”
But, says Carr:
“But that’s also why algorithms don’t work very well as editors. With an editor, you don’t want mindlessness; you want mindfulness. A good editor combines an understanding of what the audience wants with a healthy respect for the idiosyncracies of his own mind and the minds of others. A good editor doesn’t aim to provide a bland “average result”; he wants to wander widely around the average, at times even to strike out in the opposite direction altogether. The mindless crowd filters out personality along with idiosyncracy and bias. The mindful editor is all about personality.”
I couldn’t agree with Carr more. And that’s why one of my latest projects is 100% human powered; powered by personality. I could have used software and algorithms to do the heavy lifting, but decided in favor of people. Thanks Nick!
Chris Trimble: Building Innovation Ecosystems
The rate at which new ideas are generated is directly related to the effort invested in enriching social networks.
Says Chris Trimble in his Fast Company column:
“Entrepreneurs believe in the power of networking. Many are very good at it. They become good because they recognize that most people with interesting notions usually have only one piece of a puzzle. Often unexpected combinations of ideas, or chance meetings of people with complimentary perspectives, ignite genuine breakthroughs.
“Aspiring innovators from large companies are handicapped in the networking game — not because they lack skill, but because of the nature of their jobs. Once a business is proven and profitable, the name of the game is to make operations as efficient as possible. Employees at all levels are pulled into ever more specialized roles. Repeated tasks are joined together by rigorously documented processes. As a result, each manager’s web of connections increasingly mirrors the way today’s work is organized. Most connections are with managers with closely related specialties, who share similar perspectives, shaped by the demands of the same customers.”
There is one other point Chris – I call it the “closing of the corporate mind”. It’s not just about people being comforatble with the status quo. It’s about people hiring and surrounding themselves with their own kind. A tribal thing, perhaps? So the desis hang out with the desis, the Chinese with the Chinese, the Hicks with the Hicks, the golf-playing execs with other golf-playing execs, repugs with repugs, etc.
And as your colleague VG says, travel!
Trimble also mentions the “vast differences between communication networks and trust networks. Communication networks are the kind that are useful at the front-end of the innovation process because they enable the sharing of ideas. The back-end of the innovation process depends on trust networks, which require much heavier investments in time, energy, and goodwill.
Still boils down to people and trust, people! Put a value on that Mr. CFO Bean-Counter!
P.G. Wodehouse & India
In a country where most books in English sell fewer than 1,000 copies and 5,000 constitutes a bestseller, Penguin sells up to 70,000 Wodehouses a year: part of a thriving “retro-market” that ranges from Agatha Christie to Modesty Blaise.
Why? Read the article: “Why India fell for the code of Wodehouse“
Let me give you a list of what we read (for fun) when we were kids at St. Columba’s (from first grade to 10th). It sure was British, beta!
– Enid Blyton’s Five Find Outers, Famous Five, Secret Seven, Malory Towers, Saint Clare’s
– Captain W.E. Johns’ Biggles
– Richmal Crompton’s William
– Frank Richards’ Billy Bunter
– Agatha Christie
– and of course, P.G. Wodehouse
We also read Tin Tin and Asterix, the usual Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew junk, and the Bobsey Twins. Add to that a weekly Commando comic, the occasional Beano, and see what a mixed-up world we grew up in!
It’s a straight line from Noddy to P.G. Wodehouse.
One more thing – we did NOT read Shakespeare, unless we had to.
Weep, Deming, Weep: Why US Automakers Can’t Learn
Is Deming crying?
It seems like the US Auto industry is intent on destroying itself. See for example, Doug Smith’s “Removing The Deck Chairs From The Titanic”. Smith says:
“GM still doesn’t ‘get it’ when it comes to the value side of it’s products. As previously noted, GM invested heavily in product design and manufacturing flexibility — that is, the capacity to move quicker to provide new products. It can now bring 15 new products to market quicker than ever before. And, what are the deck chair managers doing with this flexibility. 13 of the new products will be re-designs of full size SUVS.”
Aaargh…
What is wrong with these people? What happened to Deming’s 14 points? It was Deming who said: “If you want to ruin a company, send it American management”…
So what’s going on? IndustryWeek‘s John Teresko talks about the Toyota Way, and asks two questions:
1) How does Japan’s leading automaker keep getting better?
2) What keeps competitors from emulating that performance?
While U.S. manufacturers in many sectors have used practices from the Toyota Production System (TPS) to boost performance substantially since the mid-’80s, they have used it improperly, experts say. Instead of embracing TPS as an overarching philosophy, they have used it piecemeal as a toolbox. These companies’ leaders must revive their strategies to mimic Toyota’s in order to compete, which means reversing the popular notion that lean and other TPS-derived concepts are tools to be used selectively to achieve departmental milestones.
Read the whole thing. Look for this fun quote: “cost reduction is not a strategy unless you want to commoditize or go out of business.”
P.S.- For those of you who have forgotten Deming, here are his 14 points:
1. Create constancy of purpose toward improvement of product and service, with the aim to become competitive and to stay in business, and to provide jobs.
2. Adopt the new philosophy. We are in a new economic age. Western management must awaken to the challenge, must learn their responsibilities, and take on leadership for change.
3. Cease dependence on inspection to achieve quality. Eliminate the need for inspection on a mass basis by building quality into the product in the first place.
4. End the practice of awarding business on the basis of price tag. Instead, minimize total cost. Move toward a single supplier for any one item, on a long-term relationship of loyalty and trust.
5. Improve constantly and forever the system of production and service, to improve quality and productivity, and thus constantly decrease costs.
6. Institute training on the job.
7. Institute leadership. The aim of supervision should be to help people and machines and gadgets to do a better job. Supervision of management is in need of overhaul, as well as supervision of production workers.
8. Drive out fear, so that everyone may work effectively for the company (see Ch. 3).
9. Break down barriers between departments. People in research, design, sales, and production must work as a team, to foresee problems of production and in use that may be encountered with the product or service.
10. Eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets for the work force asking for zero defects and new levels of productivity. Such exhortations only create adversarial relationships, as the bulk of the causes of low quality and low productivity belong to the system and thus lie beyond the power of the work force.
– Eliminate work standards (quotas) on the factory floor. Substitute leadership.
– Eliminate management by objective. Eliminate management by numbers, numerical goals. Substitute leadership.
11. Remove barriers that rob the hourly worker of his right to pride of workmanship. The responsibility of supervisors must be changed from sheer numbers to quality.
12. Remove barriers that rob people in management and in engineering of their right to pride of workmanship. This means, inter alia, abolishment of the annual or merit rating and of management by objective.
