Business & Finance

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 10 mar 2015

Gartner predicts that the global education industry (including higher, primary and secondary sectors) technology spending will grow 2.3% to reach US$ 67.8 billion in 2015. According to Jan-Martin Löwendahl, vice-president of research at Gartner, 'An increasing number of technical innovations and technology trends are emerging from within the industry, but most will emerge outside the industry, driven by major forces such as digital business and the consumerisation and industrialisation of IT.' Following are Gartner's top 10 strategic technologies for 2015 - (1) Adaptive Learning (2) Adaptive E-Textbooks (3) Customer Relationship Management (CRM) (4) Big Data (5) Sourcing Strategies (Represent a collection of technologies and vendor services, from hosting to cloud, homegrown to open source, to subscription models for acquiring software/hardware capabilities) (6) Exostructure (Means acquiring the critical capability of interoperability as a deliberate strategy to integrate the increasing numbers of partnerships, tools and services in the education ecosystem) (7) Open Microcredentials (8) Digital Assessment (9) Mobile (10) Social Learning. Read on...

Memeburn: 10 technologies that will have a huge impact on education in 2015 and beyond
Author: Myolisi Sikupela

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 07 mar 2015

Entrepreneurs and customers are important components of the business ecosystem. Entrepreneurs create innovative products and services for the customers. A strong exchange and partnership between the two will assure that the activity of product and process innovation and improvement never stops. The efficient integration of what customers need and what entrepreneurs develop will lead to growth of businesses and markets. Read on...

ilmeps/read: Relationship Between Entrepreneurs and Customers to Drive Innovation
Author: Mohammad Anas Wahaj

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 05 mar 2015

In the world where products and services are designed to be simple and bring ease in human lives, Brian Millar, head of strategy at Sense Worldwide, brings out a contrarian view. According to him difficulty can sometime make lives and jobs more meaningful. To explain his perspective he mentions an influential book 'Drive', in which author Daniel Pink argues that humans are motivated by autonomy, mastery and purpose and when things are designed to be simple, it takes away the fulfilment and satisfaction that come from mastery. He cites example of phishing scams that prey on trance-like state of people where clicking a link to reset password is not always thought about well. He also provides a case of shared space movement, a successful road safety design campaign, where ambiguity is brought back into road use at certain points, by making unclear who has right of way, for both padestrians and drivers. This resulted in slowing down of traffic and subsequent 43% fall in accident rates. He talks about his experience of an unsuccessful risk assessment sofware product that was designed to be very simple but since complexity was prevalent in investment banks for decision-making at that time, it was rejected. He argues that by incorporating a little difficulty in the design of that sofware might have resulted in a better outcome as the industry's practice relied on it. Read on...

the guardian: Why we should design things to be difficult to use
Author: Brian Millar

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 02 mar 2015

To create a business from an idea and managing it successfully, requires not only technical and managerial skills but also 'intangible' competencies that are essential for start-up's survival. Carla Young, founder and publisher of MOMeo Magazine, suggest skills that entrepreneurs should have particularly at the early stages of the venture's development - (1) Talking Money (2) Public Speaking (3) Selling (4) Managing (and Protecting) Your Time (5) Dealing with Criticism (6) Communicating with Crazy & Irrational People (7) Learning New Skills. Read on...

MOMeo Magazine: Essential Entrepreneurial Skills- The 7 Skills Every Entrepreneur Must Master
Author: Carla Young

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 27 feb 2015

The 2014 report, 'Culture of Quality: Accelerating Growth and Performance in the Enterprise' by American Society for Quality (ASQ), analyzed responses from more than 2,000 executives and quality professionals (members of ASQ) and showed that while 2/3rd of executives say their organizations exhibit a culture of quality, only half say that these values are clearly understood throughout the organization. According to Laurel Nelson-Rowe, Managing Director for Global Business Development at ASQ, 'Achieving quality goals requires a strong commitment: setting a compelling vision, companywide shared values and complementary performance metrics and incentives'. Based on the research findings, ASQ created a list of 10 signs that show the lack of 'culture of quality' in the organization - (1) Top executives rarely discuss quality (2) Lacks quality vision (3) Managers fail to consistently emphasize quality (4) Lacks feedback loops to continuous process improvement (5) Lacks formal mechanisms to assess customer feedback (6) Quality goals are not mentioned in performance metrics (7) Employees are not aware of organization's quality vision and values (8) Training and development do not emphasize quality (9) Quality visions and values are not communicated to new hires (10) Inconsistent quality causes frequent minor setbacks. Read on...

Entrepreneur: Infographic - 10 Telltale Signs That a 'Culture of Quality' Is Lacking at Your Company
Author: Laurel Nelson-Rowe

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 26 feb 2015

Designing for Internet of Things (IoT) is pushing the boundaries for designers and engineers to experiment and evolve out of their specific roles. Martin Charlier, design consultant and co-founder of Rain Cloud, provides his perspective on the future of interfaces and how to design for IoT. According to him, 'Products in today's world, especially, need to be thought about from variety of angles. A designer has to consider both the looks and working of the product while designing.' He stresses the importance of symbiotic nature of interaction design and service design. On working of cross-disciplinary teams, he says, 'Every field needs to know a little bit, have a basic understanding, of the other side... The key, though, is that they started working as one team together, before splitting up into their respective domain areas, so that there was a joined vision.' While discussing the role of human values in IoT design, he suggests, 'Designers need to start thinking about how they change people's behaviors and affect their lives.' Read on...

