Adaptovate

One of the most common misunderstandings in just about any client I have is that Cloud Computing is simply a rebranding of Application Service Providers. At a very high level I suppose that it addresses a similar set of problems, however for the most part this is where the comparison ends. For the people that were not playing around with Application Service Providers in 2000, it was simply where a company provided an application to clients to use, where the application and hardware to run the application was hosted by the company providing the service. So things like Email services using Microsoft Exchange, or SAP, or some large application was installed on a set of servers at the companies site, and the client paid rent to use this application. The idea was great, clients got a running application, however they did not need to capitalise all of the hardware and procure the software, then simply signed an rental/lease agreement to use the service. The biggest problem was the eco...

When doing anything, doing a few things well compared to a lot of things in a mediocre fashion, is often the best way to go, for the following reasons: - Simplicity: Comprehension by others is crucial in most things and the simpler it is the more chance they will get it straight away. You can always add more features to it once everybody loves it. - Focus: Spreading yourself too thin leads to mediocrity, and a bad product. - Iterations: Most people do not get it right first time, and delivering 'less' quickly so that you can fix it quickly and make a better product is almost always the best path. I will use an examples to explain: - Google is the classic example: They completely wiped the floor with every other search engine at the time, by simply making the search result more relevant, using their algorithm. That was it, one function done well. While every other site was not making search substantially better, and instead creating lots of portals and composite sites...

According to Dan Pink, the latest studies in human motivation come down to the following: Once you pay someone just enough money to take money off the table, you maximise their drive and motivation by providing the following things: - Autonomy and self direction in our jobs - Mastery of a challenge available in our jobs - Purpose for doing our job for this company You can see this animated by RSA Animate on YouTube: Unfortunately, all of these items go against many of the process driven methodologies being taught right now. Or rather to be fair, I should say that the methodologies have a process, and they are implemented badly by managers that find it easier to simply follow the suggest process to the letter, without actually thinking whether it makes sense in this instance. For example, there are a number of rapid application development methodologies in technology development these days, and one of the better ones is Agile. At the highest level the concept is to continu...

Are you a good enough manager to succumb to a natural order of things, and see if the people and the teams you manage, can self organise. Some would call this Chaos, and I think it is the best way to run your business, and mother nature agrees with me. Allowing Chaos to thrive in a team is possibly the most natural and healthy thing you can do to make your team(s) and people successful. We have over-organised our working environment to such and extent, that the natural instincts, intelligence, natural evolution and self organisation of our teams tends to literally 'wither at the vine'. Unfortunately, the business world in which we all tend to work, is still focused on 'the process', we are all process driven. It is always better to 'follow the process', than 'swim against the tide'. 'You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar', 'don't rock the boat'.... one could go on seemingly forever. A good thing (not) is that it gives us a...

I have spoken before about recognising that your perception of your environment or situation may not be the best or most appropriate point of view. Everyday I try to understand what it would be like to walk in others shoes, and although I have never heard of Cory Booker before, he has a really nice story that describes a moment in his life where he was told to understand how to view his environment from a differing point of view. This is also core to the meaning of the widely used saying of "glass half full, or half empty". You perception of your environment drastically changes the way you interact with others, and the way things will work for you. If you start sentences with "except for", "the problem is", "if only", and similar negative starts to sentence when you explain the current situation, then you are definitely are acting in a 'half empty' fashion, and you will struggle to help motivate yourself or others. Really simply t...

Being able to understand the perspective of a different point of view is one of the most important tools in your arsenal in any business relationship, the real question is how does one learn how to do it . In philosophy, there is a wonderful example of point of view, and I will term it the ill-conceived ' golden rule '. (Note I am not trying to be anti-religious, or anti any particular religion in these comments, just purely showing a differing point of view). The 'Golden Rule' exists in various forms in a number of religions. When I was taught the golden rule, it was something like 'do unto others as you would have others do unto you'. It is really quite a great concept, until you think of it from an other's point of view, and then it would clearly become something like 'do unto others as an other would have others do unto them'. Bit of a tongue twister, however I will try to explain with an example, perhaps a rather extreme example ... If you w...