Here’s Another Workplace Futures Conference Worth Considering

May 13, 2009 at 12:34 pm · Filed under Economic Development, Management, Technology Management, Work Design

I’d like to encourage anyone interested in the future of work to consider attending the Worktech(tm)09 Conference in New York City on May 20. It’s being held at the Time and Life Building at 1271 Avenue of the Americas.

Our across-the-pond colleague and fellow futurist/author Phillip Ross, CEO of Cordless Group in the U.K., is behind Worktech, which has been held annually for the last several years. He’s an expert on the impact of new technologies on work and the workplace - and a very dynamic speaker.

Dan Johnson, head of global CRE Workplace planning for Accenture, and a member of our Workplace Innovation and Performance Network, will also be a speaker. He’ll be describing Accenture’s new workplace strategy and highlighting a case study from Accenture’s Tokyo operations.

There’s lots more in both speakers and networking opportunities.

You can register for the conference here, and download a pdf brochure about the agenda and speakers here.

Unfortunately New York is too far away from the west coast for me to get there, but I’d love to hear about the program from any of you who do attend. It looks like a terrific contemporary review of what’s happening in the workplace (and beyond) right now.

Small Businesses’ Natural Innovators

March 23, 2009 at 8:53 am · Filed under Culture, Distributed Work, Economic Development, Talent Management, Technology Management, Web 2.0

Intuit and Emergent Research recently released a research brief on small business innovation.

The research focuses on the key factors that drive, enable and amplify small business innovation.  The report is part of the ongoing Intuit Future of Small Business research series and the first of several research briefs on small business innovation.

A key finding of the research is that small businesses have six inherent attributes that make them natural innovators.  These are:

• Personal passion: Personally invested, most small business owners are willing to try new approaches to make their business more successful.
• Customer connection: A deep and direct relationship with the market and customers helps small businesses understand customer needs, identify new opportunities, and fix problems quickly and efficiently.
• Agility and adaptation: Unlike large corporations, small businesses can quickly adapt to changing market conditions and implement new business practices.
• Experimentation and improvisation: When pursuing new opportunities, many small business owners and managers aren’t afraid to experiment and improvise, accepting failure as part of the path to success.
• Resource limitations: Small businesses are adept at doing more with less. And these resource constraints lend to their innovative mindset.
• Information sharing and collaboration: Small businesses traditionally rely on strong social networks to share information and inspire innovative thinking. Online social networks extend and amplify this practice.

These attributes provide small businesses with the ability to respond quickly to changing market conditions and identify and exploit new opportunities.

The research also shows that small business innovation is not limited to tech or high growth firms, but used broadly by small businesses of all sizes and in all sectors of the economy.

Interestingly enough, one of the research findings is that small business owners and managers do not consider themselves or their business innovative.  Most feel that innovation is something that only large corporations or venture backed companies do.

But despite not describing or seeing themselves this way, most small businesses are natural and continuous innovators who strive to improve their businesses and provide increased value to their customers.

The entire report and related materials are available at www.intuit.com/futureofsmallbusiness.

“5 Big Ideas for Getting All That Work Done” - recording of The AppGap webinar now available

March 19, 2009 at 10:44 am · Filed under AppGap Tips, Product Management, Talent Management, Technology Management, Webinar

As you know if you’re a regular reader of this blog, The AppGap last week hosted a discussion called “5 Big Ideas for Getting All That Work Done.” Moderated by AppGap contributor Anita Campbell, who was joined by leading commentators Jonathan Fields and John Jantsch, the webinar explored and shared insights on handling workloads that, in many cases, have only increased and gotten more stressful in these challenging economic times.

The major takeaways the discussion sought to explore:

• How to automate what you hate
• How going virtual can help
• How being “social” at work is good for business
• How to reframe what you do
• And how to get your head in the cloud, i.e., move more work to the web

See the end of this post to access the recording of the great conversation - hit play to hear it in place or download it as a podcast for later listening.

We hope you find it of interest and want to take the opportunity to point you to several other webinars The AppGap has hosted: Should your Business be friends with Facebook? from last June and a broad discussion on The Future of Work from early last year.

 

 Standard Podcast [59:31m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

A Webinar on IT’s Role in Supporting Mobile Work

November 11, 2008 at 6:39 pm · Filed under Collaboration, Distributed Work, Reviews, Technology Management, Web Commuting, Webinar

Charlie Grantham and I completed presenting a webinar on “The Future of Work:  IT’s Role in Enabling Mobile Work” just a few hours ago.
The webinar was sponsored by Citrix Online, and included our reporting out the results of an extensive survey we recently completed of IT professionals and their views about the challenges and opportunities surrounding mobile work. The survey was also sponsored by Citrix.

Among the topics we covered:

• Why mobile work is real – and here to stay

• What challenges the mobile workforce creates for IT

• Why remote access is just as important as having a laptop and a cell phone

The session is now available for viewing online whenever you wish. Just click here and you should have your Windows Media Player or other media player open right up and start playing.

The whole session takes about 50 minutes; we’re on for about 30 minutes, followed by an online demo of Citrix Online’s GotoMyPC software that does just that - it lets you access a remote PC from anywhere and work on it just as if you were sitting in front of it.

Hope you’ll find some time to listen to the webinar - it’s mostly about the issues and challenges facing IT organizations as they gear up to support mobile workers, but we also spent the first ten minutes or so talking about why mobile work is growing so rapidly (hint, it’s not just because technology makes it relatively easy - there’s much more to it than that).

We think you’ll find the session interesting and informative.

Tags:futureofwork mobilework mobiletechnology onlineaccess