Many people working in large companies speak business-buzzwords as a second language. Business language is full of pretty meaningless words. I Don’t Understand What Anyone Is Saying Anymore article tells that the language of internet business models has made the problem even worse. There are several strains of this epidemic: We have forgotten how to use the real names of real things, acronymitis, and Meaningless Expressions (like “Our goal is to exceed the customer’s expectation”). This would all be funny if it weren’t true. Observe it, deconstruct it, and appreciate just how ridiculous most business conversation has become.
Check out this brilliant Web Economy Bullshit Generator page. It generates random bullshit text based on the often used words in business language. And most of the material it generates look something you would expect from IT executives and their speechwriters (those are randomly generated with Web Economy Bullshit Generator):
“scale viral web services”
“integrate holistic mindshare”
“transform back-end solutions”
“incentivize revolutionary portals”
“synergize out-of-the-box platforms”
“enhance world-class schemas”
“aggregate revolutionary paradigms”
“enable cross-media relationships”
How to talk like a CIO article tries to tell how do CIOs talk, and what do they talk about, and why they do it like they do it. It sometimes makes sense to analyze the speaking and comportment styles of the people who’ve already climbed the corporate ladder if you want to do the same.
The Most Annoying, Pretentious And Useless Business Jargon article tells that the stupid business talk is longer solely the province of consultants, investors and business-school types, this annoying gobbledygook has mesmerized the rank and file around the globe. The next time you feel the need to reach out, touch base, shift a paradigm, leverage a best practice or join a tiger team, by all means do it. Just don’t say you’re doing it. If you have to ask why, chances are you’ve fallen under the poisonous spell of business jargon. Jargon masks real meaning. The Most Annoying, Pretentious And Useless Business Jargon article has a cache of expressions to assiduously avoid (if you look out you will see those used way too many times in business documents and press releases).
Is Innovation the Most Abused Word In Business? article tells that most of what is called innovation today is mere distraction, according to a paper by economist Robert Gordon. Innovation is the most abused word in tech. The iPad is about as innovative as the toaster. You can still read books without an iPad, and you can still toast bread without a toaster. True innovation radically alters the way we interact with the world. But in tech, every little thing is called “innovative.” If you were to believe business grads then “innovation” includes their “ideas” along the lines of “a website like *only better*” or “that thing which everyone is already doing but which I think is my neat new idea” Whether or not the word “innovation” has become the most abused word in the business context, that remains to be seen. “Innovation” itself has already been abused by the patent trolls.
Using stories to catch ‘smart-talk’ article tells that smart-talk is information without understanding, theory without practice – ‘all mouth and no trousers’, as the old aphorism puts it. It’s all too common amongst would-be ‘experts’ – and likewise amongst ‘rising stars’ in management and elsewhere. He looks the part; he knows all the right buzzwords; he can quote chapter-and-verse from all the best-known pundits and practitioners. But is it all just empty ‘smart-talk’? Even if unintentional on their part, people who indulge in smart-talk can be genuinely dangerous. They’ll seem plausible enough at first, but in reality they’ll often know just enough to get everyone into real trouble, but not enough to get out of it again. Smart-talk is the bane of most business – and probably of most communities too. So what can we do to catch it?
2,765 Comments
Tomi Engdahl says:
9 Simple Things Great Speakers Always Do
http://www.businessinsider.com/9-simple-things-great-speakers-always-do-2014-2
1. Reinforce who you are.
Framing that makes it easier for people to digest what you are saying is too often overlooked.
2. Help everyone find you.
A lot of presentations end with a slide that shows the speaker’s name, URL, Twitter handle, and email address.
3. Share real stories. People love stories.
4. Entertain as much as inform.
5. Time it perfectly.
6. Provide something to take home.
7. Feel free to repeat.
8. Help the audience remember at least one thing.
It’s very easy to overload the audience with information.
9. Really connect with your audience.
Be personal, speak from experience, feel free to entertain as much as inform, be practical, connect with the audience, and never forget that shorter is always better than too long.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Secrets of the Magic Quadrant revealed
Back to back presentations filled with ‘broad statements and grandiose claims’
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/02/12/secrets_of_the_magic_quadrant_revealed/
“Be concrete in your information, and incorporate quantifiable, tangible data whenever possible. Analysts are under a constant deluge of broad directional statements and grandiose claims all the time, and we are usually unimpressed by them.”
Quick tips for Magic Quadrant briefing presentations
http://blogs.gartner.com/douglas-toombs/quick-tips-for-magic-quadrant-briefing-presentations/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Good engineering managers aren’t just hard to find — they don’t exist
http://venturebeat.com/2014/02/13/good-engineering-managers-arent-just-hard-to-find-they-dont-exit/
Everyone talks about how difficult it is to hire great software engineers in the Valley. And it is. But nobody’s talking about how hard — really hard — it is to find good engineering managers.
Good engineering managers, on the other hand, are practically impossible to find.
I just assumed I was looking in the wrong places. But recently I’ve come to a different conclusion: They don’t exist.
Why? Well, the implicit aim of most functions in a company is to get further up the hierarchy. To have more influence. To become the “boss”. To lead people. But engineers are… different. Unlike virtually every other function in a software company, engineers — particularly the good ones – don’t want to move up. This means that the people who want the engineering manager role are unlikely to be very good at it; and those who could be good at it don’t want anything to do with it at all.
