TED has again called my attention to an outstanding information design expert. Tom Wujec works on creative innovation (ok, do you know uncreative innovation?) and visual collaboration.
As a knowledge management consultant I perceive the visual framework for business effectiveness as a framework that doesn’t contain new elements. However, the methodology relies heavily on visualized communications and is presented in a very clear way. So, the “how to” part of it is really a “visual innovation”
The so-called “knowledge maps” are collections of sketches from presentations and events. This way of visualizing a presentation is of course different from usual meeting notes. Though, the methodology doesn’t scale. You have to rely on a skilled artist as Tom is to make full use of it. And you have to like his style of doing it.
As a citizen interested in sustainability I would of course love to see the “new previously unseen visualizations” of sustainability and the unveiling of the emerging technology of EcoViz tools.
Visual Innovation
Written by Felix on July 13th, 2009Ignore Everybody
Written by Felix on July 9th, 2009
“Ignore Everybody and 39 Other Keys to Creativity“: A great book by Hugh MacLeod. Easy and funny to read. However, full of insights and food for thought if you intend to become a ‘real’ artist.
The three keys I’ve appreciated most are:
#8. Keep your day job.
#28. The best way to get approval is not to need it.
#29. Power is never given. Power is taken.
Sustainability Sells
Written by Felix on June 22nd, 2009
Yann Arthus-Bertrand introduces his wonderful movie Home at TED. ERP vendors won’t change the world alone. However, they play an important role in the socio-political game aiming at achieving a sustainable way of life. This change will not happen tomorrow. It took nearly 15 years between the sustainability discussion in academia – the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology where I studied was and is one of the leading institutions in the field – and the broad adoption by large companies. Hopefully we have reached a tipping point and the time has come to embrace sustainability.
I’m glad that my company SAP has embarked on this journey. The second Sustainability Report shows that SAP also works on the internal performance and expects a lot from business opportunities tied to sustainability. Another positive aspect of the new strategic direction on sustainability is the priority on “digital inclusion” and e.g. the collaboration with the microfinance organization PlanetFinance. Sustainability sells – in the software industry too.
01 A département to discover
Written by Felix on June 8th, 2009
The département Ain (01) in France is barely known. Even our friends in Geneva – an one-hour ride away -haven’t explored this region. We came across this beautiful landscape after having seen the movie “Le renard et l’enfant” (“The fox and the child”). Luc Jaquet shot the movie mainly in the surroundings of the Plateau du Retord where we stayed for one week. The landscape is fantastic: panoramic view on the Alps from the Col du Grand Colombier, hidden highlights to be discovered along the rivers, meadows full of various flowers and a incredible diversity of butterflies. Whoever is interested may first have a look at the tourism office of Valromey Retord.
The Lac d’Annecy where we enjoyed again sunny days during the second week is also a lovely place. Annecy has a wonderful old town worth more than a visit. The mountains which surround the lake offer a perfect ground for hikes and are a paradise for paragliders. My children particularly appreciated the four-hour hike on a overhanging path (Grand Balcon Nord) from the Montenvers station to the Plan de l’Aiguille station in Chamonix.
Bing Bang Migration
Written by Felix on May 11th, 2009Eventually, I’ve migrated
- from Windows XP to Mac OS X Leopard. I haven’t used a mac since 1992 (the good old days with e.g. Macintosh Classic). I’m really positively surprised by the user experience. It’s often “wow” in comparison to Windows.
- my domains from candan.eu to united-domains.de (a smooth process – thanks to my former and new domain hosting company)
- my webspace from candan.eu to metanet.ch. This Swiss company offers a very attractive packaged price – 9 GB webspace, unlimited traffic and databases for about 5 EUR per month. Not the kind of limitations which I encountered with candan and other German webspace hosting companies. The questions which arised during the migration were answered quickly. So, I don’t mind to recommend their services. Please mention my mediator # 905101 in case you transfer your webspace, too
- the blogging software from MovableType 3.33 to Wordpress 2.7.1
I’m happy to focus again on content, to discover new people and to say bye-bye to technological & contractual issues. Nevertheless, I’ll publish some lessons learned in one of the upcoming posts.
The Power of Less
Written by Felix on April 7th, 2009Not so sure whether the web 2.0 expo title was so powerful. I’ve barely found interesting presentations on the public website:
Tim O’Reillys keynote “Web 2.0 Five Years On” outlined nothing new. We have all already heard of harnessing collective intelligence, smart grids, gov 2.0, “build a simpler system”, “create more value than you capture” and “something that we create together” pleas.
Aaron Kim from IBM compiles some important enterprise 2.0 anti-patterns in his presentation (the content related to the anti-patterns is presented in the appendix).
Eventually, the presentation from Christina Wodtke seems to be my favourite from this series. She introduces a framework to design social websites (see below):
Britannica, Encarta, and Wikipedia
Written by Felix on April 1st, 2009
Picture by Imissthevelvetunderground (creative commons license)
Microsoft has decided to shut down Encarta. The comments on the NY Times blog post are worth to be read.
Loose sight of management tools
Written by Felix on March 30th, 2009
Image from HVargas (Creative Commons License)
Managers seem to be more reluctant to make of use tools even before the current economic crisis emerged. According to the most recent survey of Bain & Company none out of 25 tools which are relevant to senior management, topical, and measurable showed an increased usage pattern in 2008. The interesting fact, though, is that this obvious result is not even reflected in the survey report.
“Knowledge Management” still belongs to the management tools with a high satisfaction rate. However, the latest reference mentioned dates back to 2006. Five tools have been added in 2008:
Decision Rights Tools
Downsizing
Online Communities
Price Optimization Models
Voice of the Customer Innovation
Collaboration = Speed + Scale
Written by Felix on March 18th, 2009
MITWorld is another good place to explore latest thinking. So, e.g. the excellent presentation of John Chambers (CEO of Cisco) on “Building the Next Generation Company”. Thanks a lot to Jon Husband, whose blog Wirearchy (BTW: good KM blog) has pointed me to the MITWorld videos.
John Chambers is an eloquent presenter and introduces his audience at MIT to the change Cisco has undertaken in the last 2-3 years during the first 30 minutes of the talk. The enterprise-wide collaboration which has been set up at Cisco has enabled the company to now drive 26 strategic priorities in parallel in 2009 (instead of 2 three years ago).
It may not come as a surprise to a knowledge manager that John Chambers outlined the importance of a threefold approach to be successful with the transition to a collaborative company: process (CEO lead, tied to market transition goals, working groups…), technology (enable innovation, collaborative tools, …), and culture (viral, accountability, reward, enforce common processes, adopt or eliminate,…). John also talks about his personal change management experience while implementing collaboration at Cisco: from command + control to listen + trust.
Contextual information is the sixth sense
Written by Felix on March 10th, 2009
Pattie Maes and Pranav Mistry from the MIT Media Lab demonstrate a new way to access, manage and create information in daily life with a portable device. The sixth sense project shows how powerful a combination of off-the-shelf devices, smart software, and mobile information will be in the near future. Once again, a wonderful TED presentation.
