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Thursday, December 8, 2011

Disruptive Technology


Technology is the way we do things. Disruptive means we have changed.

Here is a disruptive technology story, from planning for the new year.

As a sales executive, I travel to client sites. For the Washington market, Alexandria Drafting Company (who Jack knows as “ADC” from when he was piloting cement trucks) had a great set of maps, either by county or the big book. I needed both since some government installations are pretty far out, like Pittsburgh and West Virginia.

Every year, first week of January, I would go to Price Club <dated> and get my new set for the year and move the previous year’s maps to my office for planning purposes. Old maps don’t hurt planning as much as they hurt arriving.

ADC was interactive. I sent them letters and later emails documenting changes in roads, and they responded in weeks and a year or two later incorporated the changes. I was part of their tribe.

Then Google Maps came out and I would chart my routes every morning. (Ignoring the first five directions. I can often find the nearest highway to home). ADC had been disrupted.

Researching this post I searched for the ADC website. Their inventory has been acquired by an aggregator, where I saw the maps I used in the New York area and New England. The last iceman always makes money.

My wife uses an iPhone. We were out in Virginia when they shut down Interstate 81. She interactively found us to our destination. My printer has been disrupted with the only compelling argument for a smartphone.

Smartphone went on my “want” list, which is pages longer than my “need” list.

How have you noticed you are effected by disruptive technology?

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Friday, December 2, 2011

Unexpected Value

I chair and attend a lot of meetings.

I attend a monthly meeting which is a huge frustration. We have an agenda, which I would rate at 25 minutes, which month after month takes over two hours.

The new leader, at his first meeting said, “I’ve never seen anything like this!” After a few months he’s been beaten into puzzled acceptance.

I got a new glimmer this week while doing some other work. If I look at the aggregate value for all the participants (even as they are decreasing), there is a big number missing. Then I figured out what it was.

If we figure in the value for “How do I look when I am saying this?” I can better see the total rewards, and they are exceptional.

What is the cost of “How do I look?” in your meetings?

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Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Flipping Education For Better



Yesterday at Cory Doctorow’s presentation, Bill Van Dyke told me about how the Khan Academy is changing education for the better.

Rather than using class time for lectures, students watch ten minute videos and do computerized exercises on their own time. When they get ten answers in a row, they move up a level. The internet teaches, tracks progress, issues achievement badges, shows areas for improvement.

What do teachers do? Khan makes the point that when teachers lecture, grade, and keep records, they spend less than five percent of their time teaching. With Khan support, they spend most of their time working with students, doing group experiments.

Khan Academy is free and approaching 3,000 online lessons. I’ll be trying some during the holiday.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

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Friday, November 11, 2011

Foundering

Stephen Chapman has an interesting post on ZDNet

The post energetically extends and embellishes the title.

Comments were divided:
  • Jimmy Wales is smarter than you and Wikipedia doesn’t need ads; and
  • Asking for donations feels like the guy who comes up to your car at a stoplight and sprays dirty water on the windshield.
Again, the comments embellish and extend commenters’ positions.

My comment was
Great idea! Ads aren't intrusive and Wikipedia has a huge reader base.
Unfortunately the point I got from this is Wikipedia is an open sourced plus founder management structure which is a pity,
  1. showing the indomitable strength of open sourced management, and
  2. the sad results of a founder who doesn't know what he doesn't know, or any limits.
    Thank you, Stephen, for an incredible lesson.

Open sourced management is a current game-changer, outperforming command and control management. There are good and bad examples of each, but open sourced is more efficient. Pick your own examples, they are out there.

Wikipedia today shows another model. Open sourced plus founder management.

New concept. We’re all equal, except the guys making the rules should be able to get away with things the rest of us can’t.

Should we call it foundering?

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Monday, November 7, 2011

It’s Not The Technology...

I was with a friend who sang the chorus of “I don’t do technology” more times than I had verses.

He wistfully wondered where all the dialing-for-dollars sales jobs have gone. I disrecall he liked them much, either.

Coincidence?

James Patterson gets much better rewards from moveable type than Johannes Gutenberg ever did.

It’s not the raw technology. It’s what you figure out to do with it.

How are you adapting technology for the world?

Next Up! BlogLab - Improve Your Blogs! Thursday December 8, 8:30 am - 1 pm. Learn more at http://bit.ly/WMRBlogLab