Let’s dig into this.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The IT Talent Problem
http://ww2.cfo.com/it-value/2013/05/the-it-talent-problem/
Business-savvy IT executives can be hard to come by, and that’s a big problem if your company relies on technology to exist (it does). Maybe it’s time to start growing your own.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Research firm Gartner estimates that about half of IT projects fail.
One of the main reasons of failures is that the systems simply that the benefits for which they are expected to produce. In the worst case, they do not provide benefits for the whole life cycle.
“The business and IT management there is still a gap between the legendary, the various parts of a different language and measuring different things,” Qentinel technology leader Jari Reinikainen says.
My problem is caused by the fact that the systems business benefits expected to mostly indirectly and hazy methods.
“For this project, is of course a very early stage of ROI and TCO calculations. Problems arise when the calculations do not ensure the realization of the project longer, during and after, but it is assumed that the system will pay for itself in the original period of time. ”
Some of the IT managers think that CIO’s role is to ensure that the IT systems to deliver benefits.
Information management often sees that it operates to develop and run the IT systems, but the responsibility of the benefits is the business unit.
Source: Tietoviikko
http://www.tietoviikko.fi/kaikki_uutiset/miksi+ithankkeet+floppaavat/a963821
Tomi Engdahl says:
Known for his research by International Data Corporation, or IDC has named IT ecosystem upheaval that began as the “3rd Platform”. Although the research is very marketing-oriented, the idea behind it is interesting
The third ecosystem is different from its predecessors that is industry specific and it has lack of a clear compass.
The first mainframe world concentrated in the ecosystem led by IBM.
Second ecosystem began the IBM PC and operating system produced by Microsoft
The new social, mobile was doing, cloud technologies and analytics based on the third ecosystem is not clear bow picture.
The third ecosystem is measured by the ability to change the sectoral nature of the business to use information technology more effectively and achieve significant productivity features to enable benefits.
Source: Tietoviikko
http://www.tietoviikko.fi/cio/blogit/ict_standard_forum/tietotekniikan+kolmas+valtakunta/a968461
Tomi Engdahl says:
Facebook Can Tell You If A Person Is Worth Hiring
http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/03/05/facebook-can-tell-you-if-a-person-is-worth-hiring/
Employers already know it’s a good idea to check job candidates’ Facebook pages to make sure there aren’t any horrible red flags there. The reddest flags for most employers seem to be drugs, drinking, badmouthing former employers, and lying about one’s qualifications. But there’s another good reason for checking out a candidate’s Facebook page before inviting them in for an interview: it may be a fairly accurate reflection of how good they’ll be at the job.
That’s the conclusion in a study published in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology last month.
Key takeaway for hiring employers: The Facebook page is the first interview; if you don’t like a person there, you probably won’t like working with them. The bad news for employers, though, who are hoping to take the Facebook shortcut: “So many more profiles are restricted in what the public can access,” says Kluemper.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Masters of Their Own Destiny
Why today’s giants build the tech they need to stay on top.
http://www.fastcompany.com/3025636/technovore/masters-of-their-own-destiny
The A7 neatly sums up the new reality of our always-connected world: Every market is ripe for upheaval, competition can come from anywhere, and today’s customer could very well be the one who knocks you from your perch.
Think back to just 15 years ago when the likes of Cisco, Dell, HP, Intel, and Oracle got big supplying the backbone of Internet computing. Their incumbency meant they had to serve the needs of a lot of customers, which slowed them down. And as the metabolism of change in the Internet era has sped up, they couldn’t keep pace.
When Facebook was in its megagrowth phase a few years ago, it realized that the big server companies couldn’t make what it needed to serve up all those cute baby pictures and endless event requests. So Facebook set up a skunk-works project and designed its own servers specifically to make Facebook services zoom at the lowest possible cost. It sent the plans to an Asian server maker named Quanta to build these streamlined boxes cheaply.
Facebook didn’t have designs on the $55 billion server market. It took matters in its own hands and ended up creating a competitor that Dell, HP, and IBM didn’t see coming. Facebook, thanks to its sheer size and complexity, is the standard-bearer for the data-rich, highly networked future of information. When it designs machines to handle its workloads, it’s creating the next-generation server. The big-hardware makers let the tail wag the dog.
As with Facebook, Apple’s main business isn’t making chips. But it had to craft its own processors once it realized that the major semiconductor manufacturers simply weren’t going to push the envelope on performance fast enough to meet the company’s development timeline.
The strategy today is simple: In order to move fast, build what you can’t buy or risk losing control of your fate and becoming the next Palm, Motorola, or HTC.
Tomi Engdahl says:
1 in 10 Americans think HTML is an STD, study finds
http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-1-10-americans-html-std-study-finds-20140304,0,1188415.story#ixzz2v54ieM4R
If you’re talking tech with Americans, you may want to avoid using any jargon.
A recent study found that many Americans are lost when it comes to tech-related terms, with 11% saying that they thought HTML — a language that is used to create websites — was a sexually transmitted disease.