13. Institute a vigorous program of education and self-improvement.
14. Put everybody in the company to work to accomplish the transformation. The transformation is everybody’s job.
Remembering Bob Marley…
One love…
Marshall Goldsmith: The Need to Win
“One of the most common challenges that successful people face is a constant need to win.”
Marshall Goldsmith says that the more we achieve, the more we tend to want to “be right.”
At work meetings, we want our position to prevail.
In arguments, we pull out all the stops to come out on top.
Even at supermarket checkouts, we scout other lines to see if there’s one that’s moving faster.
He has a very, very good point.
Gary Hamel on Management Innovation
Gary Hamel’s back. This time he’s looking at “management innovation” in his latest HBR article titled – “The Why, What, and How of Management Innovation.”
A management innovation, says Gary Hamel, creates long-lasting advantage when it meets at least one of three conditions:
1. It is based on a novel principle that challenges the orthodoxy
2. it is systemic, involving a range of processes and methods
3. it is part of a program of invention, where progress compounds over time
Few companies have been able to come up with a formal process for fostering management innovation, says Hamel. The biggest challenge seems to be generating truly unique ideas. (No duh!)
Hamel gives us three examples of management innovation:
1. Harnessing employee intellect at Toyota.
2. Building a community at Whole Foods.
3. Growing great leaders at GE.
This time Hamel doesn’t mention Enron… (like he did in his first edition of Leading the Revolution) 🙂
So what is management innovation?
A management innovation can be defined as a marked departure from traditional management principles, processes, and practices or a departure from customary organizational forms that significantly alters the way the work of management is performed. Put simply, management innovation changes how managers do what they do.
And what do managers do? According to Hamel, managerial work includes:
• Setting goals and laying out plans
• Motivating and aligning effort
• Coordinating and controlling activities
• Accumulating and allocating resources
• Acquiring and applying knowledge
• Building and nurturing relationships
• Identifying and developing talent
• Understanding and balancing the demands of outside constituencies
Says Hamel:
“In a big organization, the only way to change how managers work is to reinvent the processes that govern that work. Management processes such as strategic planning, capital budgeting, project management, hiring and promotion, employee assessment, executive development, internal communications, and knowledge management are the gears that turn management principles into everyday practices. They establish the recipes and rituals that govern the work of managers. While operational innovation focuses on a company’s business processes (procurement, logistics, customer support, and so on), management innovation targets a company’s management processes.”
And:
“A systematic process for producing bold management breakthroughs must include:
1. Commitment to a big management problem
2. Novel principles that illuminate new approaches
3. A deconstruction of management orthodoxies
4. Analogies from atypical organizations that redefine what’s possible”
Not too bad, eh? But how does one get managers to overcome their fear of failure? Most leaders in the Fortune 500 did not get to the oxygen-deprived board room on their talent for risk taking. I feel most got there for NOT taking risks, but rather for simply obeying orders and executing well on given tasks. Hamel does not address this problem, which I believe plagues all (ok, 99%) large companies.
While Hamel looks for management innovation, I’m still looking for innovative managers (now that’s an oxymoron).
Still, this is an article worth reading twice. And Hamel is back. I can’t wait to read the “forthcoming book.”
Almost forgot, Hamel also gives us a toolkit (a powerpoint slide set) you can download here >>
One last thing:
Hamel lists a dozen of the most noteworthy management innovations from 1900 to 2000.
1. Scientific management (time and motion studies)
2. Cost accounting and variance analysis
3. The commercial research laboratory (the industrialization of science)
4. ROI analysis and capital budgeting
5. Brand management
6. Large-scale project management
7. Divisionalization
8. Leadership development
9. Industry consortia (multicompany collaborative structures)
10. Radical decentralization (self-organization)
11. Formalized strategic analysis
12. Employee-driven problem solving
Adds Hamel:
“Losing out are Skunk Works, account management, business process reengineering, and employee stock ownership plans. There are more recent innovations that appear quite promising, such as knowledge management, open source development, and internal markets, but it’s too early to assess their lasting impact on the practice of management.”
Bill Gates on Knowledge Work
In his latest column in Newsweek, Bill Gates talks about knowledge as an adjective- as in knowledge economy, knowledge worker, knowledge networks etc.
He mentions Tom Davenport’s definition of knowledge: “Knowledge is information combined with experience, context, interpretation, and reflection.” .
And here’s where he says something interesting: “We’ve gone a long way toward optimizing how we use information, we haven’t yet done the same for knowledge.”
Says Gates: “Researchers at Microsoft and elsewhere are developing technology that can unobtrusively “watch” you working, then make suggestions about related subjects or ideas. Interestingly, even if the software makes a bad guess, it can still be valuable in helping spark new ideas. Computer scientists are also making progress against a long-held dream of “intelligent agents” that anticipate your needs and provide just-in-time information that’s relevant to the work you’re doing. Experimental programs known as reasoning engines can test your ideas against common-sense logic, spotting flaws in hypotheses and acting as “virtual subject experts” to help guide your thinking.”
I have an idea for Gates in this regard, but I don’t know how to get it to him (maybe I’ll ask my buddy Tom Davenport). But the knowledge in a knowledge network resides in the heads of people. Why not connect people to other people? Or better yet, to virtual communities on that topic? I’ve said too much already.
Execution: Laurence Haughton on the Art of Follow-Through
Laurence Haughton speaks softly, but his message comes through loud and clear:
Fact 1: 1/2 of all a company’s strategies and initiatives will fail to make it from the drawing board to the front lines
Fact 2: Because 2/3 of all managers follow through using tactics prone to fail
Fact 3: And only 1 out of 10 companies have the tools to address this critical breakdown
A management consultant, lecturer, and business writer, Haughton’s latest book, It’s Not What You Say… It’s What You Do – How Following Through at Every Level Can Make or Break Your Company was published by Doubleday in 2005.
In 2001 Haughton co-authored It’s Not the Big that Eat the Small… It’s the FAST that Eat the Slow– a Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and New York Times bestseller that was translated for sale in 26 countries around the world.
Here’s the interview I’ve been promising to post on the site.
What made you write this book?
I wanted to know why half of all initiatives fail, and what leaders at every level can do about it. Of course, I had preconceived notions of what I thought the problems were, but was surprised to find that almost all of them were dead wrong…
Can you give us an example of that?
The biggest preconceived notion I had was that there wasn’t enough accountability in the world, and that why things didn’t get done. I used to think that people didn’t take completing their work seriously or their bosses didn’t make the consequences serious enough.
I have a very high degree of what psychologists would call conscientiousness, which can make me a real pain to be around. So that’s why I thought I got things done, and others didn’t.
So you’re the worrywart for everyone…
Also a nag. I used to look to blame people. I’ve visited companies that work that way, and I’m now convinced that’s dead wrong.
