Trends in the Living Networks

The story of my life: reflections on how my interests were shaped

2009-07-06T12:42:18Z

I just discovered that an extended profile piece on me that appeared in Inside Knowledge magazine in October 2006 is now available online under the title The Knowledge: Ross Dawson.

It is fascinating to me to read it a few years later and consider what has and hasn't changed. It provides an extremely good overview of my life story and how my work interests have been shaped. It also picked up on my personal interests such as improvisational music and recording as well as my family.

Please have a read of the full article if you're interested - it's a good story. Below are a few quotes from me taken from the article.

“The network approach to open innovation is very powerful, especially when you can uncover the nodes, find out how these domains are connected and how you can link people more usefully,” he says. “Some people don’t understand the idea of open innovation. They had better get it soon as you haven’t a hope if you rely solely on your own internal innovation capabilities.”

...

“What I’ve seen is that one of the ways to draw on the best resources around the world throughout the innovation chain – from conception to development to commercialisation – is through ethnic and country dispersion. As people immigrate they still have deep roots in their native countries and have global networks that are a key source of innovation.”

...

“While this [networked consulting model offered by Future Exploration Network and Advanced Human Technologies] isn’t a new business model it brings to bear a lot of my thinking, ideas and practice from the past 12 years, and offers a real alternative to the traditional consulting firm. Rather than choose a company because it has good people, go to an organisation that can access people whether they are inside or outside the company.”

...

“Change has been rapid and we can see that social media is now a key part of the landscape. The fundamental issues for media companies are about creating content in different formats, distributing it through new channels, accessing audiences and generating revenues.” Using systems approaches to understand these industry shifts is another focal point in Dawson’s field of vision. “By bringing multiple parties together to look at the enablers and roadblocks you can collaborate and map a path that will bring about change.”

...

“Knowledge and relationships are inextricable. If a relationship does not have a knowledge component then it’s a commodity. There must be mutual knowledge: an organisation must have knowledge of its customers and they must have knowledge of the business. You create value beyond simply delivering a product or service when you make clients more knowledgeable by, for example, helping them make better decisions. It’s about human connections, not just digital flows.”

...

“Gregory Bateson, an anthropologist from the last century, said that if we have a single perspective on anything then we know it is fundamentally flawed. We can only really understand and relate to our world through multiple perspectives, which we can get from different people, languages and physical viewpoints. This relates to how relationships in a knowledge context give you multiple perspectives and a richer view, which result in more effective decision-making and analysis.” Some of Bateson’s thinking is embedded in neuro-linguistic programming, techniques that Dawson studied – and have become implicit in everything he does – to better understand the way we think.

...

“Everybody was looking internally at their employees and finding processes to leverage their knowledge. There was very little talk of how businesses touch clients, suppliers, regulators and the outside world.” To address this gap Dawson set up Advanced Human Technologies as a platform for working with networks and relationships. He also dedicated his first book to the subject. “It was a fairly new idea, but people picked it up as it was so obvious. Today, in a world of web 2.0, business process outsourcing and globalisation, people accept and understand it implicitly.”

...

“Few companies actively support some of the key determinants of high-performing knowledge workers,” he says. “One of their major characteristics is that they actively build networks. The knowledge management movement has helped build yellow pages tools and knowledge broker roles, and most companies see the value in networking events that bring high-potential people together. What I don’t see, however, is a broader or more structured approach where companies encourage people to reach out across departments, divisions and organisational boundaries and coach them on how to build these networks.”

...

“Writing books is a big part of who I am,” he says. “I have a long list that I want to write but am almost certain that the next one will be on supplier management. In a global world and modular economy, how can we find, work with and build relationships with the best people, organisations and resources available? This will be a fundamental differentiator in the future.”

Influence in launching start-ups – who do you go to?

2009-07-05T08:23:38Z

One of the most important applications of influence is in launching start-ups. This is often a make or break situation – you have a great opportunity to get attention (and on the back of that revenue) when you launch a new company. If it doesn’t work and you don’t get much attention at that point, it doesn’t mean you never get another chance, but it’s going to be a lot harder when you’re yesterday’s news.

The New York Times has a long feature today about PR in Silicon Valley, which has brought an extended response from Michael Arrington of TechCrunch, bringing into focus the question of who the REAL influencers are when it comes to getting word out on start-ups.

The New York Times piece, describing the formation of the PR strategy for word-focused start-up Wordnik, says:

[Publicist] Ms. Hammerling, while popping green apple Jolly Ranchers into her mouth, suggests a press tour that includes briefing bloggers at influential geek sites like TechCrunch, All Things Digital and GigaOM.

