samirabid.com

Here is a great article on big data. That, this and the recent Autonomy sale, inspired me to share my big data thoughts with you on the blog; especially the notion of augmenting that big data to create meaning.

Essentially big data presents a challenge an opportunity. The challenge is what to do with it. There are so many ways of measuring and cheaply storing data that there is a lot of “big data” around.

The opportunity with this big data idea, in my opinion, is to make and develop systems that can take meaning from the big data stores, to help people make better decisions.

What interests me most is in this transition from decision making by intuition to decision making complimented by meaningful, big data backed, guidance, recommendation and information.

Unlike some, I don’t see joy in automating the whole process. The satisfaction for me is building systems to codify repetitive or expert analysis techniques, apply them and speed them up, so they become a real-time solution, compliment them with context related meaning and present them with beautifully designed results and conclusions, such that they empower non-specialists and non-experts to make decisions.

Simple …

I should would on a simple way of explaining my big data ideas but for now, that’s it.

Thoughts welcome

Here is another view:

Digital scene setting – its 2007, Vista is launched, iPhone recently launched, Microsoft biggest technology business in world, Social Media = myspace … so …

Jobs comments at about 8mins 20sec … ooo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCvLTlQWT6A&NR=1

and what is Jobs not saying at about 1mins 35sec (iPad??):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2aLYBC5onk&NR=1

Jobs describing a life, not legacy – about 7mins:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGH-1L-0zo4&NR=1

Finally, a piece of advice – why they are successful Jobs 1 min 40 seconds.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQwhbazr5ug&NR=1

Jobs on Success =

1) Passion and love for what your doing.
Why?
Because it is really hard.
Otherwise any rational person will give up.
‘Successful’ ones, loved what they did so they can persevere.
The ones that didn’t love it quit, because they are sane!

2) Be a great talent scout.
Built an org that can eventually build itself.
Hire great people.

Seems about right …

Steve Jobs has really only become an influential figure in my life, within the last couple of years. Getting access to his products, especially my iPhone, have made me a happier person. How is that possible? – I don’t know, but I am not alone.

He will be missed by many and it is a sad way for him to leave us.

Here is an inspirational talk he gave in 2005. Very inspiring for me and I hope for you too – its emotional but that is actually a good thing.

Enjoy:

… http://www.the-mia.com/Business-Development–Marketing-and-Strategy-Consultant-now-available-to-fellow-MIA-members

Seriously though, I am here to help.

Just get in touch.

S

Here is a great post on what the US debt looks like. Some surprising things are how little $1m looks and the nice fact that if you’d spent $1m per day since Jesus was born, you’d still not have spend £1 trillion yet !!

Enjoy …

This is a good article in Entrepreneur magazine. It gives Richard Branson’s thoughts on how a small business should develop their organisational culture. He makes two good points I think;

• focus on the customer,
• involve everyone with a good idea in the decision-making process, no matter what level they are in the business.

The following extract really stands out to me and is a theme that resonates again and again, from my research on high performing teams; the bit about being empowered to make decisions and tolerant of mistakes is what Formula 1 teams do so well.

If I think back to what we did right, it was in our planning process, when we made sure we were having fun working together and that everyone who had a good idea was included in our decision-making process.

We had accidentally stumbled on the core elements of a culture dedicated to delivering great customer service! It turned out that people who work in a friendly environment that is tolerant of mistakes, and who are empowered to make decisions about how they do their jobs, arrive at the best possible solutions for serving customers.

Camvine are a business that develop digital signage solutions for a wide range of customers. The secret to their success is a simple to use online management system. Its worth checking out if you need an easy way to manage a network of digital signage.

Is a superstar more valuable than 100-non superstars? If you had the choice of either or, which would you go for?

Here is an article on the Harvard Business Review website that’s creating quite a stir on this subject. So much so that the author, Bill Taylor, felt compelled to publish a “part two” here.

With all discussions of talent and superstar behaviour, I feel people tend to miss the importance of context.

In different contexts (i.e. environments/cultures, plus general states of mind) individuals can excel or not. People need a opportunity and the platform / project / problem on which to demonstrate performance; either individually or within a team.

Individuals facing similar opportunities in difference contexts may not perform to the same level as before.

What I find particularly interesting is that someone who doesn’t perform exceptionally well at a lower level, can then surprise everyone by blossoming at a higher, in theory more challenging, level. One example I instantly think of from current Formula 1 motor racing is Kamui Kobayashi.

Environmental conditions are therefore significant in terms of empowering people to perform well; the talent, if there is any, is in recognising that argument and then having the guts to create an organisational structure where people can do what they are best at, appropriate to the task at hand.

This goes for every organisation you’re part of; business and social.

Well, that’s my view based on the research I did studing Talent development in some detail for my MBA dissertation. In the context of developing Formula 1 drivers, I found that there are distinctions to be made between “high-achievers” and others, however, invariably this was down them having massive opportunity to perform / practise their art (i.e. Gladwell’s 10,000 hours) and doing that within a cultural organisational structure that allowed them to fail.

Great topic … comments welcome.

Here is a link to my latest blog post on Prat Perch. It’s been an exciting few weeks so just sharing an update.

Nice article on the 100 year history of IBM. Particularly it focuses on an importance of strong relationships to sustaining market disruption; If people are happy you solved their problem with one technology, then if you have a good relationship with them and they feel you understand the problems their trying to solve, then they will be more willing to accept you providing them with new disruptive technology too.

Interesting perspective.