So the concept that all the world needs is accountability and more dire consequences, or the opposite view- a motivationalist view that all you need is more attaboys! Whichever side you want to be on, they’re both wrong.
The key is that you have to find the line between enough and too much accountability. The line is not that hard to find. I lay out a prescription in the book. But it depends on the type of project you’re working on. For example, is it more important that everyone communicates, coordinates and cooperates or is it more important that you know to last scintilla who it is that specifically dropped the ball that caused an interruption. Pinpoint accountability is totally unproductive in certain industries- the airline industry, for example. Research shows us that managers who take accountability too far, especially in businesses where follow through requires rapid responses to unpredictable changes, chip away at each individual’s willingness to look past personal interests and work with others to make sure what’s expected gets done.
In the book you’re saying that execution is critical. And yet you take Larry Bossidy to task.
It was Linda Lockwood at Charles Schwab who lifted the veil from my eyes about the Larry Bossidy’s memo in his book. She’s the one who said it was the “same old corporate gobbledygook.” Bossidy’s memo did not set clear expectations. And Linda wondered aloud: “How could managers tell when they had achieved Bossidy’s objectives?”
I can tell you that woke me up.
Then I started exploring the difficulty that people have when directions aren’t clear.
My book describes 4 building blocks that were developed after research showed us that 66% of managers use tactics that are prone to fail. And the tactics fall under the 4 building blocks I describe in my book. I use the 4 building blocks to make it plain, to explain step-by-step what to watch out for.
It’s so important that you have measurable objectives but even more important, you’ve got to have clarity. It was Einstein who said that if a scientific theory can’t be explained to a child it’s probably worthless.
Think of the stuff that you read – the obtuse language, the jargon – in the marketing world and HR world for example.
The team leader’s job is to make people understand, not confuse them. Not everyone has to be as smart as the leader as Linda pointed out, but everyone has to understand where we’re going as a team.
So let’s talk about the 4 building blocks…
The four building blocks are:
1. Having a clear direction so everyone knows exactly where they’re headed
2. Matching the right people to each goal
3. Getting the right level of buy-in (you have to outmaneuver the CAVE people)
4. Unlocking the individual initiative in every member of the team
Simple enough. But it’s far more complicated than you’d expect.
The first building block is clear direction that says that if you talk to people, more that half the time people can’t see a connection between what they’re doing and what the corporate objectives are. Why cant; they. It starts with the fact that as leaders, as managers we’re not clear. Sometimes we’re trained to say things in a vague and general way instead of doing what Douglas Smith says- make success measurable. Be specific, have some idea about how you measure the results you want and how the accountability gets divided in the team. To begin, just ask yourself- “is what I told them to do measurable, is it specific enough?”
In the book I describe the executive who is told by a 16 year old kid that “sometimes it seems like you’re writing to impress yourself.”
It’s our job to make sure that what we say makes sense and is understood at every level of the company- by both platinum level players and nickel level players, and everyone in between.
We all need to recognize that we have empathy inside us, and that we can up our ability to empathize. In the book I talk about reading between the lines. Take the world of the high-end restaurant business. A very competitive business, low barriers to entry… so how do you compete? How do you compete with people who are paid $12-15 dollars an hour?
In the book we tell readers about Richard Coraine of the Union Square Hospitality Group in Manhattan. They have created a process of “enlightened hospitality” which I describe as a real-time sixth-sense of their customer’s expectations, followed by an effort to exceed those expectations. Coraine tells us the story of how a reservations person noticed the guest whose valise had a broken grip (he held it under his arm so his client wouldn’t notice). While the guest entertained his client over lunch (at a quiet table selected by the host), the valise is sent around the block and the strap is reattached. When the guest comes to check out, the host hands him the bag by the grip to show him its fixed, without a word being exchanged. That’s “enlightened hospitality.”
The key is to “put yourself in someone’s shoes.” That’s what Coraine has created, a recipe for that includes smarts, heart, and courage. There’s another story he tells us in the book as well, but you’ll have to read it.
You mean the one about “chicken soup and crackers” after midnight?
(Laughs) Yes.
You mention how critical it is to make accurate assessments. How does that work?
Here’s something else that keeps coming up: “We tried that and it didn’t work, so we tried something else.”
How many times do executives try a change program and when it doesn’t work, they simply come up with another change initiative. This is a huge problem.
But some companies have the courage to stay the course. Take the case of SSM Health Care, another company I outline in the book. After 5 years of spending money and seminars and intense work on total quality management, a senior executive gets asked “Are we still doing CQI?” CQI was the continuous-quality-improvement initiative they had introduced five years earlier.
To their credit, they realized they had been “mucking around.” So they dug in. Something was missing. And it came out that the problem was that they were not making accurate assessments. They were trying to solve problems before they did a decent stab at the root-cause.
Ask “why” 5 times. The tendency is to try to fix something as soon as you see something wrong. Problem is people try to fix problems quickly, but they don’t fix the root cause. Why? Because they didn’t ask why enough.
The Five Whys is not new. It comes to us from Taiichi Ohno, the creator of the Toyota Production System. He believed that if managers wanted to start with a clear and accurate assessment of any problem, they had to ask why five times before trying to create a solution.
I also mention the case of Bill Zollars at Yellow Transportation– he wanted the company to start exceeding customer expectations by making sure their clients were very satisfied, not just satisfied, mind you, but very satisfied. He found out that the assessment his VP of Marketing had made of customer satisfaction was way, way off. And he found this out because he delved deeper. He checked the accuracy of their assessments.
Let’s talk about choosing the right people – the second building block…
Sure – I come from a background where you hire for experience. While researching this book, I found out that sometimes it’s more important to hire attitude over experience.
There’s another myth out there that says that anyone can accomplish anything if they just put their mind to it. There’s so much junk science out there that I had to really to clear the weeds, to find out what really works.
For example, research tells us those managers who make sure there’s the right fit between people and their goals before they take action double the likelihood of success.
There are people who are perfectly suited for the New York Yankees style of management. Others aren’t.
Sometimes the HR bureaucracy doesn’t give you the time. I talked to a manager who said they had 45 minutes to interview each candidate, which was simply not enough to get to know someone before hiring them.
HR sometimes is its own worst enemy.
Now at IKEA we have something different. Why? Because Pernille Spiers-Lopez, the president of IKEA North America. spent four years as manager of human resources for IKEA North America before being named president. She doesn’t have to put up with the nonsense. They’ve totally reinvented the HR function and it’s a beautiful thing to see. I did not talk about this in the book, but the IKEA hiring process gives them a competitive advantage.
