August 2015

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 27 aug 2015

As modern businesses and technologies evolve, their convergence brings organizational complexities. Business environment becomes chaotic and creates challenging situations that need to be overcome effectively to succeed. These challenges are giving rise to shifts in large organizations where design is becoming a center of focus. John Kolko, Vice President of Design at Blackboard, explains how these organizations are applying principles of design, not much of the aesthetic part, to the way people work. People would like to handle complexities efficiently and want their interactions with technologies and other complex systems to be simple, intuitive and pleasurable. These principles of design, termed as 'Design Thinking', involve empathy with users, a discipline of prototyping, and tolerance for failure, as core concepts to create these interactions and develop a responsive, flexible organizational culture. Mr. Kolko elaborates on the design-centric culture as one that transcends design as a role and imparts a set of principles to all people who help bring ideas to life - (1) Focus on users' experiences, especially their emotional ones. (2) Create models to examine complex problems. (3) Use prototypes to explore potential solutions. (4) Tolerate failure. (5) Exhibit thoughtful restraint. As design thinking is considered as an essential tool to simplify and humanize, most future ready organizations are utilizing it as part of their core strategy and competence. According to Mr. Kolko, 'Every established company that has moved from products to services, from hardware to software, or from physical to digital products needs to focus anew on user experience. Every established company that intends to globalize its business must invent processes that can adjust to different cultural contexts. And every established company that chooses to compete on innovation rather than efficiency must be able to define problems artfully and experiment its way to solutions.' The shift towards design as a core competence brings its own challenges - (1) Accepting more ambiguity (2) Embracing risk (3) Resetting expectations. Mr. Kolko further explains that, 'Organizational focus on design offers unique opportunities for humanizing technology and for developing emotionally resonant products and services...It helps create a workplace where people want to be, one that responds quickly to changing business dynamics and empowers individual contributors. And because design is empathetic, it implicitly drives a more thoughtful, human approach to business.' Read on...

Harvard Business Review: Design Thinking Comes of Age
Author: Jon Kolko

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 17 aug 2015

According to The Data Governance Institute website, 'Data Governance is a system of decision rights and accountabilities for information-related processes, executed according to agreed-upon models which describe who can take what actions with what information, and when, under what circumstances, using what methods.' While TechTarget.com explains, 'Data governance (DG) refers to the overall management of the availability, usability, integrity, and security of the data employed in an enterprise. A sound data governance program includes a governing body or council, a defined set of procedures, and a plan to execute those procedures.' Angie Pribor of First San Francisco Partners provides 8 data governance design principles as logical steps before getting deep into the specifics of Master Data Management (MDM) - (1) Be clear on purpose (2) Use enterprise thinking (3) Be flexible (4) Simplicity and usability are the keys to acceptance (5) Be deliberate on participation and process (6) Align enterprise-wide goals (7) Establish policies with proper mandate and ensure compliance (8) Communicate effectively. Read on...

Information Management: 8 Data Governance Design Principles
Author: Angie Pribor