Think about the things that you truly value in your life. Your family, your friends. Your experiences. The things that make you feel alive. How many of those things do you quantify? My hunch is that the answer is probably none of them, for most people. Why, then, in our organisations and institutions have we … Continue reading The value of anything
Category: Themes
In my Cloud-based, multiple device world of work, skipping freely from one software as a service to another, it's sometimes difficult to remember that most people's working life simply isn't like this. In the past seven days I've had conversations with people from two organisations where the default position for access to online services (including … Continue reading Issues of trust, competence and a nailgun
I originally published this in early September when I was still technically working at GDS. At the time I was asked to edit it as it was thought that it was "too political". Rather than edit, I withdrew it. I'm no longer there, so thought it worth republishing... I'm just coming to the end of a … Continue reading Public sector
There are few things in the tech industry these days as pervasive as the Gartner Hype Cycle. And I'm done with it. Why? Why done with something that through its commercial success and ubiquity has obviously proved its utility? Because I think it perpetuates the "sudden invention" myth that stymies so many people from thinking … Continue reading I’m done with the Hype Cycle
I found myself chatting to a few folk about the IBM Watson artificial intelligence thing at a lovely event organised by Slalom Consulting. Being in that mild state of belligerence that only a couple of glasses of a nice red can give, I was a bit dismissive of the undoubted achievement that the Watson team had … Continue reading Britain’s Got Robots
A while ago I heard someone describe the fundamental problem with modern office design as being that office workspace designers design workspaces that would work perfectly well for offices that housed office workspace designers. Unfortunately most of us aren't office workspace designers. That thought has been bouncing around my head in recent weeks as I … Continue reading Designed for (my) life
It's easy to glibly assume that technology is relentlessly getting better. How often do we stop to assess how true that assumption actually is? I'm currently re-reading John Seely-Brown and Paul Duguid's 2000 book The Social Life of Information. The second chapter looks at the rise of intelligent agents, or bots, which seems somewhat timely given the … Continue reading The rise of the Knobots
I'm quite often heard calling a distinction between social media and social networks. The two terms seem to be used interchangeably, but for me there is an important difference: social media is what organisations do, based on traditional mass media models of communication around primarily broadcasting; social networks are what we as individuals do, following the long tradition … Continue reading Enterprise Social Media
One of the themes that is recurring in my #sharingorg research project is that of there being two distinct modes for collaboration within organisations. The Optimisation mode is the one that comes most naturally to big organisations - it's the direct descendent of Adam Smith's thinking, and is about delivering improvement through process and (continual) … Continue reading Three reasons for open plan offices not working
Lots of product announcements out of Microsoft yesterday. Most of them reinforcing the idea that everyone wants everything to be a PC. As I write this I'm standing on a packed commuter train. In the carriage around me, in the hands and on the laps of the people around me, I can see: 2 Macbooks … Continue reading The scale of the challenge
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