Jun 27
Now some may interpret the headline as nerves getting the better of a kid on his first day at school! But this is something entirely different.
The Financial Times was recently quoted as saying more than 86m units of the Wii have been shipped, so why aren’t we using these consoles in the classroom? The president of Nintendo is keen for the new Wii U “to fundamentally change the structure of entertainment.” Pictured to the right, the Wii U controller has a touchscreen as well as the traditional controls which can create different interactions between players. Its ability to help retain focus is another interesting point.
Because kids are seen to have a multitude of applications on the go at once – Messenger, music/radio, Facebook, school homework and more – we think they can’t focus. Nonsense I say. These kids have a laser focus, just not with the boring stuff their schools feed them. I think the time has come to fully integrate these consoles into the learning process and just watch the results. The University of Wolverhampton in the Midlands of the UK has been doing this for a couple of years with tremendous outcomes of inclusion and benefits to all parties.
Which brings me on to another timely area of debate, and that is graduation time. With so many students happy and hopeful their studies are over and looking forward to the wide world of work, have we prepared them well? Students are raised in an environment that demands one set of navigational skills and then cast out into a different world requiring a totally different skill set, left alone of course to work this out for themselves! Today’s graduates are also told to find their passion and purse their dreams. The implication is that they should find themselves first and then go off and live it, but as we know, very few people at graduate age can take an inward journey and instead need to encounter the experience to truly define the path they ultimately take – and these days, it isn’t just one path, but a series of very different walkways and careers on the way to wisdom.
Did I really plan a career in the IT arena with a ‘major’ in certification – no chance. Do I love the experience today, no question. Some call it the cart before the horse.
Jun 11
Carlota Perez, leading economist at Cambridge University and an expert in global techno-economic paradigm shifts, explains that every 70 years, a disruptive technology emerges that alters the foundations of the economy. The 5 ages of transformation to date include the industrial revolution; the age of steam and railways; the age of steel, electricity and heavy engineering; the age of oil, cars and mass production; and the age of information and telecommunications.
It interests me to see the technology changing so much and so fast. Will technology ever reach a settling point or just continue to evolve ad infinitum; it cannot be too long before it becomes a utility much like electricity and gas, and I can see just one global and seamless wireless network where every device we purchase is connected.
Technology has been a catalyst for taking away precious time – by being better connected we are working longer hours. On the train to London this week I counted as many people on their smart devices as those reading or sleeping and you can just see the frustration as we travelled through a tunnel and they lost connectivity! I look forward to when my fridge has sensors and RFID chips embedded in its doors that recognise when I am out of bread and milk and can order it on my behalf, when my camera (or phone) automatically uploads my photos to my piece of the Cloud immediately as I am taking them and my casserole tells me which ingredients go next into the pan – all so I can get back some of the previous time that technology has taken away in the first place!
So where has the week raced away to exactly? It included a long trip to South Africa for the CompTIA member conference in Johannesburg, a great networking and education event for the leading IT vendors and training companies, and then swiftly back again to host meetings with some of our largest partnerships in Europe: Zenos, the UK’s leading IT apprenticeship provider, the Oxford and Cambridge examinations board (OCR) and Intel. Intel are diversifying into some cool new areas, look forward to seeing more of that. Is there a connection between the people I met this week, regardless of location and business focus – there clearly is. Each party is looking for ways to improve the skills of their staff, customers and partners to differentiate them in the workplace. Technology appears to be accelerating change, and yet we don’t have the skills we need to even keep pace with the demands. There is a common recognition that unless we have the skilled people in place to manage and develop this technology, and to put it to effective use, we may not get the best out of it from all quarters, and quite possibly never get the time back that so many people crave.
The two fellows in this picture were idling away in the sunshine at the Lion & Rhino Park in Johannesburg earlier this week – not a care in the world as we drove past. I wonder if they heard about Steve Jobs’ announcement of the iCloud!
May 20
Gadgets are the new cool – everyone wants the latest mobile phone, iPad 2, Motorola Xoom, Samsung Galaxy and a myriad of others. In fact, at the recent CRN PartnerConnect conference at the Ricoh Arena, where we talked about cloud business opportunities and mobility, our CEO Todd Thibodeaux brought all of these devices with him in his hand luggage and showed them to the audience, which generated a combination of laughter and interest. Todd also talked about making IT cool (http://blog.comptia.org/2011/05/09/making-it-cool/) and I would like to pick up on this.
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.
