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The librarian wave

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[Had this as my cubicle, a long time ago]

There seems to be a silent undercurrent wave of librarians entering our (not) field of information processing. If you think their thinking might be stale, think again. This here piece, for example, is clear and bright in its contributions towards better …, well, calling it flatly what it is, ‘data’ management. Flatly, as that’s what one gets by approaching it from the IT side only. ‘Processes’ add only so much. I.e., so little.

Just one pic from that blog post to demonstrate the clarity of thought:
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How’zat for clarity ..?

I’ll pick this one up in full, later, when extending the stuff on ‘information’ in light of the one overarching Book on it all that I still have as a plan, if only I had the time to work on it full-time …!

Stumbling over yourself, in the retreat

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[Utreg]

Remember the good ol’ Boston Consulting matrix ..?

Among the puerilely [that is a word] shallow startup business, apparently not many do. They’re only chasing the next, even more questionable question marks, ‘knowing for sure’ (not) to turn those into stars without fail. Current stars exist only to set the example and to be beaten.
Dogs, of course, are what they are. And cash cows are also dogs. As they aren’t fast enough. Sure. But where startup managers believe to have found the ultimate question mark will turn into star certainty, and VCs just spending off their (or Other Peoples’ Money ..!) lifetime earnings as lottery tickets, the cash cows prod along quite happily, getting only half of the world’s attention for delivering … 95% of the world’s goods and services (mostly, from the bottom up Maslow’s pyramid).

Thus, two economies result; the one being much more dependent on the other than usually considered, with the other not being old and decrepid, to be done away with, but a core, a solid basis for long-term alignment or else one keeps on floating in the sky until one evaporates. The other way around is not quite as necessary as believed..!
Which also leads to those of the stable kind, trying to get into the action of the fluid kind, to stumble while they try to retreat into some fluid future. They lose the stability, and cannot catch up with the road runner(s) for sheer secondness and ballast of the old. Cash cows are big, required and necessary, and should be left alone to innovate not to disrupt. Disruptors, may be loosely tied to cash cows, but certainly not with the intention to later integrate the latter back into the former. That will lead to failure throughout; the horse already left the barn and you wouldn’t have wanted to close the gate but now have had a kick in the teeth; i.e., the slow just missing the grasp and ending up on the rails, grappling their teeth together, while the train ever speeding up will have left the station. This form of retreat (that’s what it is, retreat as leader, T Rex trying to regain initiative by outpacing and outsmarting the Velociraptors in their teamwork) will lead to pathetic stumbling.

Conclusion: Don’t do it. Not in the me-too way. Dare to decide what you are, be proud of that ..! Just innovate, not disrupt yourself internally only, and be strong … survival of the fattest and fittest. Don’t be a lightweight, you’ll fall like Icarus – after you have learned not to fly too low …!

InNOvate

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[Again, curvy]

Gijs van Wulfen (profile here) posted something elsewhere, which I bluntly copy:

Innovation is difficult. You are not the only one who thinks it’s a challenge. It has been a struggle for me the last 25 years as manager, consultant, facilitator and as founder of the FORTH innovation method. That’s why I love it actually. I love to do difficult things. My personal goal is to make innovation less complex so others will be able to innovate their product – and service portfolios and organizations – themselves.

As one of the first Linkedin Influencers I have written more than 80 posts about innovation the last sixteen months. Last week I reread them all to identify my most essential insights. Some are provoking. Others are simplifying. Here’s a list of quotes from my LinkedIn innovation articles. Please use them to lead your organizations in innovation:

  1. In the long run a company cannot survive on doing the same things better and cheaper.
  2. Most managers are like dogs. They bark at what they don’t know.
  3. Managers say yes to innovation only if doing nothing is a bigger risk.
  4. Continuous innovation is bullshit. You only innovate when you have to.
  5. Organizations frustrate innovative employees.
  6. Starting innovation is like a child starting to walk. Learn to love the struggle!
  7. If there’s no urgency innovation is considered as playtime.
  8. Most people only innovate when they have to. Pick the right moment.
  9. Innovators need the patience of a hunter to wait for a shot that you’re sure you can make.
  10. Never start innovation with an idea. You will fall in love with it. But love is blind.
  11. A big idea is a new simple solution for a relevant problem or dream.
  12. The best innovators are need seekers.
  13. The problem of brainstorms is the inability of people to let go of the old ideas.
  14. If you don’t get new insights you won’t get new ideas.
  15. For most companies evolutionary ideas are quite revolutionary.
  16. You can invent on your own, but in an organization you can never innovate alone!
  17. Think outside the box and present your idea inside the box otherwise nothing will happen.
  18. Innovators should bring back new business not new ideas.
  19. Nobody buys innovation from a clown so bring back a new business case.
  20. The voice of the customer is your best support for a new concept.
  21. Innovators should stop writing plans. Innovation is learning by doing.
  22. Innovation does not stop at the first “No”. That’s the moment it really starts.
  23. Less creative ideas are better because they have a higher chance of becoming reality.
  24. An organization is just like a herd. Focus on the slowest animals. When they start running too your organization really gets innovative.

So here were 24 of my essential insights about innovation. I hope some of them are helpful to you. As I promised 25 insights please do me a favor and share with us, as a comment, your own essential insight about innovation as number 25……..

And yes indeed, I’d like to hear your number 25, too.

Bias Time (9 of 9)

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[To round off brain ‘governance’]

Yes, it’s bias time again. The last of the series of biases that you, yes you, have. Even if you are aware of these, and even if you consciously try to correct for them to be, heh, ‘objective’, as in what e.g. auditors pursue, you will fail.

Red herring fallacies

  • Ad hominem: attacking the person instead of the argument. A form of this is reductio ad Hitlerum.
  • Argumentum ad baculum (“appeal to the stick” or “appeal to force”): where an argument is made through coercion or threats of force towards an opposing party
  • Argumentum ad populum (“appeal to belief”, “appeal to the majority”, “appeal to the people”): where a proposition is claimed to be true solely because many people believe it to be true
  • Association fallacy (guilt by association)
  • Appeal to authority: where an assertion is deemed true because of the position or authority of the person asserting it
  • Appeal to consequences: a specific type of appeal to emotion where an argument concludes that a premise is either true or false based on whether the premise leads to desirable or undesirable consequences for a particular party
  • Appeal to emotion: where an argument is made due to the manipulation of emotions, rather than the use of valid reasoning Continue reading “Bias Time (9 of 9)”

Books By Quote, Dutch edition

Again, a Books by Quote all in Dutch. As you may expect from that, content-wise we’ve moved down a peg or two (more..?) in wisdom, correctness, and due applicability but you may figure out for yourself why I copied the quotes; either because I find them valuable or because the error is of import for its ominousness (is that a word?).

Be aware that the quotes as such, aren’t a real unbiased ‘objective’ summary; most often I heartily advise to read the book yourself..! But maybe not this time…

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[Not Dutch, but impressive; Les Ménuires]

So, first up: Jan van der Vuurst’ Effectief Beïnvloeden, Spectrum, april 2011, ISBN 9789049107598.

Stakeholderanalyse: Assen Energie (laag naar hoog) en Aanvaarding, negatief naar positief. Bij de Y-as (Aanv) onderaan Vermijders, erboven Volgers, rechts uiterst onderaan Vijanden, erboven Partners. De Afwachters staan op de X-as links bij nul. (p.27)

Stakeholderanalyse, voor elke stakeholder die ertoe doet:
1. Wat is de aard van zijn/haar werk en wat is van essentieel belang om in dat werk succesvol te zijn?
2. Met welke verwachtingen heeft hij/zij te maken?
3. Wat wordt gemeten en beloond?
4. Wat is de cultuur van de afdeling waartoe elk van de sleutelfiguren behoort?
5. Wat staat momenteel bovenaan het prioriteitenlijstje?
6. De persoonlijke werk- en beslisstijl
• Op welke eigenschappen van andere mensen wijst iemand regelmatig?
• Wat zijn de onderwerpen waar de persoon het vaak over heeft zonder dat ernaar wordt gevraagd?
• Wat zijn de eerste vragen die iemand stelt bij een nieuw voorstel?
(pp.36-38)