But Roger McNamee, a prominent tech investor who is backing Wordnik, is also in the room, and a look of exasperation passes across his face at the mere mention of the sites.

“Why shouldn’t we avoid them? They’re cynical,” he says, also noting his concern that Wordnik would probably appeal more to wordsmiths than followers of tech blogs. “That’s where I would be most uncomfortable. They don’t know the difference between ‘they’re’ and ‘there.’ ”

Without missing a beat, Ms. Hammerling changes course, instantly agreeing with Mr. McNamee’s take. “I love you for that,” she intones. “I’ll leave the tech blogs out. Let them come to me.”

Instead, she decides that she will “whisper in the ears” of Silicon Valley’s Who’s Who — the entrepreneurs behind tech’s hottest start-ups, including Jay Adelson, the chief executive of Digg; Biz Stone, co-founder of Twitter; and Jason Calacanis, the founder of Mahalo.

Notably, none are journalists.

Arrington, after showing multiple charts to prove that a start-up that launched on TechCrunch only is doing far better than Wordnik with its non-blog strategy, says:

I believe Brooke’s client have been better served if she stood up to McNamee and told him that Wordnik would have had a better launch if they hadn’t ignored the blogs that are interested in covering new startups. Instead she became a “yes woman” and told McNamee exactly what he wanted to hear.

Hammerling and her peers in the industry should help guide their clients through the minefield of journalists and bloggers, rather than simply avoid it entirely out of fear or ignorance. She isn’t in the room to drop names or “help get deals done.” She’s there to make sure the client’s news gets spread appropriately. In that they failed miserably, and the client suffered.

The key words here are “make sure the client’s news gets spread appropriately.” In short, who (or which channels) can get word out to the people who matter: the ones who will use the service and/ or pass on word to those who will?

That is why the field of influence – which will be explored in detail at the Future of Influence Summit – is so important. Influence is critical in how content and ideas are disseminated. In the world of start-ups, yes traditional media plays an important role (I bet Wordnik is getting plenty of attention it would never have got otherwise because of this New York Times article). Blogs such as TechCrunch, Mashable and ReadWriteWeb are absolutely central to how early adopters find and enthuse about new online services. The influencers mentioned in the NYT article themselves are not journalists, or in some cases even bloggers. But what they pay attention to gets noticed.

A related issue is who is best equipped to help clients navigate today's borderless world of influence. Is it PR firms that have a background in media relations they are now applying more broadly to influencers? Is it the new breed of influencer marketing agencies that focus on non-traditional influencers? Can VCs and the extended network around a start-up best reach influencers through personal connections? Or are some of new players coming from a marketing and advertising background able to do this work effectivelyl?

We are overdue for a far better understanding of how influence really does work in a post-media world – including in the success of start-ups. We will be doing and publishing research on this over the next months – keep posted.

Who will provide the credibility ratings for the journalists of the planet?

2009-07-02T13:30:51Z

Citizen journalist site Allvoices.com has just moved out of beta. CNet provides a story of the site, its founder Amra Tareen, and Allvoices' features including a map of the world showing where the latest stories are emerging. A Reuters story, Allvoices happy to pay popular posters, focuses on how the site pays contributors and its 'crediibility' algorithm.

Contributors are free to post almost anything and their credibility is rated by readers and an in-house algorithm which measures postings against traditional media and other sources.

But throwing the site open to the public has its pitfalls.

One recent post with a high credibility rating said the Ark of The Covenant was about to be unveiled. Other stories cite no sources at all.

Mr Sundelof said he had not looked at the Ark posting, but the in-house computer evaluation depended on feedback from many users and there had not been enough feedback on that piece.

Allvoices did not practice gatekeeping.

"We haven't worked out how to deal with these kinds of situations," he said. "Basically, we can only determine credibility based on the input we have."

In a world awash with information, having credibility or reputation ratings for information sources is becoming increasingly important. While most people have focused on the media channel as the brand, this is going to shift to the individual journalist. You may trust the New York Times, but after you've read it for a while, you'll place more credibility on what some journalists for the paper write than you do for others.

Allvoices is one of the early players in this space. There will be many more.

How reputation measures will evolve, particularly those for content, will be one of the important themes at Future of Influence Summit 2009.

The border between blogging and Twittering

2009-07-02T06:52:05Z

Shall I tweet it? Shall I blog it?

If you’re both a blogger and Twitterer, when you get an interesting thought you want to share, you have choices.

Do you tweet it? If it’s interesting enough to let people know, then sure – very easily done.

Or do you blog it? If it’s compelling enough, competing with lots of other stuff, and it’s time-sensitive, then yes. I have a list of over 60 blog posts I’d like to write, so something has to be compelling to get in front of that queue.

