Group items tagged

article by Martin Dewhurst and Paul Willmott, September 2014 on new leadership skills required in age of new information technologies Machines force executives and senior leaders to: 1. open up their companies through crowdsourcing and social platforms within and across organizational boundaries 2. create data sets worthy of the most intelligent machines 3. "let go" in ways that run counter to a century of OD 4. executives...able to make the biggest difference through the human touch. ...questions they frame, their vigor in attaching exceptional circumstances highlighted by increasingly intelligent algorithms ... tolerating ambiguity and focusing on the "softer" side of management to engage the organization and build its capacity for self-renewal. 5. turbocharged data-analytics strategy, a new top-team mind-set, fresh talent approaches, and a concerted effort to break down information silos...transcend number crunching..."weak signals" from social media and other sources also contain powerful insights and should be part of the data-creation process. 6. ...early movers will probably gain insights of unstructured data, such as email discussions between representatives or discussion threads in social media. 7. ...dashboards don't create themselves. Senior executives must find and set the software parameters needed to determine, for instance, which data gets prioritized and which gets flagged for escalation. 8. ...odds of sinking under the weight of even quite valuable insights grow as well. Answer: democratizing it: encouraging and expecting the organization to manage itself without bringing decisions upward. ...business units and functions will be able to make more and better decisions on their own. 9. 8 will happen even as the CEO begins to morph into a "chief experimentation officer," who draws from acute observance of early signals to bolster a company's ability to experiment at scale. 10. need to "let go" will be more significant and the discomfort of s

Fascinating article on Baylor research on how internal social networking sites supported and managed within the workplace helps newcomers (younger people usually) to connect and learn from each other, interact directly with more senior people, and inadvertently cause problems for middle managers who did not want to mentor new hires and who did not necessarily have the social/technology proficiencies to participate in the SNS, Science Daily, 1/29/2013. Their conclusions showed that a "company can improve morale and reduce turnover." Researchers are Hope Koch, Baylor, Dorothy Leidner, Ph.D., Ferguson Professor of Information Systems at Baylor; and Ester Gonzalez from Washington State University. Excerpt: he study centered on a financial institution's efforts to reduce IT employee turnover by starting a social and work-related online networking site. Under the supervision of executives, the IT new hires developed and managed the site's content. Since most new hires had moved hundreds of miles to start their new jobs with the institution, they initially used the social pages as an introduction to the community. After a year or so with the organization, the more senior new hires began using the system to acclimate and mentor incoming new hires. All study respondents worked in the institution's IT department and included new hires, middle managers and executives. With less than three years of experience, most new hires and interns were men between 21 and 27 years old. The middle managers and executives were baby boomers or members of generation X. The internal social networking site helped the new hires build social capital in several ways, according to Koch. "It gave them access to people who could provide useful information and new perspectives and allowed them to meet more senior new hires and executives. These relationships set the new hires at ease during work meetings, helped them understand where to go for help and increased their commitment to the financial

Interesting article published 1/6/2014 on Second Acts for baby boomers. Quotes Marc Freedman, Elizabeth Isele (who lived in ME for a long time), and mentions Bevan Rogel. The Boomerworks online service for matching BBs with work opportunities is very interesting--wonder how they are doing? And whether we should try to ally with them? "In 1998, living in Maine, Isele created CyberSeniors, a multilingual nonprofit computer training company that eventually trained more than 28,000 seniors in 24 states. She's led numerous nonprofits over the decades and is now pushing public policy changes and forging connections between organizations to create an "entrepreneur ecosystem." That ecosystem is flourishing in Sarasota. Sarasota's Institute for the Ages, established in 2009 to change the conversation about aging as one of deficit and decline to one about enhancing lives, is a lab for companies and services that want to tap into the needs of older adults. In late 2013, the Institute launched Boomerswork.com, a web-based network to connect freelancers with companies seeking seasoned professionals for project-based work. The program started in Canada and the Institute is the first organization to bring it to the U.S. When the Institute convenes a national convention here in February, entrepreneurship and encore careers will be a large part of the agenda. In addition to a keynote address by Freedman, Isele is leading a workshop on entrepreneurship with Bevon Rogel, who runs a Freedman-related Encore Academy in St. Petersburg to help seniors find meaningful work. For Southwest Florida, which has one of the highest concentrations of seniors in the nation, the idea of an "encore" seems natural. As the rest of the country and world grays, branding this life stage as one that brings years, or potentially decades, more productivity and meaning to life has become an imperative."

great quote on how creativity--following a passion will take you through losing memory, hearing, sight, etc. by Marna Clarke on Senior Planet

Preoccupations by Jonah Stillman on millennials using smartphones to take notes during corporate meetings and how a senior staff person first chastised him (privately) but after being informed that he was using the phone to take notes, the senior staff/mentor encouraged participants to ask for notes from earlier presentations from the young man.

video (17 minutes) of Gary Jones, co-author of "My iPad for Seniors" to use the tablet to "travel the world, cook an awesome meal, listen to your favorite music, read a bestseller, or have a face-to-face conversation with your grandchild. Values the freedom that comes with it--cites learning how to ride a bike, obtaining a driver's license with getting an iPad.

