Posts Tagged Trendspotting
Innovation Matters!
Innovation matters. Big time. And, it makes a great difference to organization performance. I spotted this interesting blog post on Techcrunch, showing some interesting analysis of the mobile handset industry. An analyst from Deutsche Bank, Brian Modoff, pulled off this interesting analysis, showing that despite a small share of handset units and handset revenues, Apple and RIM have done a stellar job of garnering industry operating profits share. Its a disproportionate share!
Here are the charts:
Fascinating stuff!
5 comments June 2, 2009
Employee Engagement & Global Economic Downturn
Towers Perrin has released a new quarterly report containing latest research around how are employee perceptions are being shaped in the light of the economic climate. Some of the most interesting observations from the data:
- Managing work-life balance is getting increasingly difficult with only 55% of the employees responding favorably to the issue of ‘being able to manage work and personal responsibilities.’
- Employee Engagement, a key indicator of organizational performance, has held steady through the economic downturn.
- Companies have responded well by redefining organizational structures, connecting better with customers and aligning employees to workgroup and organizational goals.
- However, employees feel more uncertain about the future and placed lower levels of confidence in the leadership.
- Not surprising at all – the “tendency to look out” has declined considerably.
Finally, the report ends with some handy suggestions on what companies can do to sustain engagement levels:
- Get leaders out front to talk with employees about the business environment and how the organization is responding, as well as the long-term vision and what the organization stands for.
- Involve employees in efforts to manage costs to help them feel like active contributors.
- Communicate consistently and candidly about both short- and long-term objectives.
- Listen and gather input from employees.
- Promote development opportunities so people can see a future for themselves worth working toward.
Truly, its these “basics” which make the difference.
- Get leaders out front to talk with employees about the business environment and how the organization is responding, as well as the long-term vision and what the organization stands for.
- Involve employees in efforts to manage costs to help them feel like active contributors.
- Communicate consistently and candidly about both short- and long-term objectives.
- Listen and gather input from employees.
- Promote development opportunities so people can see a future for themselves worth working toward.
Add comment June 1, 2009
Shai Agassi: A Bold Plan for Mass Adoption of Electric Cars
Shai Agassi, earlier a senior executive with SAP, is the founder-CEO of Better Place. In this TED talk, he blows us away with his thoughts about how we could make countries “oil-free” by 2020. He shares his passionate vision for an electric cars and a network infrastructure to enable the migration to and operation of emission-free vehicles.
Let me stop here and let’s hear from the man himself.
Add comment April 14, 2009
Talent 2.0
Let me begin with a cliche “Talent Management needs to move to the next level.” Now, what exactly is this next level? By the way, what is the current level?
Let’s say that the systems, processes and practices we have today are “Talent 1.0″. We have the antiquated recruitment systems, tired performance management tools, compensation administration, succession planning etc. all automated by heavily transactional and cumbersome software. While we have the tools and technology, the implementation is rather average. Line managers are reluctant to use these tools because these are complicated, offer little insights about talent and often appear very “admin” kind of activity. These tools are looked upon more from a “compliance” perspective rather than “business critical.”
Let’s call the next level – Talent 2.0. And I reckon a lot needs to change for us to move to this next level. A lot. So, this is how, I think, Talent 2.0 will look like:
- Firstly, we need to understand that people managers are the primary interface to talent. Inherently, many managers are not so clear about how talent management works. Simply automating the talent management processes using heavy-duty enterprise software cannot yield the desired results. HR and business will integrate much better to develop a shared understanding of the talent issues.
- Next, we need simple, yet powerful tools to stay connected to people. We plainly cannot rely on the enterprise software in its current form. Web applications like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter etc. and blogs will need to play a bigger role in communicating effectively with employees and mining rich real-time insights about employee behaviour.
- Finally, the way we build our talent pipeline would need to change. CV’s and interviews are not enough – how much can you judge a person from a piece of paper and a 45 minute interaction. People would look at hiring talent from within their social networks. There is rampant interactions and sharing of ideas within social networks and employers would know people better when they recruit from these networks.
These are just some top-of-the-mind thoughts. How do you think Talent 2.0 will look like?
2 comments March 24, 2009
An Interesting Employee Health Plan
I am no insurance whiz-kid, but, no doubt, it is a fascinating area. I find the field of actuarial science very interesting because of the way it borrows from multiple disciplines like mathematics, finance and economics. And, in many cases, some great application of behavioral economics too.
I was discussing a company’s employee benefits package with a group of people the other day. Specifically, I found their health insurance program very intriguing and couldn’t help chuckling about it.
This company is based in Singapore and has a self-administered health insurance plan i.e. the company doesn’t buy group insurance for the employees from the market, but instead provides health benefits to employees from it’s own funds. In Singapore, the medical system typically works in the following way:
- You have a health problem. You can go to a local clinic where a General Physician (GP) will try to diagnose the problem, conduct tests and suggest appropriate medication.
- If the GP’s treatment solves the problem, you are fine.
- In case the GP feels that you need to seek specialized medical advice & treatment, they would refer you to a Specialist doctor in one of the hospitals and then the patient has to take it forward from there.