Besides HTML, there were some other amusing findings
Despite the incorrect answers, 61% of the respondents said it is important to have a good knowledge of technology in this day and age.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Sysadmins and Devs: Do these job descriptions make any sense?
Industry lobby group defines skills used in 25 common IT jobs
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/03/09/sysadmins_and_devs_do_these_job_descriptions_make_ianyi_sense/
The Australian Computer Society (ACS) has released an ICT Skills White Paper, titled “Common ICT Job Profiles & Indicators of Skills Mobility”, offering definitions of 25 jobs and what they entail.
“For an individual,” the White Paper says, “the skills profiles provide an invaluable resource in support of career planning,”
The White Paper relies relies on the Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA)
SFIA ranks occupations on this seven-ladder scale:
1. Follow
2. Assist
3. Apply
4. Enable
5. Ensure and advise
6. Initiate and influence
7. Set strategy, inspire, and mobilise
Chief information officers score a 7 on the scale. Customer support folks score a 3.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How Aaron Levie and his childhood friends built a $2 billion business, without stabbing each other in the back
http://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-aaron-levie-and-his-childhood-friends-built-box-into-a-2-billion-business-without-stabbing-each-other-in-the-back/
Tomi Engdahl says:
One-Hit Wonders
by James Surowiecki March 17, 2014
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2014/03/17/140317ta_talk_surowiecki?currentPage=all
They are playing Candy Crush Saga, a wildly addictive mobile game that has been downloaded more than half a billion times.
The I.P.O. is no surprise, given King’s domination of the booming mobile-game business, but it’s likely to end badly, because King is part of a venerable tradition: the one-hit wonder.
In its I.P.O. filing, King claims that a “unique and differentiated model” for developing games will enable it to create new hits, and plenty of analysts believe that King has cracked the code of hooking consumers. But that’s unlikely. The world of pop culture contains many more one-hit wonders than hit factories.
It’s easy to see why King’s founders want to go public: money. But the money isn’t worth the hassle. As a public company, King will have to show shareholders consistent results and ever-growing profits. Such expectations are, frankly, silly in crazily competitive, hit-driven industries, and trying to meet them is a recipe for frustration. If King stayed private, it could milk its cash cow and build games without having to worry overmuch about hatching a new cultural juggernaut. We expect companies to constantly be in search of the next big thing. But, for one-hit wonders, the smartest strategy might be to just enjoy it while it lasts.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Bubble Question
Everywhere I go, everywhere I speak, I get asked this question. Are we in a bubble?
http://avc.com/2014/03/the-bubble-question/
It’s been a good time to be in the VC and startup business and I think it will continue to be as long as the global economy is weak and rates are low.
Tomi Engdahl says:
IT managers wanted to get fired , ” to use a lot of money , and all work smoothly ”
Gartner analyst Robert Handler always remembers a mandate of his career early:
“I was asked to collect the evidence, so that the company could fire the information technology leader”
Nothing wrong was found . In fact, consider the manager was the best CIO, which Handler had met.
Why CFO thinks the CIO should be fired?
” He uses a lot of money, and everything seems to be running properly .”
At that point, Handler decided that the information management management positions are not for him.
The case is a common paradox of the IT world.
“When everything goes smoothly, no one will remember the existence of IT department”
Source: Tietoviikko
http://www.tietoviikko.fi/cio/itjohtajalle+potkut+quotkayttaa+paljon+rahaa+ja+kaikki+toimii+ongelmittaquot/a970819
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Stress Of Being A Computer Programmer Is Literally Driving Many Of Them Crazy
http://www.businessinsider.com/syndromes-drive-coders-crazy-2014-3
Being a software programmer is one of the best jobs these days for your pocketbook and your job security, but it can be incredibly bad for your mental health.
Two things are going on that are literally driving programmers crazy.
One is something known as the “imposter syndrome.” That’s when you’re pretty sure that all the other coders you work with are smarter, more talented and more skilled than you are. You live in fear that people will discover that you are really faking your smarts or skills or accomplishments.
Imposter syndrome is common in professions where the work is peer reviewed. Writing software is just such a field, particularly open-source software where anyone can look at the code and change it.
programmers think they need to work harder to become good enough
That programmers are expected to work insanely long hours isn’t new. But this idea that they are doing it of their own accord, for the sheer joy of it, is new.
Overworked coders tended to produce less high-quality code when working 60 hour/weeks than refreshed people did when working 40-hour weeks.
best web hosting canada reviews says:
I’m really enjoying the theme/design of your site. Do you
ever run into any internet browser compatibility issues?
A handful of my blog readers have complained
about my website not operating correctly in Explorer but looks great in Chrome.
Do you have any suggestions to help fix this issue?
Tomi Engdahl says:
I have sometimes run into internet browser compatibility issues.
Stying using standard HTML codes (no browser specific extensions etc), making sure that code syntax is correct (check with suitable tools), making sure that design is scalable & gracefully degrading, and testing with many browsers will keep the problems pretty much away.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Real Engines Of Growth Have Nothing To Do With Growth Hacking
http://techcrunch.com/2014/03/22/the-real-engines-of-growth-on-the-internet/
Among real growth experts — the ones who have worked on growth at high-growth Internet companies — “growth hacking” is a loaded term. Loaded with hype. Loaded with bad ideas about how Internet companies actually grow: Empty at best, misleading at worst.
