Human Resources

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 18 nov 2014

Every region of the world poses different set of challenges for businesses and their employees due to culture, language, perceptions, people behavior etc. Josh Bersin of Deloitte, while on a visit to some Asian countries (Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo), interacted with HR professionals there and shares the following perspectives on human resources in Asia - (1) Leadership Gaps: Similar core leadership capabilites as other regions but need for style and 'cultural agility' (2) Culture and Communication Style: Varies across countries with Hong Kong more diverse and mix of Western and Asian while people in Japan more respectful, quiet and harmonious in communication (3) Employee Retention: Job hopping is prevalent particularly among young professionals (4) Use of Technology: Rapid growth and expanding economy in Asia is bringing use of latest technology (5) Fragmented and More Traditional HR Teams: Due to rapid growth HR organizations are less sophisticated and still have HR as a 'service center' function and are struggling to move to HR as 'business consultant' function (6) Highly Focused, Smart, Business Oriented HR leaders: HR leaders are actively engaged in discussions about how to restructure roles and try new approaches which drive results faster (7) The Simply Irresistible Framework: Companies should think holistically about their entire work environment if they want to compete for top talent. Read on...

LinkedIn Pulse: Talent Challenges in Asia - Growth, Youth, Dynamic Business Climate
Author: Josh Bersin

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 17 nov 2014

In the world of business there are often debates regarding the art of leadership and the science of management. Supporters of leadership sometimes consider management as simply making the trains run on time, while those favoring management view leadership as more of an emotional discipline. But there is a middle way of viewing them both - Management is the "What" and Leadership is the "Why". All what and no why leads to workforce just moving like pendulum with no real engagement. On the other hand, all why and no what results in more enthusiasm without much valuable output. Leadership and management are interdependent and in an organization, people must work along a continuum that optimally blends them to fit the situation. Executives should be prepared to undertake the demands of both leadership and management to successfully steer their organizations to desired goals. Read on...

strategy+business: Ending the Battle between Leadership and Management
Author: Eric J. McNulty

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 16 nov 2014

Successful change and transformation in an organization is often a result of the collaborative efforts of workers at various levels of hierarchy. Mid-level managers stand out considering their critical role in bringing large-scale organizational change. According to research study of 56 randomly selected companies from diverse industries, by Professor Behnam Tabrizi of Stanford University, most of the large-scale change and innovation efforts failed, but the successful 32% were due to the involvement of mide-level managers two or more levels below the CEO. In these successful efforts, mid-level managers weren't only manageing incremental change but they were leading it by working levers of power up, across and down in their organizations. Prof. Tabrizi, who is also Managing Director of Rapid Transformation LLC, mentions defining characteristics of managers who emerge as successful change leaders - (1) Change leaders have a North Star - and they talk about it (2) Change leaders use a GPS to guide them toward their North Star (3) Change leaders work across boundaries (4) Change leaders move fast. Moreover he also suggests five stages of a process, from his book 'Rapid Transformation', that managers should adopt, stick to it and inspire others to embrace it - (i) Inspiration (ii) Shifting the mindset (iii) Envisioning and articulating the future (iv) Planning how to accomplish change (v) Implementing the change. Read on...

HBR Blog: The Key to Change Is Middle Management
Author: Behnam Tabrizi

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 11 nov 2014

Successful entrepreneurs have behavioral understanding of their diverse staff to effectively align them towards the organizational goals. To manage work relationships with software developers they should have different leadership style and management structure. Scott Gerber, founder of Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC), asked 11 entrepreneurs who are part of YEC to provide significant leadership mistakes they noticed regarding management of software developers and how to avoid them: (1) Assuming They Will Speak Up- David Hassell, 15Five (2) Assuming Developers Want To Work The Same Schedule As Everyone Else- Rameet Chawla, Fueled (3) Not Showing Trust- Phil Chen, Systems Watch (4) Not Managing Distractions- Mark Cenicola, Banner View (5) Believing False Deadlines- Joshua Lee, Standout Authority (6) Not Playing to Their Strengths and Experiences- Jyot Singh, RTS Labs (7) Not Focusing on Detailed Requirements- Vladimir Gendelman, Company Folders, Inc (8) Not Listening to Technical Expertise- Laura Roeder, MeetEdgar (9) Managing Based on Whims- Juha Liikala, Stripped Bare Media (10) Assuming They Can Solve Every Problem- Alfredo Atanacio, Uassist.ME (11) Not Understanding the Developer's Personality- Adam Stillman, SparkReel. Read on...