This decision changes over time. I’ve blogged for seven years, and was slow to get on Twitter because I thought I had plenty on my plate with blogging. Now more and more idea sharing happens over Twitter. Of course, there’s only so much you can say in 140 characters and sometimes you have to flow beyond that. Comments and blog posts can do that – they’re part of the content creation landscape.

I will explore this issue more later. I’m working on a blog/ Twitter framework that will show how they relate to each other.

It certainly seems to be an interesting topic to explore: what is the border between blogging and Twittering?

Twitter and the ever-faster moving news landscape

2009-07-01T12:05:19Z

Associated Press has just released a story titled Is Twitter the news outlet for the 21st century? which examines the role of Twitter in the news cycle.

It examines the role Twitter played in the news of Michael Jackson's death, in the Iranian election, and in the Mumbai terrorist attacks, and goes on to quote tweeters such as Ashton Kutcher and Lance Armstrong, and commentators including TechCrunch and Andrew Keen to explore how Twitter is changing the news landscape. It also draws on my comments from an extended interview:

"Twitter absolutely changes the media landscape," said Ross Dawson, author and communications strategy analyst. "I like to refer to Marshall McLuhan's description of media as `an extension of our senses.' Now, Twitter is extending our senses to tens of millions of people who are often right on the scene where things are happening."

My views are expressed in more detail in a recent post How Twitter impacts media and journalism: Five Fundamental Factors, which reviews in particular the role of Twitter in breaking news.

I've had a few other thoughts on the topic recently so will post more on this later.

Twitterboard and the rise of distributed conversations

2009-07-01T11:59:22Z

Twitterboard - a very interesting way of aggregating Twitter conversations on a website - launched in alpha yesterday.

I’ve installed it on this blog to give it a try. You should see a tab on the left hand side of the page. When you click it this will bring up the Twitter thread. I'll give it a whirl and see how it goes.

Twitterboard describes itself:

Tweetboard is a fun and engaging micro-forum type application for your website. It pulls your Twitter stream in near real-time (max 1 min delay), reformatting tweets into threaded conversations with unlimited nesting. Conversations that spun off the original conversation are also threaded in-line, giving your site visitors full perspective of what's being discussed.

The way it works is that tweets on the site are appended with posted.at/ and inreply.to/ short URLs which take people to the conversation. This means that people who see parts of the conversation on Twitter can go to the site to see a single threaded discussion.

Probably the most useful reference points for this service are the main distributed commenting systems: JS-Kit, Disqus, and IntenseDebate. These enable people’s comments on blogs and websites to become part of a broader conversation. As such they are fundamental to the evolution of a web that is fully integrated rather than simply a set of websites. JS-Kit alone is already implemented on over 600,000 websites.

Twitterboard, given the 140 character limit of Twitter (minus the space taken by the pointer URLs) is not comparable to full-featured commenting systems, however it does have the advantage of tapping where people are already spending their time making comments.

On the one hand the landscape is ripe for the rise of Twitter conversation aggregators, that enable specific conversations to be picked out from the morass of messages every minute, and also allow them to be visible alongside associated content.

However the existing distributed commenting systems also boast a very powerful foundation on which to build. Conversations need both to be linked to specific content, and also to be able to transcend particular websites. Those that can provide the next level of functionality, including of course very low barriers to contributing, will be in a very powerful position.

All of this of course links closely to the theme of influence, which will be covered in detail at our forthcoming Future of Influence Summit (where JS-Kit CEO Khris Loux will be speaking). Distributed commenting can readily amplify the prominence of content as well as bring it to the attention of relevant audiences. More on this theme later.

What's happening in the living networks - an irregular update

2009-06-30T10:40:03Z

I send out an extremely irregular email to keep people posted on what's up in my world and the most prominent content I'm creating. I thought I might as well post it on my blog as well...

What's happening in the living networks
June 2009

This is a quite extraordinary year for me. It's now been 15 months since I've sent out a 'newsletter', so this email is a bit of an update on what's going on in my world, which makes it quite a long email.... The most important of all this is the birth of my daughter Phoebe on 7 June, packed into a time of great change and development in my work, writing and businesses.

I believe that 2009 is the turning of an epoch. Linear shifts are giving way to exponential change as we call into question existing structures. The key theme for me is divergence: there is a rapidly growing gap between those thriving and those struggling. These are very, very exciting times.

In this update I provide links to some of the more interesting content we have generated over the last period. The best way to keep up with what I'm doing and finding interesting are my Trends in the Living Networks blog or my Twitter updates.