Tomi Engdahl says:
What VCs Look for in Big Data Startups
http://www.cio.com/article/750113/What_VCs_Look_for_in_Big_Data_Startups
Getting ready to pitch venture capitalists on your big data startup? Here’s a hint: Don’t call yourself a ‘big data company’ and don’t pitch by analogy.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google’s Scientific Approach to Work-Life Balance (and Much More)
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/03/googles-scientific-approach-to-work-life-balance-and-much-more/
Our first rounds of gDNA have revealed that only 31% of people are able to break free of this burden of blurring. We call them “Segmentors.” They draw a psychological line between work stress and the rest of their lives, and without a care for looming deadlines and floods of emails can fall gently asleep each night. Segmentors reported preferences like “I don’t like to have to think about work while I am at home.”
For “Integrators”, by contrast, work looms constantly in the background. They not only find themselves checking email all evening, but pressing refresh on gmail again and again to see if new work has come in.
Of these Integrators (69% of people), more than half want to get better at segmenting.
They worked for 20 years before trends began to emerge, and today those findings are among the clearest risk factors of heart disease we’ve got–think cigarette smoking, lack of exercise, and obesity. gDNA is still in its infancy, and is inherently limited because we’re only including current and former Googlers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
STEM Study Shows Hiring Managers Favor Men Over Women
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1321681&
Men outnumber women in technical fields by more than four to one. A good deal of this disparity is due to biases by both sexes when it comes to hiring new employees, according to researchers who watched how technology managers behaved, rather than asking their opinions in a survey.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Beyond Meritocracy: 6 Ways IT Employee Performance Evaluations Are Changing
http://www.cio.com/article/750499/Beyond_Meritocracy_6_Ways_IT_Employee_Performance_Evaluations_Are_Changing
Neither employees nor their managers look forward to annual performance reviews. That’s why experts suggest using methods and tools that provide valuable, real-time feedback on how employees are doing.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Technology is murdering customer service – legally
Chopping down the phone tree to scrump low-hanging fruit
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2014/04/07/technology_kills_customer_service/
When someone tallies up all the good and bad things that the tech mega-explosion of the last 50 years has brought us, there’s one item I expect to see right at the top of the second column: the slow but steady death of customer service.
Anyone transported from, say, the 1970s to the 2020s will find that component of the traditional product life-cycle to be non-existent in any recognisable form, and if technology isn’t actually causing this state of affairs, it’s certainly enabling it.
Providing full-on customer service isn’t cheap, and, being a “cost centre” rather than a “profit centre,” it seems to be the lowest of the low-hanging fruit whenever the time comes to trim corporate budgets. Phone trees and support websites, now the main stand-ins for real service, are usually no more than a high-tech gloss slapped on top of a hollowed-out system designed to avoid helping you.
Ten years ago there were a slew of eye-opening accounts from poorly trained reps who’d been instructed to end support calls as quickly as possible, and reprimanded when they didn’t do so. It was a shocking revelation at the time, but today getting even one of these barely helpful consultants on the phone can feel like winning the lottery.
One trick that has occasionally worked for me is selecting “Sales” rather than “Support” to break out of the maze, on the assumption that the company has an incentive to provide personal service to customers looking to buy something.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Tech Firms May Find No-Poaching Pacts Costly
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/04/07/tech-firms-may-find-no-poaching-pacts-costly/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=1
A high-stakes negotiation is taking place in Silicon Valley among some of the biggest names in the industry — Apple and Google among them — over accusations that they were involved in a collusion to prevent their employees from being hired at rival companies. The employees filed a class-action suit, contending that the illegal hiring practices cost employees $9 billion in lost wages.
Tomi Engdahl says:
What Heartbleed Can Teach The OSS Community About Marketing
http://www.kalzumeus.com/2014/04/09/what-heartbleed-can-teach-the-oss-community-about-marketing/
If you’re a technologist and you’re not living under a rock, you’ve heard about Heartbleed, which is a Severity: Apocalyptic bug in the extraordinarily widely deployed OpenSSL software. Heartbleed lets anyone capable of finding a command line read encryption keys, passwords, and other private data out of affected systems. If you don’t remember addressing this in the last 48 hours close this window immediately and get to work.
Heartbleed is much better marketed than typical for the OSS community, principally because it has a name, a logo, and a dedicated web presence.
Compare “Heartbleed” to CVE-2014-0160, which is apparently the official classification for the bug.
Geeks sometimes do not like when technical facts are described in emotionally evocative fashion.
The Heartbleed announcement should be taught in Technical Writing courses. It is masterful communication.
That is tight, precise, hard-hitting writing,
The Heartbleed logo is probably one of the highest ROI uses of ~$200 in the history of software security. (I don’t actually know whether they got it done for $200, but that is about what I paid the last time I had a logo done for an OSS project.)
There exists a huge cultural undercurrent in the OSS community which suggests that marketing is something that vaguely disreputable
Tomi Engdahl says:
Companies Say No to Having an HR Department
Employers Come Up With New Ways to Manage Hiring, Firing and Benefits
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304819004579489603299910562?mod=WSJ_article_EditorsPicks
Sometimes the only thing worse than having an HR department is not having one.