ReadWrite: 11 Mistakes Entrepreneurs Make When Managing Developers
Author: Scott Gerber

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 10 nov 2014

According to Steve Blank, serial-entrepreneur and academician, who launched the Lean Startup movement, 'in a true, thriving startup ecosystem, venture capitalists understand failure.' In the Lean Startup methodology startups are able to "fail quickly" and learn from those mistakes to make the necessary pivot required to find a successful business model. He says, 'Smart VCs, when you have a cluster, believe that entrepreneurship is not just execution. You're betting on the team, on the people, on the passion, on the vision and sometimes on the circumstances. When you can't get them to believe failure equals experience, you don't have the right culture yet.' Read on...

StartupSmart: Venture capitalists need to better understand failure for an ecosystem to thrive, says Steve Blank
Author: Kye White

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 10 nov 2014

Number of start-ups are often considered to have a positive correlation with the health of the economy. But Professor Daniel Isenberg of Babson College, and Fernando Fabre, president of Endeavor Global, argue that 'Scale-ups', growing businesses that promote long-term entrepreneurship, have more impact on the economy as they lead to more innovation and create more jobs as compared to a high-number of quickly failed start-ups. They negate the Brookings Institution report that blames the decline of entrepreneurship in US on established companies and point out that the report doesn't classify company as entrepreneurial if it has lasted for more than 16 years, implying that fewer start-ups reflect an economy that can't support new business. On the contrary, companies that exist for longer period continue to grow and innovate and contribute substantially to the economy. Prof. Isenberg and Mr. Faber have created a 'Scale-up Declaration' that explains the benefits of scale-ups: 'Entrepreneurs create value and are necessary in all sectors of society. What makes great entrepreneurs are people who scale up their operation and then reinvest their knowledge or financial gains to help the next generation of entrepreneurs.' An example of successful scale-up entrepreneur cited by Mr. Faber is Fadi Ghandour, founder of Aramex, who reinvested in Jordanian entrepreneurs and helped create an entrepreneurial ecosystem there alongwith other successful entrepreneurs. Scale-up entrepreneurs have the power to recycle life and energy into the economy by reinvesting in innovation. Read on...

Chronicle-Independent: A broader definition of entrepreneurs
Author: John Hoffmire, Krystal Bailey

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 09 nov 2014

Big data technologies and applications, like most other emerging technologies and trends, is evolving and companies are trying to adopt and search for the best options to stay ahead of others. Bill Loconzolo of Intuit opted for data lakes that can hold vast stores of data in their native format, while Dean Abbott of Smarter Remarketer advocated cloud. According to Mr. Loconzolo, 'In the past, emerging technologies might have taken years to mature. Now people iterate and drive solutions in a matter of months - or weeks.' Computerworld sought suggestions from IT practitioners and experts and came up with the following 8 important big data and analytics trends - (1) Big data analytics in the cloud (2) Hadoop: The new enterprise data operating system (3) Big data lakes (4) More predictive analytics (5) SQL on Hadoop: Faster, better (6) More, better NoSQL (7) Deep learning (8) In-memory analytics. Chris Curran of PwC suggests, 'You need a way to evaluate, prototype and eventually integrate some of these technologies into the business.' While Mark Beyer, an analyst at Gartner, says 'IT managers and implementers cannot use lack of maturity as an excuse to halt experimentation. IT needs to work with analysts to put a variable-speed throttle on these new high-powered tools.' Read on...

Computerworld: 8 big trends in big data analytics
Author: Robert L. Mitchell

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 08 nov 2014

Managers, in addition to their technical and job related specific skills, require ability to provide an enabling environment for their subordinates to realize their full potential. This is a challenging but achievable task. Jerry Osteryoung, consultant and Professor Emeritus at Florida State University, suggests managers to avoid the following 5 mistakes to become a strong and more effective manager - (1) Avoid the tendency to micromanage as it makes the staff to rebel (2) Failing to see the value and potential in each of their workers. Recognizing potential assists in motivating and rewarding them (3) Failing to appreciate their staff. Appreciation helps to keep them motivated and encouraged (4) Avoid becoming friends with your workers as it may be perceived as favoritism by others. But be friendly with all your staff (5) Failing to set a good example. Managers must always demonstrate the behavior they want their staff to emulate. Read on...