[Note: Working Mother magazine named IKEA North America one of the 100 best companies for working mothers and singled out Spiers-Lopez for its Family Champion Award. The company provides benefits not widely offered retail workers in the U.S: full medical and dental insurance for those who work as little as 20 hours a week, including coverage for domestic partners and children; paid maternity leave; tuition assistance; a 401(k) matching plan and flexible work schedules. Spiers-Lopez was named president in 2001, when sales staff turnover was 76%. The next year these and other policies helped the company slash turnover to 56%.]
HR people are dying to get a seat at the strategy table. They have to be invited to the table because they bring something to the table. Traditional HR does not.
The key again is to connect personal goals to the goals of the organization. And sometimes that doesn’t just happen. As a leader, you have to make it happen. And if HR is going to be relevant, its got to become better at identifying and discovering talent.
And you’re only going to make that happen if you can outmaneuver the CAVE people.
Who are these CAVE people?
Anand Sharma at TBM Consulting Group gave me that acronym.
CAVE stands for Citizens Against Virtually Everything.
Just as our bodies have an immune system that assaults everything new and unfamiliar, organizations have their own auto-immune response that impulsively and instinctively attacks everything new or different- the CAVE people. They work overtly and covertly to undermine the change initiative your company is depending on. In the book I outline the strategy for outmaneuvering them, to give your change initiative a fighting chance of success.
Can you give us a hint how? How do you outmaneuver the CAVE people?
Anand Sharma was very kind to share these insights with our readers. I go into the details in the book, but essentially:
1. Kick off your change initiative with a “wow” event.
2. Blitzkrieg them (follow through so fast the CAVE people don’t have time to organize resistance)
3. Create disciples from the rank and file
4. Take your success story straight to the top
The bottom line is to execute, you simply have to get past the CAVE people.
Why are some people so motivated? And others so unmotivated? And why do incentive plans not work? That’s something I examine in the book as well.
This is all great, actionable knowledge for executives who want to get things done. We should let people buy the book to get the full story. Thanks for all your time.
Thank you.
A must read for everyone from the CEO on down…
The Irrelevance of Walter Cronkite
MWW’s Michael Kempner tells us:
“When I hear his [Walter Cronkite’s] comments today, it strikes me that there is no better example of how materially the media has changed since the 1960’s. Today, no one person and no single television network newscast own the hearts and minds of the American public. Cronkite’s words and the parallels to the power of his 1968 comments clearly illustrate how diffused and muddled the media has become since that time. Today, it’s more likely that public opinion will be shaped by a group of unknown bloggers, Internet coverage, and 24 Hour Cable News than a talking head on ABC, NBC or CBS. While network news still has an important place in informing and influencing opinion, they are now but one piece of the puzzle. Today, public opinion is more likely to be shaped by a person’s favorite ideologically attuned media outlet or by “group reporting,” where scores of media chase each others’ stories, than by a singular and powerful voice.”
Kempner’s comment made me think- aside from the fragmentation of media, people don’t listen anymore. They are closed to voices outside their comfort zone. Not only is there no conversation, there is no attempt at dialogue. Either/Or. For us or against us. And this explains why people who listen to Pat Robertson won’t hear any other voices, period.
I’m guilty too. I listen to the voices I want to hear, and discount others. I’m not saying everyone should have equal time. But it helps to have different perspectives. Edge perspectives.
Is there anything or anyone that unites us? Events, perhaps, like Katrina or the World Cup. But even with Katrina, we saw the bifurcation of reality based on politics.
Chris Charron: The Digital Experience
Chris Charron defines a digital experience as products and services integrated end-to-end under the control of a single application. Digital experiences have three parts: 1) available content and services; 2) personal control devices; and 3) portable players and peripherals. All of these parts come together under one application in a single business model.
This is a good start, but it is a “business-view” of experience. Digital experiences are not restricted to on application or a single business model. That’s why businesses are having such trouble dealing with digital experiences.
Digital experiences are transcendent experiences, and go beyond content and services. The part Chris Charron leaves out is interaction. And digital interactions span applications, devices, and most importantly, business models.
Human beings are not business models.
Ask Walker Percy about that! [Hat-tip to William Dunk]
John Hagel: Consumer Electronics Show – in Shanghai?
“I expect that we may not see CES in Las Vegas that much longer. Any bets on when it will move to Shanghai?”
The global innovation landscape is changing. And Hagel’s got his finger on the pulse.
Doug Smith: What Do People Who Work at the IRS Stand For (Part 2)?
Doug Smith lets the IRS have it:
“Ought the people at the IRS care about and seek to reduce cheating? Of course. But, when employees at IRS go home at night and tell their family about ‘what their shared values stand for’, do they seek to say, ‘we believe so strongly in catching cheaters that we accept and indeed defend the need to make poor, innocent and law abiding people even poorer.’ ”
Strong stuff >>
I’m amazed at Doug Smith’s constant and unrelenting fight to set things straight. Take a look at www.douglasksmith.com. See what I mean?
Will Steve Jobs Start Blogging?
Jobs in a Newsweek interview:
Your new iLife software has a blogging application. When will you start your own blog?
(Laughs.) “After I get a few days of rest.”
He’ll never get a few days of rest. So the answer is no, the man will not be blogging!
P.S. – Here’s a great commencement speech by Jobs. >>
China’s 5 Surprises + 1
From S+B:
Five facets of business in China may surprise most outsiders:
1. Local entrepreneurs are interested in producing global brands, not just low-cost commodities
2. China has become a hotbed for rapid innovation
3. Executives from around the world are moving to China for the long haul
4. Good management and transparency are starting to count more than patronage, at least in some sectors
5. China is becoming a catalyst for growth in emerging markets throughout the developing world.
Let’s add another surprise:
6: China is becoming a market for high-end luxury items once thought to be “exclusive” for the western elite and Middle-East oil-barons.
Also:
“Because they are in such a hurry to make a place for themselves, and because it is still early in the life cycle of their ambition, Chinese entrepreneurs tend to give the impression that they don’t care much about quality. However, that is not universally true. Many of them recognize the trade-offs among cost, quality, and time that exist for any startup, and they have explicitly chosen designs and processes that sacrifice quality for the sake of speed and cost savings.
“But this doesn’t mean that China will always be a nation of commodity enterprises; indeed, many Chinese businesspeople know the price of a Motorola phone in Chicago or a pair of Nike sneakers in Manhattan. They ask themselves, “If I can make these things, why can’t I sell them for higher prices?” Some of them are already laying the groundwork for the evolution of their industries from low-cost producers of shoes, handsets, and components to branded enterprises.”
Read the entire article here.
This will come back to bite almost all of our western “outsourcers.” See “Innovation Blowback” by JSB and JH3 >>
EmoryLeadership.org: Blogging on Global Leadership and Performance
Emory’s Peter Topping has just started blogging at EmoryLeadership.org.