O'Reilly Radar: Design to reflect human values
Author: Jenn Webb

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 21 feb 2015

In recent reports it is found that execution, the way of translating strategy into results, is not only more challenging but enough is not even written about it in business literature. A survey of 400 global CEOs mentions that executional excellence was the number one challenge facing corporate leaders in Asia, Europe, and the US. Moreover studies have also found the difficulty associated with the execution, about 2/3rd to 3/4th of large organizations struggle to implement their strategies. Extensive and ongoing research by Donald Sull of MIT Sloan School of Management, Rebecca Homkes of London Business School and Charles Sull of Charles Thames Strategy Partners, in which a survey of about 8000 managers in 262 companies and across 30 industries has been done, found that several commonly held beliefs regarding strategy implementation are wrong. They provide five myths and explain relevant and accurate perspective and insights that will help managers to effectively execute strategy - (1) Execution Equals Alignment (Coordination and cooperation across all functions and units horizontally is the need in addition to hierarchical alignment from top down) (2) Execution Means Sticking to the Plan (Real-time adjustments, adaptiveness to the changes on the ground and seizing unexpected opportunities at the right moment with creative solutions on an ongoing basis are required apart from sound planning. The need to be agile within the framework of overall strategy is the key. Concentrate on fluid reallocation of funds, people and attention. Failure to exit when needed also creates a drag on execution) (3) Communication Equals Understanding (Explaining and making everyone understand with clarity the strategic objectives of the organization and how they relate and connect with the overall strategy is essential. Leaders need consistency in communicating strategic priorities and avoid confusing and conflicting messages) (4) A Performance Culture Drives Execution (In addition to performance, a culture that supports execution must also recognize and reward abilities and skills like agility, teamwork, and ambition. Excessive emphasis on performance can impair execution as it may lead to play it safe attitude and making conservative performance commitments. Culture of coordination and collaboration among team members is essential for execution) (5) Execution Should Be Driven from the Top (Effective execution in large, complex organizations emerges from countless decisions and actions at all levels. Concentrating power at the top may boost performance in the short term, but it degrades an organization's capacity to execute over the long run. Distributed leadership is where execution is propelled and achieved. It includes not only middle managers but also technical and domain experts who are part of the ecosystem that get things done. Although execution should be driven from the middle but it should be guided from the top. Top leaders should bring out structured processes to facilitate coordination and teamwork. Micromanagement and alignment traps should be avoided). Read on...

Harvard Business Review: Why Strategy Execution Unravels - and What to Do About It
Authors: Rebecca Homkes, Donald Sull, Charles Sull

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 19 feb 2015

In today's business world driven by social media, mobile and numerous other digital technologies, to seek customer's attention and stand out seems to be a logical digital powered brand strategy. But in the process of jumping on the digital bandwagon are brand strategists forgetting the golden rules of human strategy and customer connection. Umair Haque, author and Director of Havas Media Labs, explains why digital strategy shouldn't focus too much on ephemeral customer attention but on customer relations and not only seek their loyalty but try to be loyal to them and care for them as human beings. He suggests 4 mistakes of digital strategy and how to overcome them - (1) Titillating, not educating (2) Making zombies, not superheroes (3) Infecting, not connecting (4) Communicating, not elevating. Read on...

Harvard Business Review: Your Digital Strategy Shouldn't Be About Attention
Author: Umair Haque

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 19 feb 2015

Apart from providing excellent products and services, businesses have to ensure that their brand connects with customers with a uniform and consistent message. Small companies and startups have to be even more careful to provide the unified message all across the different media as they have limited budgets and are trying to build their reputation in a competitive business environment. As a small and emerging business make sure that you answer the following questions with diligence - (1) Are you presenting a universal message? (2) Is your theme always consistent? (3) Do you have clear brand guidelines? Read on...

Startups: Why consistency is crucial in on and offline branding
Author: Lucy Wayment

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 16 feb 2015

The report 'The Sales Organization Performance Gap' by Prof. Steve W. Martin of University of Southern California and Nick Hedges, CEO of Velocify, is based on surveys of about 800 industry participants and dismantles the myth of a lone, star performer, cowboy-type salesman without whom the organization can't generate revenues. According to Mr. Hedges, 'The goal of the study was to identify the differences between a "good" sales organization and a "great" one. When we quantified what made the great sales organizations work, we found the underlying factor was a team process, a team culture.' Prof. Martin says, 'Another differentiator between good and great sales operations is that the latter are quick to recognize a poor fit in the team and rectify it. That usually means terminating employment.' The study also found that, 'The best sales organizations are not a collection of individuals trying to succeed as a team. Rather, they have a high level of morale and camaraderie. They are united for a greater purpose than themselves.' Read on...

CMSWire: No Cowboys Here - Teamwork, Culture Leads to Sales Success
Author: Erika Morphy

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