- Needless to say, specialized medical care is more expensive than GP services.
The insurance plan of the organization I was talking about, reimburses 80% of the total medical expenses, if you go to the GP. And, it reimburses 70% of the total medical expenses, if you need to see the Specialists after the GP consultation. So, effectively, if you have bigger health problems, there is a lower percentage of reimbursement. One could look at this benefit structure as the company’s way to manage risks i.e. not making itself liable for higher payouts for medical bills of employees with relatively more complicated health problems. But, to me, there is a more subtle message in here. I also sense that this is a small, gentle incentive for employees to pay attention to their health and stay healthy. It is almost akin to having a small penalty if you have slightly complicated health problems.
The economics of incentives continue to fascinate me!
Add comment February 27, 2009
How Social Media Changed My Media Consumption Habits?
The term “social media” is not just a hype-word for me. The web has made far-reaching changes to the way many of us consume media. Here are the top 6 ways in which my media habits have changed.
- From a content “consumer”, social media encourages people to also create content. So, I no longer am just a consumer, but a part of the ecosystem of producers and consumers. I write articles on my blog, create photographic content, video content etc. And, it’s not that I had a major change in my life which made me a “content producer”. It’s is the very nature of the “wikipedia economy” to make people “active”, rather than “passive” in the ecosystem.
- Social media has weaned me off traditional media. I hardly read the newspaper these days. It’s quite a big “object” to hold in the hands anyway. Instead, I prefer to read all the news / blogs via Google Reader on my iPhone. It is always available, easy to use and serves me fresh content.
- Not that I am a big TV fan, but I was quite sure that people cannot imagine their lives without the idiot box. But, I can see a lot changing there. More and more video content is moving to the web (Hulu, Youtube, on-demand movies etc.). Not only this makes content available on demand, rather than fixed show timings, it is also a great way of content “discovery”, rather than being tied to the content you subscribed for. Also, there are possibilities to buy specific content that you like and watch it at your leisure on the phone or computer. So, I don’t like all shows on Discovery Travel & Living, but I can definitely buy Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations through iTunes.
- I have an audio cassette of one of my favourite artists, but I don’t know how to play it. With music moving to digital formats, we made the content more portable. The iPods provided a great interface to run through and organize your music on-the-go. And, then phones doubled up as your music player. Even more, now I don’t necessary have to store music, I can hear it streaming from the web legally though sites like Last.FM, Pandora etc. While the radio still is in fashion (somewhat), you have tons of web apps offering streaming radio.
- The social media makes the content timeless for me. So, I am free to go back to look at the content repeatedly with ease.
- Best of all, my content is no longer confined to me. It’s out there in the open – for sharing. Always available to everyone – on demand!
Many of these changes we see in this new web-driven world are very disruptive, changing attitudes, behaviour and even ways of doing business.
What changes did social media bring to your life?
9 comments February 21, 2009
IBM Going Enterprise 2.0?
Looks like IBM is taking a first web towards open collaboration – integrating services like LinkedIn, Tripit, Skype, Flickr, Salesforce etc. This, to me, is a definite first step towards re-defining the way enterprise applications and fuelling social collaboration across the enterprise. I think I am going to follow this closely.
Edit: Another piece of interesting information – “IBM Announces Lotus Notes ActiveSync Support For iPhone”. This is what I have really been waiting for. Now the question is – whether companies will allow their corporate emails to sit in employees’ personal phones? Or will companies start investing in iPhones instead of Blackberries?
What are your thoughts about this development?
Add comment January 20, 2009
Dismal State of The Indian Tourism Sector
I came across a few numbers browsing through stuff on the internet. And, I was quite shocked to see something. This is to do with the state of the Indian tourism industry. While some of these data are from different timeframes, they intuitively make sense.
As per this article in The Economic Times, India received a total of about 5 million tourists from abroad. Contrast this to the tiny island-nation of Singapore – it got over 10 million tourists in 2007 alone! I mean India is hundred times bigger than Singapore and has far too many attractions and things to see & do. The culture is rich, there are great food choices, there are the hills and the plains and the beaches and the backwaters. But, the numbers fall very short of expectations. It may be just inadequate marketing. Or it can be bad perceptions about the tourism & general infrasructure in the country. Or it can even be poor word-of-mouth from tourists who had a not-so-pleasant experience. Whatever is the case, there is an urgent need to come up with a holistic approach to tap this important revenue stream.
What do you think are the top reasons for the below par performance of the Indian tourism sector?
2 comments January 11, 2009
2008 Round-up: Most Popular Posts
Wow! Was that 2008 that just zipped past me!! Time flies.
It has been an eventful year for me. I got promoted. I left my job at Gallup India. I got married. Yay! I had a wonderful vacation in Thailand. Yay, Yay!! I joined Towers Perrin in Sing a pore. I went about Singapore. And so on.
Meanwhile, a lot of posts on this blog got quite popular. And, I thought it will be a good idea to do a quick round-up of the various things I wrote about in 2008.
- The concept of “Micro-Boredom” and how the mobile phone has become my saviour.
- My wishlist from the grand-daddy of internet – Google.