Companies seeking flat management structures and more accountability for employees are frequently taking aim at human resources. Executives say the traditional HR department—which claims dominion over everything from hiring and firing to maintaining workplace diversity—stifles innovation and bogs down businesses with inefficient policies and processes. At the same time, a booming HR software industry has made it easier than ever to automate or outsource personnel-related functions such as payroll and benefits administration.
Some workers say they feel the absence of an in-house HR staff acutely, especially when it comes to bread-and-butter HR responsibilities such as mediating employee disputes and resolving pay problems.
“Whenever you consider eliminating portions of HR you have to think of the financial risk, the strategic risk,”
“When you have an HR person, you have a point of contact that’s confidential.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Four Reasons to Quit Your Job
https://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20140408040010-86541065-four-reasons-to-quit-your-job?goback=.mpd2_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_20131209210429*586541065*5four*5bosses*5you*5don*5t*5want*5or*5want*5to*5be&trk=prof-post
The first is so simple it almost goes without saying
Do you want to go to work every morning?
Second, do you enjoy spending time with your coworkers or do they generally bug the living daylights out of you?
Third, does your company help you fulfill your personal mission? Essentially, this question asks whether your company jibes with your life’s goals and values.
Fourth and finally, can you picture yourself at your company in a year? We use that time frame because that’s how long it usually takes to find a new, better job once you decide to move on.
To be clear: We’re not suggesting people quit at the first inkling of discontent. No matter where you work, at some point you will have to endure difficult times, and even a deadly dull assignment, to survive a crisis or move up. But it makes little sense to stay and stay at a company because of inertia. Unlock your door and get out.
Tomi Engdahl says:
France bans managers from contacting workers outside business hours
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/10/france_bans_after_hours_email/
A new agreement between employer organizations and labor unions in France has made it illegal for French managers to contact their employees about work-related matters outside of normal business hours.
That means French workers who receive emails or calls from coworkers or the boss at dinnertime can now safely ignore them without fear of retribution.
French companies won’t be the only organizations in Europe to follow such rules. Germany’s labor ministry has enacted a similar policy for its own employees as an example for German companies to follow
Some German companies have reportedly even set their email servers to stop forwarding messages outside business hours by default.
The French labor agreement, however – which is legally binding – will be the first time such rules are foisted upon European companies at the national government level.
In the case of the new “after hours” rules, certain classes of workers will be exempt, but these will mostly be managers
Tomi Engdahl says:
Product / Market Fit is a Trap.
Why you should focus on the jobs to be done instead
https://medium.com/product-love/2c2bf6c88cc6
So frankly having product/market fit or obsessing about it isn’t very useful.
It’s as actionable as obsessing about having success or being productive.
Reaching product/market fit just means that …
… there is a lucrative market you operate in
… you create a product for that market
… you get better at it (either at product or at distribution or both)
Reaching product/market fit is just a side-effect of doing the right things. The only way to get there is to focus on product and distribution.
Tomi Engdahl says:
No, we’re not in an IT ‘stockapoclyse’ – boom (and bust) is exactly what tech world needs
Love Google? Thank the first dot-com bubble
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/09/not_the_stockopolis/
Is this the stockapoclyse, as tech shares crater into the ground and no more money gets invested into the sector? Or is that 20 per cent fall in the largest internet-based companies – Netflix, Flicker and Twitter – that $275bn drop in collective value over the last month, just an overdue correction to recent price run ups?
Well, this is the stock market so the correct answer is: who knows? Google, Microsoft Oracle have also seen their stocks drop recently, while Cisco is up.
Why does it have to be this way?
Perhaps our final question is, well, if this stock market stuff leaves us open to overvaluations, booms and busts, why the hell do we put up with this method of financing? Can’t we design something better?
Out in the unfashionable end of finance economics there’s a potential answer to this one. Which is that major new technologies actually require a financing bubble to get off the ground.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nice work if you can get out
Why the rich now have less leisure than the poor
http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21600989-why-rich-now-have-less-leisure-poor-nice-work-if-you-can-get-out
FOR most of human history rich people had the most leisure.
In today’s advanced economies things are different. Overall working hours have fallen over the past century. But the rich have begun to work longer hours than the poor.
Americans with a bachelor’s degree or above work two hours more each day than those without a high-school diploma.
The rich, it seems, are no longer the class of leisure.
There are a number of explanations. One has to do with what economists call the “substitution effect”. Higher wages make leisure more expensive: if people take time off they give up more money. Since the 1980s the salaries of those at the top have risen strongly, while those below the median have stagnated or fallen. Thus rising inequality encourages the rich to work more and the poor to work less.
The “winner-takes-all” nature of modern economies may amplify the substitution effect.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Innovation creates instability, you say? BLASPHEMY, you SCUM
Ooh, a stoning, a stoning!
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/11/innovation_creates_instability_blasphemer_kill_the_heretic/
In one particular session labelled ‘Publishing & the IT Sector’, a great deal more than this was being lost in translation. We heard that 85% of jobs in the publishing industry will soon demand ICT skills but only 25% of those currently in it have any. Of course, you can make percentages mean anything you like but I’m 50% sure this is correct.