In this update:

- I morph into futurist and entrepreneur
- Launch of leading events firm The Insight Exchange
- Implementing Enterprise 2.0: New book and consulting work
- Recent keynotes in Abu Dhabi, San Francisco, Sydney, Perth etc.: videos and presentations
- Future of Influence Summit coming soon!
- Relaunch of Advanced Human Technologies
- Media coverage: New York Times, The Guardian, ABC, SBS, SkyNews etc.
- Most popular blog posts: influence framework, future of finance, Twitter and media, organizational change etc.
- Phoebe Dawson is born

[NOTE:] You have to be viewing the full article for the internal links above to work

I morph into futurist and entrepreneur

This year is proving to be a turning point for me, as I create new businesses and scale our activities. This has enabled me to reframe my work as futurist and entrepreneur. I research, speak and write on the future of business, and build businesses stemming from the opportunities I see.

My intent is to spend up to two days a week on my keynote speaking and strategy advisory work, and the rest of the time building our companies, which include professional services and venture firm Advanced Human Technologies, future and strategy consulting group Future Exploration Network, leading events firm The Insight Exchange, and influence ratings start-up Repyoot.

Launch of leading events firm The Insight Exchange

In March we launched The Insight Exchange, which will be built to be a leading international events firm under the leadership of CEO Beth Etling, who brings a wealth of experience and fantastic energy to the role. The Insight Exchange has taken over the events previously run by Future Exploration Network, including Future of Media Summit, Enterprise 2.0 Executive Forum, and Web 2.0 in Australia. It already has a full portfolio of new events, including the forthcoming Creating Value with Content and Future of Influence Summit 2009, which will be run simultaneously in Sydney and San Francisco on August 31/ September 1.

Implementing Enterprise 2.0: New book and consulting

Enterprise 2.0 is a major focus this year. My new book Implementing Enterprise 2.0 has been doing extremely well. Four free chapters and full details are available from the website: www.implementingenterprise2.com.

We are also doing extensive consulting and strategy work for companies on implementing Web 2.0 and social media approaches to drive organizational performance.

Recent keynotes in Abu Dhabi, San Francisco, Sydney, Perth etc.: videos and presentations

My keynote speaking schedule has been very busy recently. See below for more details on:

- Abu Dhabi: Closing keynote on Profiting from Accelerating Change at MegaTrends conference (Opening keynote by Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman)
- San Francisco: TEDx on Future of the Enterprise
- Sydney: Opening Keynote on Future of the Global Health Economy
- Gold Coast: Opening Keynote on Embracing the Future
- Perth: Keynote on Future of Global Business - Implications and Opportunities
- Sydney: Opening Keynote on Transforming Aged Care with Technology

Forthcoming speeches include Dubai, Istanbul, and Kuala Lumpur.

Future of Influence Summit coming soon!

Future of Influence Summit 2009 will be held simultaneously in Sydney and San Francisco on September 1/ August 31, produced by The Insight Exchange. This event has evolved out of the highly successful Future of Media Summit which we have run for the last three years.

Relaunch of Advanced Human Technologies

My original company Advanced Human Technologies has been repositioned to be the hub of our small group of companies. It provides consulting services on networks and high-value relationships, with currently a strong focus on implementing Enterprise 2.0 from an executive perspective. It also provides services to the other companies in the group and seeds new ventures.

New Advanced Human Technologies website:www.ahtgroup.com

Media coverage: New York Times, The Guardian, ABC, SBS, SkyNews etc.

I have been getting extensive media coverage this year - full details on my recent media appearances page.
Media in the last couple of months includes:

- Sky News: Federal Government's National Broadband Network Announcement
- SBS World News: Consumer Cost of Australian National Broadband Network
- The Guardian: Australia's government will build high-speed broadband network
- The New York Times: Australia to Build $31 Billion Broadband Network
- ABC TV: Twitter As a News Outlet
- Trends magazine: Interview: The Middle East economy and future

Most popular blog posts: influence framework, future of finance, Twitter and media, organizational change etc.

My blog Trends in the Living Networks is still ranked as one of the top 100 business blogs globally. The most popular recent posts include:

- Launch of the Influence Landscape framework
- How Twitter impacts media and journalism: Five Fundamental Factors
- Top Twitterers: US, Canada, Norway, Australia, UK, New Zealand
- Tapping the Power of Social Media: 6 steps for marketers
- 10 DOs and DONTs of organizational change
- An Argument for Heterarchy: creating more effective organizational structures
- Eight key issues in understanding Australia's National Broadband Network

Phoebe Dawson is born

And not least, Phoebe Dawson, my second daughter, was born on 7 June 2009. She is even more delightful than you can imagine!
Click here if you're a sucker for baby pics.

I'll keep any updates occasional, and try to focus on sharing useful content.

Hope to catch up before long!

Ross

New iPhone app: Steampunk view of global climate – ideal for world travellers!