- The business case for Employee Engagement. This post got a lot of attention and was eventually published on the front page of Deccan Herald’s Career Supplement DH Avenues.
- I got myself an iPhone 3G and wondered if it is “smart-phone” enough. Subsequent fixes from Apple have resolved some of my issues with the almighty phone.
- I borrowed from some research by my company to think about “deal-structuring” for employees or how we could maximize employee RoI from their relationship with organizations.
- 2008 was the year of economic ‘pain’. I mused about how we could manage differently.
- I am bowled over by the wonderful system of ‘incentives’ in Singapore. But, why are restaurant staff here not incentivized enough to provide great service to customers?
- I became a fan of TED. Fascinating stuff. Kevin Kelly impressed with his talk on the next 5000 days of the web.
- Mumbai will not forget 2008 so easily. Neither will I. I blabbered as Mumbai took the bullets.
- I started thinking about simplifying the interfaces of enterprise applications. I think this is a big big opportunity.
- I stumbled upon an idea to convert the employee benefits system into a ‘marketplace for benefits’. I have completely given up on looking at traditional system thinking on solving this critical problem that so many organizations face. An innovative and experimental approach is more likely to lead to a solution. I am looking for organizations who would like to partner with me on such an experiment.
And, if you think, I have bored you enough with this serious stuff, go straight to my alternate blog at Tumblr to enjoy some really cool pictures, videos, quotes and fun stuff. Or meet the shutter-bug in me at Flickr. Or, just head straight to my FriendFeed page to get a snapshot of all my online activity and networks.
Here’s to a peaceful and fulfilling 2009. Cheers!
2 comments December 25, 2008
Steve Job’s Worth to The Shareholders
However, cliched it may sound, but I firmly believe that employees are the biggest asset for an organization. Though there is no definitive way of measuring the “human” value, it makes sense intuitively. I came across this article by Jeff Segal from BreakingViews, where he does some simple calculations to indicate the value of Apple’s various businesses and the value of its ever-charismatic leader Steve Jobs.
He values the Mac business at about $19 billion.
iPod business at $14 billion.
iTunes store at about $1 billion.
iPhone business at $17 billion (that’s simply wow!).
Other businesses at $11billion.
Roughly, these add up to about $60 billion dollars, which is about $20 billion less than Apple’s market cap. And, Jeff concludes, that Steve Job is worth $20 mind-blowing-billions to Apple’s shareholders. That is the premium for a truly innovative leader. In a way, it makes all the more sense for companies to get the best people and invest in them. People assets can be as big as or even outgrow the core tangible business assets.
Add comment December 19, 2008
Simplify the Business Applications’ Interface
Further to my post titled “The Bane of Systems / Processes”, I have been thinking about enterprise information systems that I see in companies around me.
Why is it that we have cool-looking, easy-to-use and feature-rich interactive interfaces for consumer web-apps (think Gmail, Google Calendar, WordPress, Facebook, Google Docs, Gtalk, Twitter etc.) and extremely boring, intimidating interfaces for enterprise apps (think Oracle, IBM, SAP etc.).
Think of your company’s information portal or expense management system or accounting package or HRIS, and you get the shivers. Why does it have to be so non-intuitive? Why do you have to plug in so many pieces of unnecessary information? Is it that consumers apps need to be simple and business apps need to be complex just for the sake of demarcation? Is it the organization’s way of saying “It’s not simple. Complexity is the name of the game. You have to learn our systems. It’s not the same as your everyday stuff”??
I am sure there are tons of clever people who can simplify these dull, complicated interfaces. Don’t we have business consultants who can conceptually simplify information requirements, consolidate data and make life easy for the millions of employees who use these systems? And don’t we have ace coders to breathe life into these concepts? Companies need to start thinking about this and embrace the simple, uncluttered and fresh look. This will go a long way in making work ‘look’ simple, friendly and interesting. There will be a sense of familiarity with the IT environment and I feel that this will be a critical performance enabler and enhancer.
2 comments December 10, 2008
Kevin Kelly: Predicting the Next 5000 Days of the Web
I have become a huge fan of www.ted.com. I came across this very interesting talk by Kevin Kelly, founder-editor of the Wired magazine, on the future of the internet. He begins with a simple, yet powerful statistic – “the web is only about 5000 days old” and then goes on to predict the next 5000 days. Some key takeouts:
- The total processing power of the web will exceed that of the human race by 2040. He does this using simple approximations and using similarities in the functioning of the human brain and the web.
- All devices (PCs, mobiles, cameras, cars etc.) are just ‘windows’ to look into the big machine called the web. Every device will be web-based and the web will own every ‘bit’.
- Media will have a common platform.
- Humans will become the extended senses of the machine!
- Data would be able to transcend websites. Eg. you won’t have to tell different social networking websites about your identity. It will be able to identify you and your friends by itself.
- Humans and the web will be co-dependent. We will be “always on.” The web will be able to provide us a complete personalized experience, provided we are completely honest with it.
- In effect, the web will become much smarter, personalized (at the price of transparency) and very ubiquitous.
1 comment November 23, 2008