His blog is about leadership and it discontents… Here’s his POV:
“I work with managerial leaders every day. My emphasis is on helping them find ways to enhance their leadership effectiveness incrementally – based upon their current leadership context.
“My purpose in offering this blog is to engage in dialog about how to do that at the highest possible level – what are the optimal ways to enable individuals to be better managerial leaders?”
Andy Grove: “Engage and then plan…”
Harvard’s Richard Tedlow tells us the Andy Grove story in Fortune:
“At Intel he (Andy) fostered a culture in which “knowledge power” would trump “position power.” Anyone could challenge anyone else’s idea, so long as it was about the idea and not the person–and so long as you were ready for the demand “Prove it.” That required data. Without data, an idea was only a story–a representation of reality and thus subject to distortion.”
An example? How Grove managed his prostrate cancer treatment:
“…when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1995, Grove found himself in the position of most patients: frightened, disoriented, and entirely reliant on the advice of doctors. Their advice was straightforward: Surgery was the best option, and that was pretty much all there was to it.
“Was it, though? It took very little to discover that there was much, much more to it. There were alternatives to surgery. No surgeon advised him to take them seriously. But the expert opinions, Grove soon determined, were just that–opinions, based on little if any hard data. Data did exist. What Grove found most shocking is that no one had done the hard work of pulling it together. Plainly, Grove would have to do it himself.
“The patient, in effect, became his own doctor.”
and-
“What Grove found most appalling, in the end, was the utter fixity of belief among doctors who failed to separate knowledge from conventional wisdom. Even the doctor who carried out Grove’s procedure was captive to it. “If you had what I have, what would you do?” Grove asked him at one point. The doctor said he’d probably have surgery. Confounded, Grove later asked why. The doctor thought about it. “You know,” Grove remembers him saying, “all through medical training, they drummed into us that the gold standard for prostate cancer is surgery. I guess that still shapes my thinking.”
On technology and strategy:
“His (Grove’s) speech was a strong statement about strategy. Understanding comes from action. So “be quick and dirty,” he said. “Engage and then plan. And get it better. Revolutions in our industry in our lifetime have taken place using exactly this formula. The best example is the IBM PC”–created on the fly by a team in Boca Raton.”
There’s more… Read the article >>
Book Value Deal: Jimmy Carter + Doug Smith
If you’re interested in values and business sustainability, you should check out this double book deal on Amazon.com. For the rest of this month, you can buy On Value and Values by Doug Smith together with Our Endangered Values by Jimmy Carter and save $20.76…
See the details on Doug Smith’s site >>
Jakob Nielsen: Google, Yahoo are Leeches!
Usability guru Jakob Nielsen says: “search engines extract too much of the Web’s value, leaving too little for the websites that actually create the content.”
And: “In the long run, every time companies increase the value of their online businesses, they end up handing over all that added value to the search engines. Any gain is temporary; once competing sites improve their profit-per-visitor enough to increase their search bids, they’ll drive up everybody’s cost of traffic.”
According to Nielsen, “liberation from search dependency is a strategic imperative for both websites and software vendors.”
What does he mean? He means that companies need to focus on search engines for initial acquisition, but then bring them directly to the site- i.e. keep ’em coming back for more.
Again, his words: “The question is: How can websites devote more of their budgets to keeping customers, rather than simply advertising for new visitors?”
Nielsen offers the following suggestions:
– Email newsletters
– Request marketing
– Affiliate programs
– Newsfeeds
– Stick your URL onto any physical product you sell
– A hardware component that’s hardwired to connect to your site’s service
– Mobile features
I have a powerful answer: ’tis double loop marketing!
Read Nielesen’s post >>
Bonus: an interview I did with Jakob Nielsen years ago now…
Wild Rumor: Ballmer Out, Clinton In @Microsoft
This one is so wierd, it could be true. Andy Abramson says that Bill Clinton will replace Ballmer, or perhaps get on the board. I believe it’ll be the latter.
Why? Because Bill Clinton can’t focus on just one thing. After all, he’s gotta fight AIDS, help with the Tsunami+Katrina recovery, build a sustainable energy strategy for the US, get Hilary ready to run for President, his Global Initiative, and his Small Business Initiative… and that’s just in the a.m.
See what I mean? No way he’s going to waste his time as president of Microsoft.
That said, he’ll do great on the board. He can go up against Al Gore who’s on the board at Apple. Frankly, I see Bechtel hiring him as an advisor before Microsoft. Now would that be ironic.
Besides, look for Google to hire him away from Microsoft! 🙂
Bill Gates Worries about Big Blue, not Google
“The biggest company in the computer industry by far is IBM. They have the four times the employees that I have, way more revenues than I have. IBM has always been our biggest competitor. The press just doesn’t like to write about IBM,” said Gates in an interview on Wednesday ahead of his keynote speech at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas…
Wait till the Google-Desktop takes over MS-Office.
What’s Google-Desktop? It’s how Google will take over your PC via the web. Fits in nicely with a $100 PC don’t you think?
What does a web-based desktop look like? Take a look at this.
OK, I admit it has a ways to go, but I know Google will do this right. They’re going to add an “open-office” component to the web-desktop. You’ll be able to do your word-processing, your spreadsheets, your presentations, your email, your calendar, your RSS subscriptions, your blog, your IM, your VOIP, your video-conferencing, your downloading, your podcasts, your news, your search, and your shopping all at Google.com. That’s going to be the real Google Pack!
And that’s why AOL went with Google, not Microsoft.
Microsoft will become a B2B software company, and yes, IBM will be the biggest competitor in that space.
Michael Porter: The Relationship between Innovation & Living Standards
During the 1990s, Americans found a way to do what seemed no longer possible — grow the economy, create jobs, and increase the standard of living, without driving up inflation. Much of the credit goes to the nation’s ability to develop and commercialize new technology. The result: one of the most robust periods of economic expansion and prosperity of the past century.
Today, the nation is experiencing an economic downturn. While fiscal and monetary policies pump dollars into the economy to boost the level of activity, innovation infuses the economy with growth-incubating new ideas, new products, services, and technologies. National policies and national investment choices have much to do with the growth and capacity of the American economy. For innovation, however, the real locus of innovation is at the regional level. The vitality of the U.S. economy then depends on creating innovation and competitiveness at the regional level.
In healthy regions, competitiveness and innovation are concentrated in clusters, or interrelated industries, in which the region specializes. The nation’s ability to produce high-value products and services that support high wage jobs depends on the creation and strengthening of these regional hubs of competitiveness and innovation.