2009-06-29T21:27:32Z

Graham Dawson of OzWeather fame has launched his latest iPhone app Climate Eye, which promises to be another big winner. It enables users to look up any city on the planet and find out official current weather and forecasts, including how much colder or hotter it is compared to expectations for that time of the year.

It also shows average weather for any month or day of the year in each location, including temperatures and rainfall, even the likelihood of rainfall on any particular day.

Among other uses, the app is great for travellers who want to know what the weather is likely to be when they arrive in their destinations, or even for choosing where they want to go at a particular time of year.

The innovative interface design (which I am told is referred to as “steampunk”) reminds me of the world in The Golden Compass – antique brass instrument style to access digital data – very cool.

Forthcoming apps from Graham will provide additional insights on climate and climate change.

See screenshots of the app on Graham's blog

FULL DISCLOSURE
Graham is my brother :-)

Media convergence in action: Journalists (try) mastering the Twitterverse

2009-06-29T04:00:45Z

That’s influence for you. After The Insight Exchange’s event Twitter’s Impact on Media & Journalism last week, the biggest front page article in The Australian’s media section today, titled Journos mastering the Twitterverse, opening with:

IT'S Tuesday and I'm at a forum on the topic "Twitter's Impact on Media and Journalism", busily taking down the speeches in shorthand. As I do, the business-suited woman sitting on my left is tweeting about me on her laptop.

"This is interesting," she types. "I'm at #timj talk about Twitter and media/journalism. I'm tweeting and the journalist next to me has paper/pen :-)"

Paper and pen? Got me! I do use them. However, I also use Twitter, which is how I caught up with her comment once I was back in the office.

It’s a long article, accompanied by three other articles on Twitter in media. The thrust of the article is about how journalists are using Twitter. It mentions Dave Earley’s list of Australian journalists and news media people with Twitter accounts, and Anthony Dever’s list of Australian media organizations on Twitter.

Presumably from these lists they have compiled a list of prominent Australian journalists on Twitter:

Mia Freedman (@miafreedman) – Sun-Herald and mamamia.com.au – 6216 followers
Adam Spencer (@adambspencer) – ABC 702 breakfast presenter – 3999 followers
Melissa Doyle (@melissadoyle) – Sunrise co-host – 3777 followers
Joe Hildebrand (@joe_hildebrand) – Daily Telegraph blogger – 3215 followers
Tracy Grimshaw (@tracygrimshaw) – A Current Affair host – 2771 followers
Annabel Crabb (@annabelcrabb) – Sydney Morning Herald columnist – 2609 followers
Leigh Sales (@LEIGHSALES) – Lateline anchor – 2609 followers
Paula Joye (@paulaJoye) – Madison editor – 1823 followers
Caroline Overington (overingtonc) – The Australian journalist – 1279 followers
Mark Colvin (@Colvinius) ABC Radio PM presenter – 1227 followers

First noteworthy feature is that these are pretty low follower numbers compared to prominent journalists in other countries. The second is that these are largely prominent TV personalities with very large audiences, so with strong existing media visibility.

Journalists are rightly keen to get onto Twitter. Media convergence is a real phenomenon, with bloggers and Twitterers taking attention from “real” journalists, and journalists trying to get in on the action. However a quite different mentality is required, which some journalists get, and others don’t. More on this in my piece on How Twitter impacts media and journalism: Five Fundamental Factors.

Very usefully, accompanying the article the newspaper also published Julie Posetti’s Top 20 takeaway tips for tweeting media.

The motivations of influencers and amplifiers: how content becomes prominent

2009-06-24T02:03:07Z

Increasingly, we primarily find content through aggregated influence. In other words, influencers use Twitter, blog, Delicious, Digg, Reddit etc. to highlight the content they find most interesting. Collectively these influencers make this content highly visible, driving at times massive traffic to articles.

A couple of years ago I wrote about Uncovering the structure of influence and social opinion, which drew on research on how just a handful of influencers drive the content aggregation sites such as Digg, and a little later analyzed how influencers and amplifiers had helped one of my blog posts hit the front page Delicious.

These topics will be covered in detail at Future of Influence Summit 2009 - details coming soon.

In January the grand-daddy of the tech news aggregators, Techmeme, started accepting suggestions for stories, by people sending links on Twitter along with "tip @techmeme". The most prominent Techmeme story suggestor has been @atul.

Atul is interviewed in Success Secrets of a Top Techmeme Tipper. The entire interview is worth reading; I have picked out some of his comments on his motivations.