When IT bosses talk up the power of computing, you have to take it with a fistful of salt.
a fantasy near-future in which high-speed-train passengers will be able to pull e-reader devices out from their armrests and download a book to read for the journey
Inevitably, when an IT boss sings the praises of technology in front of a large audience, the computers dig their heels in.
Rounding off the session was EU policy officer Marisa Fernandez Esteban who claimed that we had apparently witnessed examples of the TISP ideal.
It seems that while TISP is laudable in principle, it is disconcertingly lumbered with cool-sounding jargon such as “driving innovation” and “creating convergence” which, as El Reg’s readers will know, mean nothing whatsoever.
Questioning the righteousness of innovators is heresy in these narrow-minded times but it pays to heed the bullshit meter. The next time someone starts bandying around the term “innovation” at your office, grab your mobbafer and call security to escort them from the premises. The last thing you need is someone cocking up your business because it sounds cool
Tomi Engdahl says:
Exclusive: Apple, Google agree to pay over $300 million to settle conspiracy lawsuit
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/24/us-apple-google-lawsuit-exclusive-idUSBREA3N28Z20140424
(Reuters) – Four major tech companies including Apple and Google have agreed to pay a total of $324 million to settle a lawsuit accusing them of conspiring to hold down salaries in Silicon Valley, sources familiar with the deal said, just weeks before a high profile trial had been scheduled to begin.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Four out of five British company cio to agonizing over the business strategy of compliance difficulties, while eight out of ten will see it as a necessity.
Similarly, almost 80 percent of 250 surveyed IT director, says that strategy-it-tool the biggest trouble are closed systems.
About half of the respondents saw the applications and infrastructure fragmentation as a serious obstacle to the realization of the required service levels.
Less than half of IT budgets to be directed towards expanding the business or a change projects, the majority of the mainly Alongside business administration.
It’s the control moves toward the business, because more than 40 percent of it-s seen as a key derived from a project other than the IT Department.
Source: http://www.tietoviikko.fi/kaikki_uutiset/it+takamatkalla+strategian+toteutuksessa/a984064
Tomi Engdahl says:
New technological trends intimidated by the CEO
According to a recent study, four out of ten interviewed the CEO believes that their business activity comes six years after the distinctly different from the present .
While nearly two-thirds of interviewees leader sees new technologies as key factors in the success of their company , 43 per cent of fears that it will lose its competitive edge because they find it difficult to stay behind the evolution of technology . Approximately one-third feel that they are already dropped behind.
Business transformation is clearly visible in all sectors. New technologies and the opportunities brought about by changing the way businesses operate and sectors logic.
“We have seen in the past how fast technology changes can be. For example, the rapid breakthrough of the Internet in our society brought with it new applications , such as online banking . These days, online bank has become the norm , ”
Source: http://summa.talentum.fi/article/tv/uutiset/56461
Tomi Engdahl says:
Economic co-operation to change the business
Many people call the current development of all the social media and mobille gadgets as economic cooperation (collaborative economy). What is certain, however, is the fact that business must adapt to the new time.
Crowd Companies advisor Jeremiah Owyang is of the opinion that it is only begun seeing the effects of the social media business.
“The next step change communication, customer management and personnel relations with employers. Alongside business must adapt to shocks,” he says.
Owyang believes that the new economy associated with the following factors: the products, services, transport, tele-working, and money. The Internet has a huge impact on all of these.
Sharing economy
Some consider the cooperation with the ancient barter economy as a new version, as if basaaritalouden continuum.
Altimeter Group analyst Brian Solis calls the economy of cooperation rather the sharing economy, where people exchange their holdings, and its time for them to the most appropriate pace.
“Digitisation or not, the economic model is the same,”
The new technology offers people the ability to assess the cost of doing business and the associated risks.
Source: http://www.tietoviikko.fi/cio/yhteistyotalous+muuttaa+liiketoimintaa/a984113
Tomi Engdahl says:
How the Collaborative Economy Will Change the Way You Do Business
http://www.cio.com/article/751764/How_the_Collaborative_Economy_Will_Change_the_Way_You_Do_Business
The Internet puts the goods, services and expertise you need at your fingertips. Some call it a ‘collaborative economy’ focused less on transactions and more on trades. Others see a throwback to the early days of economic exchange. Either way, it’s quickly changing the way we do business.
Owyang identifies five keys areas of the collaborative economy:
1. Goods. Women in particular share clothes and jewelry in order to access an unlimited closet without buying so many “things.” Startups such as 99 Dresses, Poshmark and Threadflip serve as buy/sell/trade sites
2. Services. A variety of sites, such as eLance, Freelancer, oDesk and TaskRabbit, let people share their time and/or expertise.
3. Transportation. When people share rides through companies such as Uber and Lyft, they may not need to buy a car at all.
4. Space. Websites such as DesksNearMe, Liquid Space, ShareDesk and PivotDesk provide an alternative to signing a long-term lease by letting individuals rent desks, offices or meeting rooms in somebody else’s space. Homeowners are getting in on the act
5. Money. Crowdfunding and peer-to-peer lending sites such as Kickstarter and LendingClub are taking off. LendingClub
Tomi Engdahl says:
Customisation is BAD for the economy, say Oz productivity wonks
Bakers today, modders and makers tomorrow
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/30/customisation_is_bad_for_the_economy_says_productivity_commission/
Australia’s Productivity Commission is complaining that high-value, highly-customised – artesan, in fact – products are a drag on national productivity.