Tallahassee Democrat: Five common mistakes that managers make
Author: Jerry Osteryoung

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 08 nov 2014

Management and leadership expert, Ken Blanchard, while speaking to students at Armstrong State University on the concept of 'servant leadership' said, 'The big thing that's changed is that I think we've really moved from a philosophy of command and control as leadership - you know, my way or the highway - to much more of a partnership relationship. I think the young people have really pushed that.' As a consultant to Southwest Airline & its former CEO, Colleen Barrett, Mr. Blanchard observed servant leadership and corroborate a portion of their success to the way they value their customers and employees, key ingredients to servant leadership. While describing servant leadership he states, 'There are two parts of servant leadership, which I talk a lot about. One is the vision and direction and goals parts. You have to know where you're going ... that's the leadership part. The other part is if you don't have anything to serve - a vision, direction, goals - then the only thing to serve is yourself.' As an example of this he cited the widening gap between executive compensation and workers' salaries. Read on...

BusinessInSavannah.com: Management expert Ken Blanchard talks 'servant leadership' at Armstrong State University
Author: Julia Ritchey

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 06 nov 2014

There are varied perspectives regarding the age at which entrepreneurs are most effective regarding their capabilities to generate breakthrough ideas and found successful companies. Famous Silicon Valley investor, Vinod Khosla says, 'People under 35 are the people who make change happen; people over 45 basically die in terms of new ideas.' Referring to the age of entrepreneurs whom venture capitalists fund, investor Paul Graham commented, 'The cutoff in investors' heads is 32; after 32, they start to be a little skeptical.' Considering the power of youth in entrepreneurship, Peter Thiel (Co-founder of PayPal), in 2010 even announced that he would pay US$ 100000 to college students to drop out and develop new technologies and pursue entrepreneurship. But Professor Vivek Wadhwa of Stanford University, based on his research argues that the younger age bias in entrepreneurship most often results in older entrepreneurs not getting much attention and funding, and consequently it is hurting venture-capital system as well as Silicon Valley. According to his research conducted in 2008 regarding successful technology firms that started in garage and reached a revenue of US$ 1 million, it was found that average and median age of their founders was 39. Twice as many were older than 50 as were younger than 25. And twice as many were older than 60 as were younger than 20. Dane Stangler, vice president of research and policy at the Kauffman Foundation, built on Dr. Wadhwa's research findings and found in every year from 1996 to 2013, Americans in the 55-to-64 age group started new businesses at a higher rate than those in their twenties and thirties. Dr. Wadhwa and his team's research further revealed that, work and industry experience, and management ability, are what makes entrepreneurs successful. These come with age and therefore immaturity & inexperience of youth is one reason venture capitalist's record of success is so dismal. There are numerous technology companies whose innovators, founders & executives disprove the notion that only young can effect change. Consider for example the case of Qualcomm that was founded by Irwin Jacobs when he was 52 and Andrew Viterbi, who was 50. Professor Benjamin F. Jones, an economist at Northwestern University, analyzed the backgrounds of Nobel Prize winners and other great achievers of the 20th century. He found that the average age at which Nobel laureates performed their prizewinning work and the average age at which inventors had their great achievement was 39. Young entrepreneurs do have an advantage regarding newer technologies like social media and app developing but the technology shifts that are happening will alter the entire entrepreneurial landscape in the coming years. Dr. Wadhwa concludes,'Several technologies - involving medicine, robotics, artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, 3D printing and nanomaterials - are advancing at exponential rates and are converging. These advances are making it possible to solve the global problems of health, energy, education and hunger. These technologies will make it possible to create the next trillion-dollar industries and to better our lives. But they require knowledge of fields such as medicine, biotechnology, engineering and nanotechnology. They require experience, an understanding of the problems people face and cross-disciplinary skills. All of these come with age and experience, which the baby boomers have in abundance. That is why we need to get beyond the stereotypes and realize that baby boomers are going to better the world.' Read on...

The Washington Post: Why baby boomers are an important part of technology's future
Author: Vivek Wadhwa

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