May 03
I have mentioned some of these sites before, such as NeighborGoods, ShareSomeSugar and Swap, in previous posts, but this is a trend that must be taken seriously. Rachel Botsman and Roo Rogers have shared an extremely insightful view of how we are moving towards a world of sharing and renting, as opposed to owning (‘What’s Mine is Yours’ – well worth reading). It is changing a mind-set started in the 1950s of hyper-consumerism, where all our ills were swept under the carpet with just another purchase. So the old community activities and sharing were quietly eased out of the picture as we focused on number one (me, me, me). Technology is facilitating change and allowing cool sites such as ZipCar, Freecycle, thredUP, Ecomodo, Landshare and CouchSurfing to bring together people with a specific need (ie. somewhere to stay during a trip overseas) with those that have something to share (ie. a spare couch for travellers). What is most pleasing is that hard working people who gave up their leisure time and hobbies so that they could afford bigger houses and cars are now utilising the benefits of technology to claw back some of that valuable time. Back in the depression of the 1930s, President Roosevelt in the US shut down the country’s banks for a week, and many stores and practitioners were paid not in cash, but in home-grown groceries, batteries, oil and tobacco. Whilst we may not be heading back to the 30s, technology is helping to drive new thinking, where we don’t need to own a physical CD to listen to music, don’t want the DVD but want the movie; in other words, we want not the physical goods but the experience. Here is another, very relevant, quote from Bill McKibben, from his book Deep Economy: “For most of human history, the two birds ‘More’ and ‘Better’ roosted on the same branch. You could toss one stone and hope to hit them both. Now you’ve got the stone of your own life, or your own society, gripped in your hand, you have to choose between. It’s More or Better.” I like that.
Apr 07
The CompTIA Annual Member Conference (#amm11) and Colloquium event are both over. Some enlightening sessions and excellent networking for a solid 2 days. Highlights of my presentation can be found at: http://blog.comptia.org/2011/04/07/making-social-media-work-for-your-business/
My main takeaway – technology drives communities. Whilst Facebook is great and accounts for 4-5% of all the time we spend online, less obvious communities like Ravelry is what it is all about for me. Specialised groups, in this case with an interest in knitting and crocheting, bring like-minded people together. Don’t understimate the power of the knitters – there are 1.2 million members to this community. That is technology’s true power.
Mar 16
The share price of H&H Imports jumped $50 million in one day after 50 Cent tweeted about the company. Investigating further, it seems companies have worked out that celebrity endorsements can catapult their product to the headlines. Some are paying celebs anywhere from $100 – $10,000 per tweet to promote their brand. New marketing indeed, although just spotted here in the UK that the authorities are looking to clamp down on this – spoilsports!
Feb 26
Spent a day with Kyocera at their Service Director’s conference this week. One cannot emphasise enough the value of bringing people together face-to-face from different markets to interact and brainstorm. The Europeans were tough and direct, focusing on taking the business to the next level while the senior reps from Japan were very reflective and said little, although what they shared was critical. Their commitment to leading-edge learning and skills systems underline their core values in investing in their talent. Watching the human dynamics was fascinating, but they also had the sharpest sense of humour. The Japanese were easily the masters of origami, creating animals, birds and this boat from the evening menu!
Feb 18
Spent most of this week in Dubai, working with a new reseller partner to help grow the region. Only two blog posts ago, I talked about companies’ ‘secret weapons’ and this team is impressive. They surrounded us with a circle of dynamic and motivated individuals who are chomping at the bit to make a difference. I sense this partnership will do well, they are keen to succeed. I also had the most pleasant check-in experience via Emirates Airlines. I checked-in myself, printed my own luggage tag and boarding card, all at a kiosk and weigh-in counter utilising the latest technology – quick, effortless and impressive. We can all learn from this experience – I felt it was the best customer service, I had to do it all myself, yet it was more satisfying when it worked.
Feb 02
The iPhone is not just leading the way in design, but could well revolutionise shopping. Using near-field communication (NFC – short-range wireless between a chip and reader) the device could easily act as a payment system, allowing you to swipe your phone to pay bills or groceries (this happens in Japan today) or work in combination with an app to use it as the key to your car. Thanks to my friend Ian Green from Liverpool Community College, the Sunday Times and to Simon’s blog for the pieces of information that now form a mini-story (beyond just this post) – technology and collaboration at its best.
Jan 24
I love David and Goliath stories and so I was immersed in a story about independent bookshops that are bucking the trend and doing well against the giants of the e-tailing world. How? By putting to effective use their secret weapon: PEOPLE. Individuals with the specialist knowledge, people skills and personal touch to make customers want to go in and buy books, even though they are almost always cheaper online. Brilliant and encouraging for every small business.
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