In its latest productivity report, the nation’s flint-eyed economists have decided that the best thing for the economy is for every possible product to sink into an identical low-cost, indistinguishable grey goo, apparently, like the generic “food” from the 1984 cult classic Repo Man.
Even worse, it’s really difficult to come up with any way to measure the economic value of product quality: “the higher quality of some of the output produced with these additional inputs may not be fully reflected in the measures of real value added growth for the subsector”.
Tomi Engdahl says:
OK Virtual Instruments, you’ve made a thing. Must you fill our ears with PR gobbledegook?
They’ve upgraded their network management tool – we think
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/30/gen_4_virtualwisdom_diesentities/
Virtual Instruments has launched an “entity-centric solution” amid an unparalleled display of marketing verbiage.
The product is called VirtualWisdom, version 4.0.
“Beyond the IT” and an “entity-centric solution” indeed. Who writes this stuff?
Tomi Engdahl says:
This Weekly Meeting Took Up 300,000 Hours a Year
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/04/how-a-weekly-meeting-took-up-300000-hours-a-year/
How much time does your organization squander? My colleagues and I gathered data about time use at one large company and found that people there spent 300,000 hours a year just supporting the weekly executive committee meeting.
Some of that time was productive, no doubt. But organizations in general are remarkably cavalier about how they invest their scarcest resource, the time of their people. In this month’s HBR, we analyze why companies waste so much time and what they can do to conserve it.
The best companies — those in the top quartile of revenue per employee — did 30% better than their peers in return on invested capital, 40% better in operating margin, and 80% better in revenue growth. Those differences contributed to a whopping 180% differential in total shareholder return over the 10-year period.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Team Lead – here is what your boss isn’t telling you, yet still expects of you
http://lnbogen.com/2013/06/05/team-lead-here-is-what-your-boss-isnt-telling-you-yet-still-expects-of-you/
Let me start with what your boss does tell you:
You need to deliver results.
You need to deliver on time.
You need to communicate – raise flags, synchronize effort with other teams etc.
So you’re leaving your one-on-one meetings with your boss “checking” every one of the bullets above, yet, you feel as if you’re missing something. You’re exhausted.
It gets even worse.
There is an underlying expectation that nobody told you about – as a team lead, it is your job to enable your company’s scalability. [Tweet it!]
“Scalable Company” can align and adjust its team and goals without losing its unique culture (vision, values and people) in the process.
It means changing direction if the business doesn’t make sense anymore, without feeling resentment: “but I’ve invested so much time in it!” It means growing from a team of 15 to 50 without feeling pinned down: “oh gosh, it used to be fun working here. Now I need to write a 50-page document just to get something to move forward.”
Just like a scalable architecture – you can bring more users, enhance your product and the experience remains smooth. Many things happen under the hood to support it, but the end result remains the same.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ask Slashdot: How Do You Tell a Compelling Story About IT Infrastructure?
http://ask.slashdot.org/story/14/05/09/194226/ask-slashdot-how-do-you-tell-a-compelling-story-about-it-infrastructure
“Every month we submit status reports to upper management. On the infrastructure side, these reports tend to be ‘Hey, we met our service level agreements … again.’ IT infrastructure is now a lot like the electric company. Nobody thanks the electric company when the lights come on, but they have plenty of colorful adjectives to describe them when the power is off.
What is the best way to construct a compelling story for upper management so they’ll appreciate the hard work that an IT department does? They don’t seem particularly impressed with functioning systems, because they expect functioning systems.
Comment:
The only other situation I’ve seen is when the CTO is a really charismatic guy who can describe the most simplest of task in the most interesting way and can play enough politics so people kiss his butt to make sure he’s happy. Then the CTO tells his underlings how appreciated they are by the executives even though they themselves never thought to say so.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nokia had a small metal spirit of the workshop – ” all knew each other ”
“We had a small metal spirit of the workshop , and all knew each other . Get your hands in the clay was made , ” says CEO Mikko Lietsalmi .
Nokia did not come in the 2000s the world’s best software houses because of lack of knowledge of substance .
” Coding is an art, a new creation. Doing so will suffer if the executive director has not written a single line of code in his life , ” says Sami Halonen .
Entrepreneurship brought on by the most obvious change has been the decision-making speed. Mikko Lietsalmea frustrated at Nokia stiffness, caused by the swelling of the organizations .
“It’s hard to imagine that even without a career at Nokia as possible, the company can immediately head to the global market ,” Lietsalmi thinking .
Source: http://www.tietoviikko.fi/kaikki_uutiset/nokiassa+oli+pienen+metallipajan+henki++quotkaikki+tunsivat+toisensaquot/a987046
Tomi Engdahl says:
The strange truth about fiction
https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-data-science/the-strange-truth-about-fiction/10152215561458859
Sharing rumors can be useful: they can be important sources of truthful information, especially in situations where authoritative sources of information are unavailable. Because rumor sharing is such an important activity in social networks, nearly every technological advancement that facilitates human communication, such as Facebook’s “Share” functionality, is ultimately used to relay rumors. In this note we examine a set of rumors propagating on Facebook either as text or images.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Old saying. Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM. Nobody ever got fired for buying Microsoft. Nobody ever got fired for buying SAP. It’s a simple cover-your-ass game.
