Often, the most profound things are the simplest.

I read an interview with Christian Louboutin who said his father gave him the best advice of his career. His father was a carpenter and once told him that to make beautiful sculptures in wood you should work with the grain. If you go against the grain, you end up with splinters. Louboutin took this as a metaphor for getting along with people.

I think that is a golden nugget of advice, especially when people, skills and talent are the future of everything.

Technology has spawned a new type of entrepreneur which allows people to work not 9-5, but 5-9 in the evening, having a side business that runs online and with an appearance that can compare with any giant out there. The little guy can compete. My point however, is that the great next idea will most likely not stem from the giant corporatioons, because these organisations are focused more on satisfying their shareholders, their green footprint and their internal systems. Most innovation, great ideas and next-gen creativity come from small groups, startups and the individual – a youngster in a corner of the south west of England or two best mates from college on the west coast of the US. We must give them a platform for dialogue and exchange – give them an opportunity to shine, because I firmly believe these youngsters, digital natives as they are, are full of ideas that may materialise into something great. The future for me is all about small countries, small organisations and individuals.

My view of the role of the big company matches something Rajesh Chandy of the Deloitte Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship referenced last week – that arguably the biggest responsibility of the CEO of these big firms is to assign time to think about the future. My personal view is that these CEOs will help all parties if they organise think-tanks, workshops and invitations to young people willing to talk ideas, and give them a chance.

Just back from a whirlwind visit to the Pearson VUE headquarters in Bloomington, Minneapolis. What a slick operation. Professional, exceptional talent working in well-organised teams to serve its clients.

A lot can be learned from watching people at work, although generally I find I pick up a lot more ideas and nuggets of information from the US when I travel there than anywhere else. How can we capture some of that “essence” and ship it home? Is it the people and their attitude, their education or just the unflinching desire to succeed? I think it is a combination of all those things, and especially the philosophy of learning by failure. The US is the only market I know where mistakes and failure are a recognised part of growing up and the learning process.

It all about continuous learning. Every discussion and every experience is an opportunity to learn something new. On every plane journey I take, I weigh myself down with books, magazines and printed articles, always capturing quotes and stories along the way. That is how I assemble the content for my presentations.

The future of IT jobs and learning? That is a little harder to predict. The world of work continues to evolve and IT jobs are moving up the value chain, combining technical with business-savvy skills to give IT a seat at the boardroom table (more of this next post). But what is absolute, is that surrounding yourself with the best people is how to make the difference, regardless of business model. That is, yet again, the one standout thing from my trip to the US. I close with a comment made by fashion mogul Tommy Hilfiger in a recent interview:

“Hiring the best, most intelligent people allows you to sleep at night. One of my advantages starting out was that I was never afraid to hire someone smarter than me.” Rock on Tommy.

Many people are commenting on the future of email this week, predicting it’s slowdown and demise. Mark Zuckerberg, of Facebook fame, declared that “we don’t think a modern messaging system is going to be email.”

Technology has increased the pace of everything. We are never offline and once we get on that treadmill, we cannot stand still. If we stop for a moment, we invariably go backwards. But whilst it needs to slow down and we need time to think and reflect, I do agree with him. Email is growing largely due to the sheer volume of new users in Asia, but for the younger demographic, email doesn’t cut it. Our kids want something faster and easier than e-mail and amongst teenagers email usage is down 59%. How often do you see kids wandering with heads down clicking away on Blackberry Messenger?

As most people know, I am a big supporter of giving youngsters a chance. At a recent event in Brussels at the EU, a minister said if every small business employed one person we would have no unemployment problem. Easier said than done of course, but I took on a few apprentices/interns at CompTIA and it made a difference. What’s more, I unearthed a couple of real diamonds with great futures ahead of them, just buy committing to giving somebody a chance. We should all do it – it is very rewarding.