Led by our buddy Michael Porter, the “Clusters of Innovation Initiative” examined five regions around the country: Atlanta, Pittsburgh, the Research Triangle, San Diego and Wichita.
One key point: “Growth is not the same as prosperity. Growth is only desirable if the standard of living of citizens rises. High growth per se often leads to a rising cost of living that erodes prosperity and degrades natural resources and physical infrastructure that support quality of life.”
My question: are there virtual innovation clusters out there as well? Clusters tied by purpose, but not geography? Is there a way to create and strengthen a virtual innovation cluster?
Read the report, and let’s talk >>
Abramoff, Business Ethics, and Peter Drucker on Decision-Making
Find me an honest politician, and I will spare this world. We looked everywhere, but could not find an honest politician.
I’m kidding here, but just barely.
“Abramoff is the central figure in what could become the biggest congressional corruption scandal in generations,” writes the Washington Post.
And today there’s another story: apparently “the U.S. Family Network, a public advocacy group that operated in the 1990s with close ties to Rep. Tom DeLay and claimed to be a nationwide grass-roots organization, was funded almost entirely by corporations linked to embattled lobbyist Jack Abramoff, according to tax records and former associates of the group.”
And:
“Two former associates of Edwin A. Buckham, the congressman’s former chief of staff and the organizer of the U.S. Family Network, said Buckham told them the funds came from Russian oil and gas executives. Abramoff had been working closely with two such Russian energy executives on their Washington agenda, and the lobbyist and Buckham had helped organize a 1997 Moscow visit by DeLay (R-Tex.).”
“The former president of the U.S. Family Network said Buckham told him that Russians contributed $1 million to the group in 1998 specifically to influence DeLay’s vote on legislation the International Monetary Fund needed to finance a bailout of the collapsing Russian economy.”
Everyone knows how corrupt politicians are. These days, it seems worse than ever.
But now we are looking at the Enronization of Business, all business.
If competitive advantage is gained through “bribes,” then why should business ever play straight?
Is corruption the core-competence of successful businesses? What happened to the rule of law?
From Exxon to Wal-mart, businesses have lost their way. In their hurry to boost shareholder value, they are destroying their brands and their future.
They are playing in Box 1 and ignoring Box 3.
So why is this happening? Why are so many smart businesses (and politicians) being so dumb?
The answer comes to us from the late Peter Drucker:
Drucker tells us this story about Alfred P. Sloan Jr. who is reported to have said at a meeting of one of the GM top committees, “Gentlemen, I take it we are all in complete agreement on the decision here.” When everyone around the table nodded in assent, Sloan says: “Then I propose we postpone further discussion of this matter until our next meeting to give ourselves time to develop disagreement and perhaps gain some understanding of what the decision is all about.”
Drucker’s point is that “unless one has considered alternatives, one has a closed mind.” Decision-making for Drucker is best only if based on the clash of conflicting views, the dialogue between different points of view, and the choice between different judgements.”
The first rule of decision-making is that one does not make a decision unless there is disagreement.
Alas, few business leaders or politicians tolerate dissent in their ranks. In fact, they work hard to eliminate nay-sayers.
And that is the root cause of all this corruption. Not money, but bad choices, bad decisions. OK- perhaps it is money after all.
Vijay Govindarajan on Strategy & Getting a Global Mindset
Where American education excels is in critical thinking, imagination, creativity and unstructured problem solving. People from India, and also China and Japan, have the basic skills drilled into them, “and when they acquire the knowledge taught at American business schools, the combination is dynamite.”
That’s Vijay Govindarajan (VG) explaining how East meets West and increasingly how West will have to meet the East.
Govindarajan has taught more than 3,000 students in his 20-year career at Tuck, and he has specific advice for the area’s high school students: “Learn languages, they open up your mind to different possibilities. Take courses in public speaking to build your level of confidence. Really focus on education, especially science, math and technology, and travel,” he said.
Is travel education? VG seems to think it is.
Read this article and listen to this audio interview on strategy.
Note his Box 1-2-3 freamework. According to VG, strategy is a competition for the future, not the present.
Box 1: Manage the Present
Box 2: Selectively Forget the Past
Box 3: Create the Future
Most companies are stuck in the present- Box 1. They spend their time in Box 1 and think they’re doing strategy.
It’s about continuous improvement (linear performance) vs. breakout performance (non-linear). Listen to his example about Hasbro- the family entertainment company. Who has time to play Monopoly for a half a day?
Again, listen to this interview. What happens when children go older younger– a non-linear shift in Hasbro’s market. By focusing on the tweens- learn how Hasbro creates a whole new business with Video Now… Box-3 thinking.
Roots and chains… Fertilize your roots, but break your chains.
Nice language from VG. But how do you re-invent Monopoly?
What about Kodak? VG tells us why Nokia and HP are the biggest player in digital cameras.
How can companies succeed in strategic innovation? See Ten Rules for Strategic Innovators: From Idea to Execution
How to Create Dysfunctional Teams
From The Five Dysfunctions of a Team
Dysfunction #1: Absence of Trust
Strategy for Overcoming:
• Identify and discuss individual strengths and weaknesses
• Spend considerable time in face-to-face meetings and working sessions
Dysfunction #2: Fear of Conflict
Strategy for Overcoming:
• Acknowledge that conflict is required for productive meetings
• Understand individual team member’s natural conflict styles, and
establish common ground rules for engaging in conflict
Dysfunction #3: Lack of Commitment
Strategy for Overcoming:
• Review commitments at the end of each meeting to ensure all team
members are aligned
• Adopt a “disagree and commit” mentality—make sure all team
members are committed regardless of initial disagreements
Dysfunction #4: Avoidance of Accountability
Strategy for Overcoming:
• Explicitly communicate goals and standards of behavior
• Regularly discuss performance versus goals and standards
Dysfunction #5: Inattention to Results
Strategy for Overcoming:
• Keep the team focused on tangible group goals
• Reward individuals based on team goals and collective success
Makes sense, right? It’s not quite so simple.
A manager in a large Fortune 500 company once gave everyone on the team (yours truly included) a copy of “Who Moved My Gouda?” as a substitute for addressing the real issues affecting performance. Was I inspired or what?
Message to management: do not go out and buy copies of a book for your team and expect to solve anything.
I think the real key to teams working well is a sense of shared purpose. Of course, results matter… which is why we all need to study the secrets of successful strategy execution >>
Joe Vitale: How to Write a Press Release to Get Attention
Just before the last US presidential election, I asked Joe Vitale to write a product press release for one of my clients. The product was a political toy- a frisbee for dogs- one for Kerry-bashers, and one for Bush-bashers.
Here’s what he wrote:
Who Would Your Pet Vote For?