Why do you tip Techmeme? Tipping to techmeme is an avocation i.e. a hobby. But I have discovered it is great to build a personal brand and network with folks online. Techmeme is a excellent resource for consuming technology news for people in Silicon Valley and beyond. You can think of tipping to the Techmeme site as a modest contribution to bringing some of the news quicker to the attention of Techmeme and its readers.

How has this tipping altered your Twitter habits? A little bit. I was using Twitter mostly to share technology news so tipping to techmeme has not significantly altered my Twitter habits. It has made me a better curator of links. If I come across some interesting on the technology front, I do assess if it is worth tweeting about and/or tipping to techmeme.

Is is worth you time tipping Techmeme? It has been worth my time tipping to Techmeme. It has enabled me to reach out and connect with folks on Twitter and other social networks in a much more credible way. Given the current restriction of submitting no more than 2 tweets/hour to Techmeme, I actually spend no more than 30-45 minutes per day cumulatively sending tips over to techmeme. It is time well spent in sharing new about technology to folks who follow Techmeme.

People like Atul play an important role in the influence economy. They are rewarded in a variety of ways for their efforts in being first to highlight interesting articles. I suspect they will be rewarded in more ways in the future, as the influence landscape develops into a true marketplace.

Uncovering high-value applications of organizational network analysis

2009-06-23T09:44:43Z

New Scientist has published an interesting article titled Email patterns can predict impending doom, which reviews findings by researchers at Florida Institute of Technology. They, as many researchers, used the email logs from Enron, which have been made available for analysis by federal investigators.

The key finding from the research was that the number of active email cliques, in which groups exchanged emails between each other but not outside, went from 100 to 800 a month before the collapse of the company. This appeared to reflect decreasing trust across the broader organization and increasing stress. This indicates that very strong indicators of organizational health can be gleaned from network analysis.

Network analysis by Advanced Human Technologies of top executives in global corporation

As indicated in the article, one of the key challenges of organizational network analysis is obtaining email logs, even if the data is disguised. Advanced Human Technologies has been applying social network analysis to enhancing organizational performance for most of the last decade, using both surveys and digital trails to provide management insights and identify high-value initiatives.

There is now a very solid body of research on how to apply insights from network analysis to improving organizational performance. However in the big picture this is just the beginning. There are very rich insights - and rewards to those that apply them - in understanding organizational dynamics. We're keen to find organizations that are willing to share encrypted data in order to generate unique insights. Full privacy is maintained, while potentially creating significant competitive advantage.

Event review: Twitter’s Impact on Media & Journalism

2009-06-23T06:09:31Z

Today I was at Twitter's Impact on Media & Journalism run by The Insight Exchange. It was as usual a fantastic event with great insights – I will be digesting and musing on the conversations and ideas for a while, and will incorporate these into future frameworks.

Below are quick on-the-fly notes from the event. Check out the Twitter stream #timj for the rich conversations from the event. For my own thoughts on the topic read my post from last week on How Twitter impact media and journalism: Five Fundamental Factors.

Here are my notes from each of the presenters – taken on the fly but hopefully a reasonable representation of what they said. Some of the presentations will be put on online in audio and hopefully transcription so will post links when they’re available.

Mark Pesce (@mpesce)
He begins by quoting Bob Woodward:
"Social media? It's noise. Twitter? Facebook? It's all a diversion. Good reporting is always going to be about hard work; about waking up every morning with the thought: What are the bastards hiding today?"

Mark responds by saying that’s exactly what he thinks when he wakes up in the morning and reads the newspaper: “What are the bastards hiding today?" Bob has become a creature of the moneyed and powerful.

The battle was over before the first shot was fired. On 12 May 2008 Mark saw tweets on the Chinese earthquake. Because traditional channels were broken, Twitter provided better information than

Twitter will be the death of the wire services. They were born in an era of a scarcity of information. We have raw reporting through Twitter of every major event around the world.

As the newspapers have collapsed they are being forced to rely more and more on wire services. They are building their businesses on sand, because the wire services will crumble.

What will future journalists do? A journalist will research, confirm, compile from an array of sources.

What happens in a world in which absolutely everything is under observation?

What Google and Facebook began, Twitter is going to finish.

Twitter is the backchannel for TV that everyone has always wanted. Mark started using Twitter a lot in April 2008. At the time he Twittered about The New Inventors show he appears on as he watched it, and others joined in. Mark and many friends now join in the conversation to discuss The New Inventors every week as it happens. Eurovision became a global Twitter event as thousands started to Twitter to each other about Eurovision as it happened.

Twitter intensely amplifies content by allowing people to share what they find the most compelling.

Twitter is objective, partial, biased, incomplete.

Renai LeMay (@renailemay)
"I'm not an official CBS spokesman." I've been called to defend the honor of the fair lady of journalism. She is beset on all sides by falling revenue, PR professionals and more.
I am a journalist and also a Gen Y person comfortable with technology. I represent the future of journalism.

