Monthly Archives: June 2011
Are you guilty of having a failure to communicate? Here’s the thing – who cares if you possess excellent communication skills if you don’t use them properly. If your command of vocabulary and the elocution of your presentation are impeccable, but they don’t advance your vision, develop your team, or otherwise add value to your stakeholders, then I would suggest your well honed skills are not as refined as you may think. In today’s post I want to address an often overlooked aspect of communications, which if not well understood, can render even the most articulate leaders ineffective – frequency. When it comes to communications, it’s not just a matter of if you send a message that determines whether it’s received, but rather how, when and why you send it that matters. I don’t know about you, but I’ve come across many a leader who just can’t seem to put … Continue reading
There have been several recent product announcements or launches that move a step closer to the future vision of computing that I began advocating two years ago. That vision that moves computing to the pocket, home, or office and envisions display and input devices relevant to the context the person is currently in. I believed two years ago and still believe that what the world needs is not more smart devices, but more flexible and plentiful dumb devices that are driven by the one smart device to rule them all – an extensible smart phone that can not only drive multiple display and input devices wirelessly, but also augment its processing and storage capabilities via wireless devices or the cloud. Here is a flashback to what I said the Apple iPhone should become two years ago: “People don’t want a fourth screen. What they want to do is extend the … Continue reading
Interview – Marjorie Dwane – Dow Corning I had the opportunity to interview Marjorie Dwane, the Business Development Group Manager in the Innovation Accelerator for Dow Corning’s Specialty Chemicals Business, about open innovation strategy, importance of an innovation culture, and . Here is the text from the interview: 1. Do you feel that companies need an innovation strategy? If so, where does open innovation fit in? Innovation needs to be pervasive and an integral part of a company’s culture. It is an inherent component of one’s overall strategy and open innovation is a tactic to help you achieve those strategies. 2. Why did your organization begin its open innovation effort? For Dow Corning, open innovation allows us greater returns from our strategic technology and business investments. To be competitive today, in our global world, open innovation is critical. Bringing together the talents, strengths and ideas of others delivers positive business … Continue reading
You are probably familiar with the concept of a gauntlet. A gauntlet in its origins meant that an individual had to pass through a narrow passage formed by ranks of soldiers who were striking the individual as he or she passed by. Originally a gauntlet was used as punishment for defeated enemies or soldiers who demonstrated cowardice. The concept of running a gauntlet go back at least to the Roman times, when Roman soldiers used a gauntlet to punish criminals in their ranks or enemy soldiers. I often compare many innovation projects to running a gauntlet, especially from the perspective of the idea. If you think about innovation in just about any company, the work seems to start with the generation of an incredibly interesting, new idea. Often the idea is novel in several respects, and has the possibility to disrupt a market space or attract a range of new … Continue reading
In the last month or so the SEC has said that it will consider changes to certain capital markets regulations, including: Raising the 500 shareholder threshold that triggers a public disclosure of financial results (and usually results in a public stock offering); Adjusting the ban on general solicitations that prohibit or restrict publicizing share offerings; and Allowing some form of crowdsourcing to raise smaller amounts of capital from a larger group of investors. (via Mashable and VentureBeat) Changing these and other rules are long, long overdue. Our capital markets operate under some regulations that are decades old – pre-Internet, pre-mobile phone, pre-lots and lots of other advances. Here are seven reasons why the markets and regulations need a dose of innovation: The current regulations let the rich get richer. Not to get all Robin Hood-y, but most start-ups only raise money from “accredited investors” (at least $1 million net worth) … Continue reading
Innovation should always deliver on a specific purpose or promise, often it simply doesn’t. It needs to be suitable to our needs; it needs to resolve a given job-to-be done. In the developed world we are consistently over-delivering innovation for many and there is a given cost to that, which we all pay for even though we often don’t really need it in the first place. Take for example, the software provided by Microsoft for its windows application, in its office versions, they all are over specified for our personal needs. The majority of these ‘sit’ on our computers taking up space and never used. This continued requirement which we are forced to constantly upgrade requires us to seek more computing power yet it is really inappropriate for most people’s needs. Perhaps with cloud computing we can see more ‘stripped down’ versions from Microsoft in the future that reduce the … Continue reading