Managers, unless they have a very special bond with the company (like, say, they built it from the ground up) don’t give a shit about the company. They care about their ass.
And when the question is whether to blow a million of company money for software they don’t know jack about but has a big name behind it, or to save the company a million bucks using software they don’t know jack about but has no name to it, they blow them money.
Because they needn’t explain why they did it. It’s IBM/MS/SAP, how should he have imagined that it’s no good?
Source: http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/05/12/2159234/how-to-approve-the-use-of-open-source-on-the-job
Tomi Engdahl says:
Why consensus-decision making is better for open source projects
http://iquaid.org/2014/04/21/why-consensus-decision-making-is-better-for-open-source-projects/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google Beats Apple in List of World’s Most Valuable Brands
Brand value highlights tech sector growth By Lauren Johnson
http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/google-beats-apple-list-world-s-most-valuable-brands-157868
Google, Apple, IBM and Microsoft are the companies that rank the highest in terms of brand value, according to a new study commissioned by WPP and conducted by Millward Brown. McDonald’s is the only non-tech brand within the top five, highlighting the growth of the digital vertical in recent years and more trust among consumers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Information Mobility Means Business Opportunity
http://mds.ricoh.com/blog/information_mobility_means_business_opportunity?utm_campaign=ContentSyndication&utm_medium=NativeAd&utm_source=Taboola&utm_content&utm_term=InfoMobo+means+business+opportunitiy&utm_content=businessweek
Tomi Engdahl says:
Meetings and meetings of various media is doomed at the very least a waste of time
Pointedly put all invited to the meeting , which may somehow relate to the theme of a meeting , the agenda is no more than a couple of lines in the passive, preparation is non-existent and most of the time goes into the many cell phone using
No one does not lead or direct a meeting and notes are done at random – and can not really be shared with others.
Meetings typically last for at an hour, most of which is used for back view ; what has been done , what’s going on , and so on .
In the last ten minutes, the focus is moved in haste to the following steps. In practice, the meeting has to be stopped for five minutes ahead of time, so that participants have time to the next session on time.
Teleconferencing is a crisis even more computers surfing the participants during the meetings who knows where .
Modern facilitator to take advantage of social media solutions for business advantage .
For example, the review, assessment and prioritization of issues need to handle a prior time and place decisions , when during the meetings of these things do not have to deal with.
Time together can be used to forward view , as well as , for example, together with the ideas.
Noteworthy is also the fact that all things do not need to arrange a meeting .
This time is freed up for those meetings where everyone is really to be present . Time is saved , and the best travel expenses are reduced.
The proceedings of the web will not happen automatically, but action must be both controlled but also goal-oriented ; one of the goals is to have a view , in particular how they are achieved.
Source: http://www.tietoviikko.fi/cio/artikkelit/parhaat_kaytannot/moderni+palaveri+suuntaa+eteenpain+ndash+fasilitoidusti/a989656
Tomi Engdahl says:
Economic Nobel laureate Edmund Phelps harshly criticizes the corporate management
Economic Nobel Prize winner, judged western societies in the development and structuring . According to him, they do not help people, companies and societies to grow. The company’s management has changed to the short term.
- CEOs and managers know that they enjoy the position for a long time. Therefore, they think mainly large bonuses that they get after their term
The short-sightedness leads to Phelps , the fact that the companies develop innovation, the implementation of which goes to the ” five or ten years .” The situation is exacerbated by the fact that the company is financed by requiring quarterly results. The financial sector’s pressure to keep all eyes firmly by management in the following months.
- Companies operating in an environment where it is difficult to think of innovation
Surprisingly, Phelps to bring a solution to the Renaissance , after gradually developed the values: individualism, risk-taking and self-expression.
The current situation does not look good . Not only is the company ‘s management and operational funding is short-sighted, administration may not get clean papers either: In societies is a strange philosophy, that all should be protected. It leads to the fact that all tax revenue is used to maintain the current situation. The benefit of social security is that entrepreneurs do not have to worry about that failure leads to personal bankruptcy.
Source: http://yle.fi/uutiset/talousnobelisti_arvostelee_kovin_sanoin_yritysjohtoa/7257684
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nobody Cares How Awesome You Are at Your Job
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-05-23/nobody-cares-how-awesome-you-are-at-your-job
In an article published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science, University of California at San Diego behavioral scientist Ayelet Gneezy and University of Chicago business professor Nicholas Epley tracked people’s responses to three types of promises: broken ones, kept ones, and then ones that were fulfilled beyond expectations. And while it’s true that everyone gets upset when a promise is broken (I’m looking at you, housing-contractors-who-claim-bathroom-renovations-will-be-done-in-a-week), it turns out that overdelivering on something won’t make anyone significantly more impressed by your awesomeness. “Going above and beyond a promise didn’t seem to be valued at all,” says Epley.
The reason for this, Epley says, is that promises work a bit like verbal contracts. If I promise you something and you accept that promise, you assume I’ll do it, nothing more, nothing less.
“It really makes you think about how you spread your effort and how to use your resources wisely,”