Twitter is not the death of the traditional journalist. In fact it's a playground of pleasure for the journalist. It represents a way for journalists to connect to readers, and vice versa .

Research shows that much of journalism is press release rewrites. Journalism has dropped the ball. Twitter is the best tool yet discovered for facilitating conversations between people with similar interests.

Twitter is cutting the fat out of journalism. Journalists are the only people that can publish certain sorts of information. It is our responsibility to bring the hard issues to the public.

People who argue that social media can replace traditional media are right. The situation in Iran is an example. But it doesn't negate that traditional jourrnalists have a valuable role to play. Journalists of my age are proving that's true.

Twitter is a playground of pleasure that is renewing journalism.

Paul Colgan (@Colgo)
Children today will look back and laugh at the technology we have now.

There is massive fragmentation of media channels. When I began work as an online reporter in 2002 most of the social media tools we know today did not exist. When I look at how YouTube and Facebook have transformed our expectations, it is staggering.

Twitter is now a massive torrent of incredible information. It's an incredibly uplifting and positive place.

Journalism has never been healthier. Twitter is a very powerful channel for journalism, both in gathering information and getting it out, making it the property of the world.

#IranElection is changing the way people feel about Twitter.

Jon Stewart on Today Show did a great sketch on CNN's use of Twitter and social media in covering Iran (see video below) - CNN received a shellacking for their failure to cover Iran. Verifying information still remains paramount.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Irandecision 2009 - CNN's Unverified Material

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Political Humor

Jason Jones in Iran

The Twitter API is very important, for example in allowing apps like Twittervision in showing where tweets are coming from. This can allow verification of some information. #UKhols provides a great way to share information. Twitter can help to map swine flu migration - telling an interesting story in a compelling way. The challenge for journalists is to work with developers and designers to deliver better stories.

Corrie McLeod (@espressocomms)
PR has an important role in this discussion. Relationships are changing. Tech companies have been the earliest to adopt new communication channels, Government will be next.

Twitter is a great channel for PR. Journalists want PR professionals to be connected, informed, provide useful insights. Journalists often ask their Twitter followers for sources or information for their sources. PR people can connect them to good sources and do it fast, providing value for journalists. They may know themselves, or they can ask their network.

Press releases will go out through traditional channels and also on Twitter.

The delineation of our personal and professional lives is shifting further with Twitter.

Roundtable discussion
At our table the discussion question was how the merging of personal and professional lives impacts trust and objectivity. Establish trust over time - this can accelerate through Twitter as you see them well. Because more is visible of more people than ever before, increasingly when people make decisions they go to those they feel they know as people.

Driving innovation in large professional service firms: Six high-return initiatives

2009-06-22T22:00:18Z

Over the last years I have spent significant time assisting professional services firms to drive innovation. This year I am finding that the economic climate is intensifying the focus on these issues rather than pushing them to the background.

The pressures that commoditize services are intensifying, local and global competition is increasing, and clients are seeking value in different forms than they have in the past. Another critical driver is the war for talent. Young, talented professionals show little interest in continuing to plough the furrow of long-established processes, however wax enthusiastic about creating new approaches to their work.

However there are many barriers to innovation in large professional firms, including billing imperatives, strong functional specialization, and often highly risk-averse cultures. Much of the management literature on innovation focuses on product development and design, and is not always relevant to a professional services environment.

I’ve written before about innovation in professional services, including the White Paper I wrote for SAP on Service Delivery Innovation and in Chapter 9 of Living Networks.

Here are some reflections on where I see the greatest potential for value-creation in the space.

DOMAINS FOR INNOVATION

There are several key domains for innovation for professional firms:

Services and products. In a rapidly changing business environment, providing the services that are most relevant to clients’ needs can provide real competitive advantage. The issue is not just in quickly generating new offerings, but also in packaging these so they can be readily communicated to clients by front-line professionals.

Service delivery/ Process. There are many aspects to service delivery innovation, notably the integration of internal, external and online resources to create efficient and differentiated value creation for clients.

Structure. One of the perennial issues for professional firms is to how to structure themselves to balance and integrate functional specialization and industry expertise. There is continuing scope for innovation in how to do this effectively as the business landscape evolves.

Pricing/ Business model. There continues to be interest and demand from clients in new pricing structures. Effective innovation in this space enables offers that create value for both clients and their service providers. While business model innovation will be slow for professional firms, it is important to incrementally introduce new ways of leveraging professional talent.

HIGH-RETURN INNOVATION INITIATIVES

There are a variety of initiatives that I have found are particularly useful in developing innovation in professional service firms that directly generates business results.