A bigger issue I have, however, is these kids and their career choices. We are too easily led by the glitz and the glory of TV fame, and it is unrealistic. 25 years ago, the three primary career choices were Teacher, Banker and Doctor; today, they are Sports Star, Pop Star and Actor. This is the X-Factor generation and there will be a lot of disappointed young people out there.

Now I love technology and continue to take an interest in its evolution. More notably, since I resigned from my current role at CompTIA (my favourite place of work to date), I have had a couple of weeks to do things for myself and email has reduced to a trickle. What a joy! How I have used my time has opened my eyes to how we should work, think and be creative ordinarily. We should not have to stop work to get access to this quality time but factor it into our daily routines – I for one will be doing this at Pearson when I join.

Zenos is a quite amazing company. 400 staff, mostly young and very dynamic, but what really stands out is the camaraderie, the culture and the ethos that drives this team of people led by Jason Moss and his management team. They live to help the next generation acquire the skills that will set them on the road to a new chapter in their lives, a career IT.

I selected Ashleigh Carr as the Zenos-CompTIA apprentice of the year.  He is 18 years-old. He has Crohn’s disease. Our CompTIA A+ certification helped him find himself and a job at the Royal Bank of Scotland in IT Support. Most of 400+ audience were in tears as I presented the award to him (and we gave Ashleigh a 3D LED TV as a cool gift to go along with his award). We must never forget, this is why we exist, helping Ashleigh and others like him to get a job and make progress in the world of technology.

I will always love football, basketball and most other sports, and I will always enjoy watching the best talent grace our stadia. But this week has taught me that our inspiration comes from these youngsters, who overcome adversity to achieve results and aim high, and get the jobs they apply for. If that is our future, there is hope. Presenting at Zenos this week, and handing out this award, was my finest hour at CompTIA. Thank you Jason, Claire, Nicky, Richard and all the fantastic Zenos team.

Read an inspiring article about Steve Jobs, who has left his day-to-day role at Apple. He embodies everything that Apple has created. I particularly liked the quote, “Apple has beautiful artifacts, but what Jobs has been building is a company whose legacy is ideas.”

Another such inspiration is London-born Sean Maloney, who was one of the leaders at Intel and recently suffered a stroke that deprived him of his ability to walk and talk. He has made a great recovery and is now the chairman at Intel China. Success, companies and technologies are always about great people.

A project that impressed me recently was Adopt a Care Home, an initiative that encourages young people from schools and colleges to help the elderly get online. The saddest part of this was that residents of a care home would go downstairs in the morning to collect their post and there wasn’t any. They were used to mail as a form of communciation. This project seeks to do something about that. One great example of its success is Enid Adamson, 87, who hadn’t seen her daughter, who lives in New Zealand, for 2 years. It was terrible that she feared she may never see her again. With the assistance of this project, they now talk once a week on a large screen using Skype, a webcam and clip-on microphone.

Great story. People driving technology to make this a better place.

CompTIA UK hosted our UK Channel Community last Thursday at the ICC in Birmingham and most of us agreed it was the best meeting to date.

A community operates differently. Whilst sometimes tempted to dictate the run of play, it was more productive and more satisfying to see members of the community step up and take the lead at different times during the session, each adding their own nugget of value to the collective. Our chair, IT consultant Richard Tubb, is well respected by all, and his effortless leadership ensured everybody in the room was included, particularly with the ‘30-second Best Practice’ session, now an institution at these meetings. Adam Harris launched the legal resource centre and shared why we localised it for the benefit of our UK members, and vice-chair Lee Evans, owner of Vital Technology Group, updated the delegates on the Quality Mark we are working on.

It was also pleasing to see some new faces take the stage, such Les Billing from HMD Electronics, who led the update on the Vendor Resources Portal and my favourite session of the day, ‘Connecting with Customers’ presented by Gareth Brown, MD of Sytec. Gareth told us that simplicity is the key for customers; that we often talk in our own ‘IT language’ which customers don’t understand, and how great it was to see his company’s mantra – “We Fix IT” – get a great response from the group. This was my biggest take-away from the day: all of us must “de-jargonise” and “de-fluff” our services when we market, and talk to, customers. Great phrases!