New Online Poll Lets Pets Decide Next US President
If you can’t decide who to vote for this November, there’s a better way to make a decision than flipping a coin: Let your pet decide.
“This race is going to the dogs anyway,” says the three mysterious men in Arizona who created the world’s first polling booth online for pets at http://www.xxxxxx.com
“We thought we would simplify the process by creating a poll where our pets can go vote,” they explain.
The creators also developed a way to determine if your pet is a Republican or Democrat. There are twenty categories of statements. For example:
If your pet likes to display affection in public, it may be a Democrat. If it doesn’t like to show affection, it may be a Republican.
If you pet sues incompetent vets, it may be a Democrat. If it always gets the best in vet care, it may be a Republican.
“We didn’t stop with just the poll,” says the creators. “If your pet wants to get out some aggression, it can get one of our chewable Frisbees and tear the heck out of it.”
It’s a cloth Frisbee with a caricature of either George Bush or John Kerry that has the international sign for “no” across the face. There’s a navy-blue border with stars, and a squeak toy inside.
“People may find it comforting to chew on one, too.”
Who will the pets decide should be our next President?
Watch for the results at http://www.xxxxxx.com
*** end ***
The results? In 48 hours we got 12 responses, 8 for national radio-talk shows. Part of it was the product, part of it was the “is your pet a Democrat or a Republican” angle I dreamed up, part of it was the distribution of the press release. But the most important part was the way in which Joe Vitale captured your attention with words. It was a press release that had to be read.
Copy is king. Hypnotic copy builds kingdoms.
Mars vs. Venus: How Men and Women Use the Internet
Here are some highlights from a new report from Pew Internet and American Life which shows how men’s and women’s use of the internet has changed over time.
The percentage of women using the internet still lags slightly behind the percentage of men. Women under 30 and black women outpace their male peers. However, older women trail dramatically behind older men.
Men are slightly more intense internet users than women. Men log on more often, spend more time online, and are more likely to be broadband users.
In most categories of internet activity, more men than women are participants, but women are catching up.
More than men, women are enthusiastic online communicators, and they use email in a more robust way. Women are more likely than men to use email to write to friends and family about a variety of topics: sharing news and worries, planning events, forwarding jokes and funny stories. Women are more likely to feel satisfied with the role email plays in their lives, especially when it comes to nurturing their relationships. And women include a wider range of topics and activities in their personal emails. Men use email more than women to communicate with various kinds of organizations.
More online men than women perform online transactions. Men and women are equally likely to use the internet to buy products and take part in online banking, but men are more likely to use the internet to pay bills, participate in auctions, trade stocks and bonds, and pay for digital content.
Men are more avid consumers than women of online information. Men look for information on a wider variety of topics and issues than women do.
Men are more likely than women to use the internet as a destination for recreation. Men are more likely to: gather material for their hobbies, read online for pleasure, take informal classes, participate in sports fantasy leagues, download music and videos, remix files, and listen to radio.
Men are more interested than women in technology, and they are also more tech savvy.
Still, the data shows that men and women are more similar than different in their online lives, starting with their common appreciation of the internet’s strongest suit: efficiency. Both men and women approach with gusto online transactions that simplify their lives by saving time on such mundane tasks as buying tickets or paying bills.
Men and women also value the internet for a second strength, as a gateway to limitless vaults of information. Men reach farther and wider for topics, from getting financial information to political news. Along the way, they work search engines more aggressively, using engines more often and with more confidence than women.
Women are more likely to see the vast array of online information as a “glut” and to penetrate deeper into areas where they have the greatest interest, including health and religion. Women tend to treat information gathering online as a more textured and interactive process – one that includes gathering and exchanging information through support groups and personal email exchanges.
Read the complete report here >>
William Dunk: Systems on the Edge of a Nervous Breakdown
Says Dunk:
“The world of broken systems is also a world of broken communication where citizens will have to be ingenious beyond belief to fight entropy. Broken systems turn ordinary citizens into guerilla fighters.”
Read Dunk’s brilliant “letter” here >>
Better yet, subscribe:
Simply send an email to join-globalprovince@lyris.globalprovince.com. Leave the subject field and the body of the email blank. You will automatically be subscribed to the Global Province.
Clayton Christensen: The Innovator’s Battle Plan
Here’s a quick look at a slice of Christensen’s book- Seeing What’s Next.
According to Christensen, the more interesting scenarios occur when there are asymmetries—important differences of motivation or skills. Asymmetries of motivation occur when one firm wants to do something that another firm specifically does not want to do. Asymmetries of skills occur when one firm’s strength is another firm’s weakness.
In this excerpt, he discusses three topics:
1. How asymmetries power the process of disruption
2. How to identify the company with the shield of asymmetric motivation and the sword of asymmetric skills on its side
3. How to identify circumstances in which a high-potential disruptive development will prove disappointing, ending in either a brutal fight or incumbent co-option
See also my archived interview with Clayton Christensen.
The Draw: World Cup 2006
Print this out and stick it in your wallet. My predictions are in bold 🙂
GROUP A
Germany
Costa Rica
Poland
Ecuador
GROUP B
England
Paraguay
Trinidad & Tobago
Sweden
GROUP C
Argentina
Ivory Coast
Serbia & Montenegro
Holland
GROUP D
Mexico
Iran
Angola
Portugal
GROUP E
Italy
Ghana
USA
Czech Republic
GROUP F
Brazil
Croatia
Australia
Japan
GROUP G
France
Switzerland
South Korea
Togo
GROUP H
Spain
Ukraine
Tunisia
Saudi Arabia
Most Admired CEOs for 2005
Burson-Marsteller and the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) report on the “most admired” CEOs for 2005.
The 2005 CEO Capital™ study asked more than 600 global business influentials in 65 countries to write in which CEO or chairman they admire most in the business world today.
Result? Bill Gates, Microsoft’s chairman and chief software architect, came out as the world’s most admired business leader. The CEO/chairman rankings appear below.
format: Rank CEO/Chairman Company Country
1 Bill Gates Microsoft U.S.
2 Steve Jobs Apple U.S.
3 Warren Buffett Berkshire Hathaway U.S.
4 Michael Dell Dell U.S.
5 Richard Branson Virgin Group U.K.
6 John Browne BP U.K.
7 Carlos Gohsn Nissan Motor & Renault Japan/France
8 N.R. Narayana Murthy Infosys Technologies India
9 Jeffrey Immelt General Electric U.S.
10 Rupert Murdoch News Corporation Australia
11 John Bond HSBC Holdings U.K.
12 John Chambers Cisco Systems U.S.
13 Jorma Ollila Nokia Finland
14 Terry Leahy Tesco U.K.
15 Lakshmi Mittal Mittal Steel Netherlands
Several interesting characteristics about the world’s top 15 most admired leaders surfaced:
1. Despite the predominance of American companies among the top four most admired leaders, more than half (nine of 15 or 60 percent) represent other regions — UK (4), Finland (1), Netherlands (1), Japan/France (1), India (1) and Australia (1).