1. Develop a systematic innovation strategy. Creating an innovation strategy does not need to be a massive project. However it is critical to identify and prioritize the kinds of innovation that are aligned with the firm’s positioning and long-term strategy. Governance is a key element of this process, in establishing parameters for allocating resources and managing risk. A clear strategic framework helps identify the initiatives that will best support useful innovation.

2. Establish lightweight innovation programs. Over the last decade many companies have established innovation programs of various kinds, often including idea submission, stage gate filtering, and innovation funding pools. In many cases overly ambitious programs haven’t met their expectations. However this kind of program, scaled appropriately, can play a valuable role within a broader array of innovation activities.

3. Set up a program of pilot projects. Pilot project programs are one of the most relevant and effective tools for generating useful innovation. These provide defined parameters for establishing, supporting, assessing, migrating and if necessary closing pilot projects. Managed well, these programs can generate substantial value with limited resources.

4. Implement product development processes. Product and software companies that live on bringing new offerings to market have well-established product development processes. Professional firms rarely have these kinds of processes in place. Establishing these can strongly support a firm-wide shift to proactively creating new product and service offerings.

5. Run industry strategy workshops. In many cases the most valuable activities lie in providing a structured process for generating relevant, value-creating ideas. For example innovation workshops can focus on the current industry structure of key client segments, and identify how shifts in the business landscape are creating new priorities and opportunities for companies and their service providers.

6. Identify and support innovation champions. In a large firm, the majority of the impetus and energy for innovation is usually found in a relatively few people. Identifying the people who have the most positive energy for change enables them to be supported in creating or evangelizing new ventures. This is one of the single strongest levers for success in large firm innovation.

In summary, there are many ways of successfully driving innovation in professional firms, often without requiring substantial resources. Times of rapid change in the business environment are when innovation initiatives are the most important. Those firms that continue to work as they have in the past are at risk of losing market share and emerging opportunities. Effective innovation will be extremely richly rewarded both in the short-term and in the years ahead.

Gerontocracy is our future

2009-06-19T09:18:09Z

Gerontocracy n. Rule by the elderly

When we think about the future, there are some things we can predict better than others. One of the things we have the best idea of is demographics and age distributions. There remain uncertainties such as improvements in health care and gerontology, the rise of unforeseen diseases and pandemics, and devastating war, but by and large we can be fairly confident of our demographic forecasts.

In recent keynotes I've done on technology in aged care and the future of the global health economy I examined the implications of future demographic profiles. The forecast profiles for 2050 for some of the world's largest economies are shown below. Source for all of the profiles is NationMaster, an excellent repository of country information. Of all of these countries, USA is the country which will have the least imbalance to the elderly, accompanied by a dramatic shift in ethnicity of the young.

One of the many implications of these age profiles is the inevitability of gerontocracy - rule by the elderly. Given the age profiles below, it is starkly clear what segment of the population any warm-blooded vote-seeking politician will seek to woo. In other words, given a democratic future, we can expect government policies to be unmitigatedly pro-aged, with barely a look in for the young.

Fortunately I'll be old by then.

Video of TEDx on Future of the Enterprise in San Francisco

2009-06-18T09:30:21Z

We finally have video of my presentation on Future of the Enterprise at the TEDx event in San Francisco on May 5. The video is a nice production, very kindly done by Denis Mars to pull in the slides and Flash that supported my presentation.

Read more about the TEDxAdvance event, organized by Advance San Francisco. The best description is Andrew Mager's excellent review of the evening.

The TEDx presentation format is strictly 20 minutes, so my presentation fits into two 9 minute YouTube videos below. Feel free to start at Part 2 if you want a sampler of the content - the story pretty much hangs together from there too.

In the presentation I discuss:
* Origins of organizations, from pre-agricultural through pyramid building, the guild, and modern companies
* Enterprise vs. Corporation. The critical distinction that means the "enterprise" will be more important than the "corporation" moving forward
* My personal work journey, through distributed computing, financial markets, Japan, information broking and NLP formed my thinking on organizations
* Knowledge and relationships are the only resources that matter in today's economy
* Living networks of people, organizations and industry emerge
* Organizations are media entities - the flow of information defines its functioning
* Three driving forces today: Connectivity, Expectations and Commoditization
* Enterprise 2.0 is about creating the next phase of organizations - it is done by creating parameters for experimentation
* In the Heuristic Age structured trial and error is the only viable path to responsiveness
* Five questions: I end with five key questions we must answer to create the future of the enterprise:

What structures will emerge for allocating capital to enterprise?

What models will best turn participation into value creation?

How do we best tap the global talent economy in a virtual world?

What role will reputation play?

How will we make work meaningful?