The most fulfilling piece of all however, was seeing the members come together, engage in conversation, laugh out loud, talk about the markets, economy and trends, even about their cars, but most importantly build connections and enhance the community.

A picture is worth a thousand words, and sometimes the beauty is just to step back from the conversation and watch the magic happen.

Pupils across the UK have received their A-level results and are wondering what to do next. Like every year, we can expect that nowhere near enough of these talented individuals will pursue a career in IT.

The reason for this is surely not that IT has little to offer, or that it is too specialist, or even that it is boring, for it is none of these things. But this is how a lot of young people see it. Until we start doing something to change this perception, we will struggle to attract the required talent.

IT flies our planes, broadcasts our football matches, and records and edits our music. IT systems monitor the effects of global warming, fight terrorism, and ensure hospitals function. New innovations like the iPad and Facebook have made billions and changed the world.

None of these are dull professions and they are all areas which interest young people. They are more interesting than most office jobs, and a heck of a lot more interesting than bar work, which seems to be the fate of all too many talented young people.

But as an industry, we are seen by many 16-18 year olds as sitting in a basement with a computer. We need to change this perception and get these people, who are currently making big career decisions, excited about IT. We need to start focusing on all the exciting and varied opportunities that IT offers, and to communicate this to young people through education, careers talks and the media.

I was closely watching the exchange in the US over the debt issues and President Obama supported the Gang of Six plan to reduce trillions of debt over 10 years. In a news debate on TV, the panelists claimed it was led by somebody with whom the President had a close relationship over the years. No surprise.

Now apply this to technology and to every walk of life. Despite the new platforms and tools now at our disposal, doesn’t business still get done when people make a connection with each other and find a situation that benefits both parties? Hasn’t it always been the case, and will it not always be that way? I think so.

I do enjoy the US – such good service and huge choice of everything you care to buy. Little wonder that so much innovation stems from there. It seems to have this knack of combining ideas and people to create some of the most innovative and forward thinking applications of technology.

Look at the image above. In a Brookstone store, I found this cushion; it was a remote control embedded within the softest material. Tacky in some respects, ingenious in others, but it sells! The US has such a willingness to try things, to embrace failure as a step in the right direction; as one leading author claimed, “By failing in a project or task, that is one less mistake that can’t happen next time.”

I enjoyed being a part of the Service 800 event where the theme was excelling in customer service. I had a chance to present to the group and engaged in some interesting conversations with individuals from 3M, GE Healthcare, Lexmark, Siemens and others, as well as some quite brilliant personalities from CompuCom. Some of these great people were kind enough to share a testimonial for me (see the tab above). Europe can benefit so much by watching and learning from these service experts.

When I present to audiences about some of the trends in technology, eyebrows are always raised when I ask about engaging our young employees and utilizing social media for business. Why? The younger generation are digital natives and they live and breath the technology that so fascinates my generation. For them, it is their oxygen, a gateway to the outside world. They also understand how it works, how it connects, and how to maximize it, so why do we push back and in some cases not allow social media sites in the office during work time. My view is that we should encourage its use, and also invite the younger generation to tell us how we can build sites to target the new generation on the platforms they are so comfortable with. That is how we can tie “cool” and “IT” together, and create a new harmony in the workplace. More importantly, by doing this we make our companies a more exciting place to work and we will attract the new generation to want to work for us. Today they have a choice, and those with the skills and talent will decide whether they want to add us to their CV. They are vitally important to our success, regardless of how cool we think our company is – we must engage them on their terms, because they are both our workforce and our customer of tomorrow.

Above was the view at the Ricoh Arena from my room when I drew the curtains in the morning. What a great idea to combine corporate hospitality suites with hotel bedrooms to maximize use of the space. Another cool.