2. Eight of the top 15 leaders (53 percent) are company founders.
3. All of the global most admired are insider CEOs (CEOs who have been with the same company for three years or more).
4. No female CEOs or chairmen were chosen.
Hmmm… I wonder how many of these CEOs will mess up in 2006? I can’t say I think any of them will. But Gates has the potential to lose big in the next three years.
My vote goes to Ricardo Semler. And keep an eye out for Eric Schmidt!
Eric Schmidt’s 70 Percent Solution
In an interview in Business 2.0, Google’s CEO explains the magic behind Google’s success: 70/20/10.
What is 70/20/10? It’s how they spend their time at Google:
– 70 percent on the CORE BUSINESS (AdSense, AdWords, Google Search)
– 20 percent on RELATED PROJECTS (Froogle, Google Desktop, Google Local, Google News, Google Print, Google Stocks, Google Toolbar, Google Video)
– 10 percent on NEW BUSINESSES (Blogger, Google Mini, Google Movies, Google Reader, Google Talk, Google Wi-Fi, Picasa)
Here’s how Schmidt describes it:
“…how it works for management: We spend 70 percent of our time on core search and ads. We spend 20 percent on adjacent businesses, ones related to the core businesses in some interesting way. Examples of that would be Google News, Google Earth, and Google Local. And then 10 percent of our time should be on things that are truly new. An example there would be the Wi-Fi initiative — which I haven’t kept up with myself. God knows what they’ve done in the last week. I’ve been too busy on core search and ads.”
There are some more interesting things in the article. Read it here >>
For more on the Google R&D process, read my post: Google’s Product Development & Management Process Revealed >>
“Golden Rules” at the End of the Year
Business 2.0 does a nice job of executive soundbites:
Surround Yourself With People Smarter Than You
Chris Albrecht, CEO, Home Box Office
George Steinbrenner, owner, New York Yankees
Remember Who You Are, Not What
Brad Anderson, vice chairman and CEO, Best Buy
Make Hiring a Top Priority
Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft
If You Think You Can’t, You’re Right
Carol Bartz, CEO, Autodesk
Make Your Customers Your Sales Force
Marc Benioff, CEO, Salesforce.com
Reinvent Yourself. Repeat.
Alex Bogusky, executive creative director, Crispin Porter & Bogusky
When People Scr*w Up, Give Them a Second Chance
Richard Branson, founder and chairman, Virgin Group
Check With the Wife
Po Bronson, author, The First $20 Million Is Always the Hardest and What Should I Do With My Life?
There Can’t Be Two Yous
Warren Buffett, chairman and CEO, Berkshire Hathaway
The Customer Should Always Be Happy
John Chambers, CEO, Cisco Systems
Don’t Be Interesting — Be Interested
Jim Collins, management consultant; author, Built to Last and Good to Great
He Who Says It, Does It
Simon Cooper, president and COO, Ritz-Carlton
Treat your customers like they own you, because they do.
Mark Cuban, co-founder, HDNet; owner, Dallas Mavericks
and more…
John Hagel: Unbundling Time Warner
Three years ago, strategy guru John Hagel was urging Time-Warner to:
– Divest the distribution business and retain the content business.
– Create audience segment business units to address specific audiences that are economically attractive and fit with some of Time Warner’s existing properties – some natural examples: business executives, sports enthusiasts and teen-agers.
– Assign content businesses to report to specific audience segment business units (e.g., Sports Illustrated would report to the sports enthusiast business unit) or establish content production businesses as shared services units (e.g., Warner Brothers movie studio) to support the targeted audience segments
– Build distinctive overarching audience-centric media brands aggressively
– Invest in businesses and skill sets to deepen database marketing capabilities
– Acquire businesses selectively to broaden share of attention and share of wallet within targeted audience segments and develop licensing relationships to access an even broader range of relevant resources to serve target audience segments.
Read his latest blog post on the topic >>
Eric von Hippel: Democratizing Innovation
Eric von Hippel is the Professor of Management and Head of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Group at MIT’s Sloan School of Management. Here’s a downloadable video of his April 2005 lecture on “Democratizing Innovation.”
What’s it all about? From the description:
“If you have ever come up with a work-around or improvement for a balky product only to find that it performs better than the original, you are not alone. Eric von Hippel proffers multiple examples where an ordinary user, frustrated or even desperate, solves a problem through innovation. His research found innovative users playing with all manner of product: mountain bikes, library IT systems, agricultural irrigation, and scientific instruments. Often, manufacturers keep at arm’s length from these inventions. He describes the Lego company “standing like a deer in headlights” when technologically adept adults discovered they could design their own sophisticated Lego robots. User communities arise, freely communicate with each other, advance ideas and sometimes even “drive the manufacturer out of product design,” according to von Hippel. This widely distributed inventing bug is a good trend, believes von Hippel, because users “tend to make things that are functionally novel.” Not only is it “freeing for individuals” but it also creates a “free commons” of product ideas, parallel to the more restrictive world of intellectual property governed by less creative manufacturers.”
And here’s his downloadable book: Democratizing Innovation >>
Mark Cuban Shreds NYTimes’ “Journalistic Integrity”
Laurence Prusak [“Lorenzo”] told me recently he’s studying the “democratization of knowledge.” I’m going to tell him to look at the “democratization of media” as well.
He can start by checking out Mark Cuban’s blog. Cuban’s had two run-ins with the NYTimes, and both times the reporters have chosen to mischaracterize Cuban. Well, the “blog-maverick” doesn’t take this lying down; instead, he just blogs about it here and here.
Finally, he asks: “NYTimes Sunday Business or Bloggers. Who has higher standards?”
Another step in the slow march towards the “democratization of media” ? I think so.
Unfortunately, the news media in the US is a joke. See my previous posts:
– Fantasy News: The Great Uncyclopedia
– Small Business Offshoring about the WSJ
– Koppel Steps Down: The End for Nightline?
The business of news is business. They’re not interested in the truth. Leave it to the poets to go after the truth. See Harold Pinter’s Nobel Lecture: The Pen Against the Sword. And of course, we’re going to ban the poets from the Republic (following Plato’s advice). Did you know that Gabriel Garcia Marquez isn’t allowed to step on US soil? Bet you Harold Pinter won’t be given a visa either.
Mark Cuban is a foot soldier for a bigger cause than he realizes. He’s fighting to preserve integrity and, in the bigger picture, democracy.