Good way to release survey results in "preview" fashion to collect reactions from senior L & D leaders which were then incorporated into the report for final release. Blog post by Levi Phillips on 12/5/14. "We captured some first-time responses from L&D leaders to three simple questions at the event: 1. What caught your attention from the findings presented today? 2. What actions are you taking away from today? 3. What do you think will inspire others in your sector and/or network?"

Maryellen Weimer writes for faculty in educational settings and is focused on when collaboration crosses into cheating and how to know when students have really learned vs. mimic answers they had to real part in developing. Raises questions for me about the mindset that people carry from education into the workplace...wasn't there research on how research papers get credited with the most senior or male person first and those that followed (graduate students, less experienced faculty, women) did not get the same respect?

by Taunee Besson, CareerCast.com senior columnist about David Bell who successfully used networking to land a new job. His 6 tips: Ask people for info, not a job; start with people you know, then who they know, and finally strangers after you have practice; know what you want to say ahead of time, but don't have a canned speech; recognize you will have good and bad days; prepare a specific topic for each discussion; if your contact refers you to other people, let them know how it turned out.

Development of Next Avenue by PBS, a new internet-based forum to engage baby boomers before they become decrepit. Excerpt: Next Avenue, PBS' first venture to begin on the Internet rather than broadcast TV, was conceived and developed at Twin Cities Public Television (TPT) in St. Paul.

Very good, practical article by Marco Albani and Kimberly Henderson, McKinsey & Company, July 2014 on companies and social groups joining forces to protect the environment. The seven tips to make such alliances successful work for all partnerships/odd couples IMO. 1. ID clear reasons to collaborate. "The effort needs to help each partner organization achieve something significant. Incentives such as 'we'll do this for good publicity' or 'we don't want to be left out' are not sufficient." -Nigel Twose, director of the Development Impact Department, International Finance Corporation, World Bank Group 2. Find a fairy godmother "It is important to have a core of totally committed, knowledgeable people who would die in a ditch for what the organization is trying to achieve." -Environmental NGO campaign head 3. Set simple, credible goals 4. Get professional help "It is very important to have an honest broker. The facilitator must be neutral and very structured and keep people moving along at a brutal pace. You need someone who can bring things to a close." -Darrel Webber, secretary general, Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) 5. Dedicate good people to the cause "If a company like ours believes something is strategic, then we resource it like it is strategic." -Neil Hawkins, corporate vice president of sustainability, Dow Chemical LOVE #5--HAVE SEEN "COLLABORATIONS" FAIL IN STATE GOVT. BECAUSE GOOD PEOPLE AND SENIOR LEADERSHIP WERE NOT BEHIND IT. 6. Be flexible in defining success "Partners think that collaboration will change the world. Then it doesn't, and they think that it failed. But often the collaboration changed something-the way some part of the system works and delivers outcomes. It is a matter of understanding the nature of change itself." -Simon Zadek, visiting fellow, Tsinghua School of Economics and Management, Beijing 7. Prepare to let go "I've been absent from the FSC since 1997.

A network of regional leaders committed to serving the common good in Silicon Valley. They have created a Fellows program that brings together demonstrated leaders to explore process of collaborative leadership that can strengthen their capacity to address difficult issues. Graduates of the program are called Senior Fellows and they act as networked servant leaders

summary of main findings from just released CompTIA study on millennials' expectations of technology, telecommuting in the workplace, etc. 

article by Ron Ashkenas on difference between cooperation and collaboration and how to set up and negotiate successful collaborations, April 20, 2015

LA Times article by Matt Pearce, January 20, 2013 on infrequent Office MAx customer who received a solicitation from Office Max with his name on it followed, by "Daughter Killed in Car Crash." How did the company get the information and why did it appear on the envelope because the recipient had lost his daughter in a car crash a year before?

Allyson Kapin writes about nonprofits taking advantage of online social media, December 31, 2015.  Includes new ones such as Medium, Periscope. 

Really wonderful article on nonprofit leadership development and how the lack of it leads to much external executive hiring and high turnover in these roles

article by Jayne Cravens, February 20, 2015 on virtual volunteering moving from asynchronous to synchronous interactions, virtual identities including pictures, lack of recognition by some nonprofits of how they are using virtual volunteers.