Het Set-Up-To-Fail Syndrome … Als je vertrouwen in een medewerker begint te wankelen, is de kans groot dat je hem meer zult controleren en minder positieve feedback geeft. De medewerker zal dit aanvoelen en aan zichzelf beginnen te twijfelen. Hierdoor wordt de kans op fouten van de medewerker groter, waardoor je je indruk alleen maar bevestigd ziet. (p.67)
Continue reading “Books By Quote, Dutch edition”

TL;DR on TLD (or 5LD)

Ah, yes, let’s not forget to add the biggest Quod Non of the decade to our list of subjects for the redevelopment of information security / information risk management / risk management / management of risks / management ‘book’ forthcoming.
Indeed, three lines of ‘defense’ will be in. As well as the extension to five lines of defense. Which will all not work, and will all just add to the culpability of those proposing them, as they must know better or declare their incompetence at an even broader scale and abstraction layer.

Because, and here I repeat myself, and many others, how can something help defend when it’s not between a threat and a vulnerability ..!?

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[Dee An Bee]

Because I already discussed this in the past (way back, couple of months ago (final one)), and will discuss in all detail in the overall Book (white paper) on the above subjects, I’ll leave it here. For the believers in the idea: Full speed ahead into the blind alley …!

Silent SOx Shutdown

As Fortune Magazine reported last week, suddenly everyone realises that the dreaded (dreadful?) Sarbanes-Oxley act has hardly any sway anymore over business affairs. And some senators are calling for its repeal.

First, a pic for your viewing pleasure:
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[Barça, near the Olympic (remember?) village]

Can we assume this a sign of the waning of Compliance ..? Hopefully. What we’re left with, is a decade of misery for all but the compliabullies. How can we force them to pony up the compensation for financial and immaterial damages they caused ..?
They’re probably too blind (numb) to see that they did, massively, without any improvement in overall management, or viability, of the organisations involved. On the contrary, all the efforts were so misdirected that initiatives that might actually have helped, were thwarted. Innovation initiatives were demolished, economies destroyed. The only escape vent was in the financial industry, where wizardry escaped the numb compliabullies. What a bubble blew out…
And think of all the (actual, positive) creativity and careers that didnt take flight, or were culled. How to restore all the joy of years of productive careers, not as a second wind because that always sourly reminds of the lost years, the irrevokably lost life ..? If all that can be done is destroy the compliabullies’ lives and memories, then maybe that’s all that can and should be done. Not preferable, but if, then.

Two shorties

Just to drop ’em.

First; the hypes come and disappear again quicker than you get to notice them as such. As in some Bird thing. Is this the new way trends will go ..? If so, we’ll all have trouble keeping up, and will see disparate clusters of innovation, some re-inventions without linkage, some unique evolutionary directions taken. Long live diversity! Until the Other comes to bite you. Yes, I did aim to frame this as a remark on, e.g., economic development (followed by military power to secure the elsewhere cheaper resources), new-business models, and products and services. Now that we come to realise the balance between exposure for scrutiny and secrecy for deep development. À la Eppel.

Next: Not even pop-art is sacred. What’s next; a 3D (sic) printer for Jackson Pollocks ..? The horror. But, this may lead to creativity being defined better. Since the Act of pop-art, at its inception, was the great Move. The copy, even IF it were an improvement or only equally valuable (in cultural terms), still needs the reference to the greatness of pop-art, throughout, and doesn’t add a critique or anything, no ump to new insights. Nice mee-too art, but not Great Art, for my part. Now where is that chasm; what criteria to establish..?
(And, some pics in the link are quite good, in particular when seen as a series. Some form of art there. Should not have referenced older art too much, would have been better.)

As expected, a picture again for your viewing pleasure:
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[Trier but you spotted that]

Maverisk / Étoiles du Nord