Saturday, May 23, 2009

Best Practices of Desktop Strategists (6)


From our experience, we have seen a few people who can think, strategize and implement regardless of the technology, the distance and the grand settings. We referred to them as world class strategists.

These people can also stay focused on the current objective while minding the grand picture.
It is a rare skill. Does your team possess this set of skills?

Following are some of the other questions that we usually ask our clients:
  • How does your team look at your projects and plans?
  • Do they know what is the grand picture for your plan?
  • Can your team view your entire plan from a top down view?
  • Do they understand your plan from a "bottom up" perspective?
  • Can your team see the tactical specifics for each milestone?
  • Can your team see what is ahead after each completed milestone?
  • If a strategic change in one milestone occurs, can they also see the consequential strategic change from one milestone to the following milestones?
  • Regardless of the amount of critical information at your team's fingertips, do you sometimes feel that your team feel overwhelmed by an information overload that they are caught in a phase of paralysis by analysis?
  • Do you feel that your team is not receiving the quality information, that they cannot make a good decision?
Poor quality of information usually prevents one from gaining the strategic insight of the current situation.
  • How many times in your professional career, has your team been able to instinctively perform your projects without fear and uncertainty?
  • Has your team ever automatically connect the dots and reap the rewards?
Technology comes. Technology goes. It is just a tool that does specialized tasks. Nothing more. Nothing less.

To prevail in the global economy, one needs the dual skills of analyzing the information and connecting the dots.
  • Does your team possess that set of skills?
  • If they cannot effectively connect the dots, will they reap the rewards?
  • Is your team still able to effectively compete in spite of the situation?
If not, it is time for you and your team to reconsider the strategic process of seeing the grand picture.

Conclusively, it should always be the plan that runs the technology, not the other way around.
Do you have a process to build that specific plan?

If not, you should contact us at service[@tt]collaboration360[dott].com.

Collaboration360 Consultants (C360 Consultants). Copyright:2009 © All rights reserved. Copying, posting and reproduction in any form (without prior consent) is an infringement of copyright.

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Beyond BlackBerry, high-tech execs shun gadgets
Fri May 22, 2009 4:13pm EDT

By Franklin Paul

NEW YORK (Reuters) - You'd think the leaders of the world's biggest and coolest tech companies would be total gadget freaks, 'tricorder'-carrying whiz kids sporting the latest doodads months before the masses.

Think again.

Top brass and chief thinkers from companies from Web upstart Twitter to "Big Blue" IBM told the Reuters Global Technology Summit that, when not developing "the next big thing," they turn to hobbies similar to that of non-geeks.

They read books and go fishing. Very un-Star Trek, eh?

"I'm not actually a gadget freak. And I'm not a computer freak. I'm a physicist," said Eli Harari, chief executive of SanDisk Inc, which makes those ubiquitous fingernail-sized digital memory cards and USB thumb drives.

"I love technology. But I don't like gadgets. I rarely use my notebook PC -- and I type with two fingers," he said.

Popular folklore and network TV, fuel a belief in a high-tech world of anti-social genius's like Sheldon from "The Big Bang Theory" or Jack Bauer of Fox's hit show "24", who have critical data at their fingertips via powerful gadgets.

But most of the summit guests admitted that the only super device they wield is a mobile phone -- Research in Motion's Blackberry or Apple Inc's iPhone -- with most saying they would suffer without them. ...

BOOKS OR KINDLES?
Technology executives said their busy lifestyles don't leave much time for dabbling with sophisticated devices that do not pertain to building their own businesses.

"I like to get away from electronics," said John Chen, CEO of business software provider of Sybase. "I have found that very constantly grinding (is) quite stressful."

Like many of his peers, Chen seeks respite in the printed word. But two camps are evolving, now that Amazon.com Inc's Kindle digital reader has captured the fancy of executives bored with sitting around airports.

"This morning I got on a plane to come down here," Corning Inc Chief Financial Officer Jim Flaws said. "I had checked to make sure it downloads the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. I can read both of them on my BlackBerry, but it's a little easier to read on your Kindle, which is...bigger."

Venture capitalist Tim Draper, a man accustomed to writing million-dollar checks, said he was itching to buy a Kindle, but was too frugal to do it yet.

"I have a little bit of Kindle envy," he said. "I have a Sony Reader, and I have a whole bunch of books on it. I'm so cheap, I want to be sure I've read all of those books before I buy a Kindle."

Sybase's Chen, a self-described old-fashioned guy, says he will pass on Kindle. "If I get on a plane for a long ride, I read a book. I can't stand Kindle. It's not an Amazon issue -- I like the feel of a book."

The aversion to toting gadgets doesn't mean that tech leaders aren't wowed by their electronic abilities. Take, for example, one new take on an activity thousands of years old.

"The last thing I bought was a fish finder -- it's amazing technology," Ralph de la Vega, AT&T Inc's mobile chief, said of a device made by satellite navigation tool maker Garmin Ltd . "I don't know how people used to fish before -- you had to have a lot of stored knowledge."

"You can go to a place, scout it out and say 'I think there's fish over there!' Its such a better thing to do than just casting a fly, and you don't know where the fish are."

He pulls out his other favorite device -- an iPhone -- to show off a snapshot of his prized catch, a Bass. ...

(Reporting by Franklin Paul, editing by Tiffany Wu, Leslie Gevirtz)

http://www.reuters.com/article/GlobalTechnology09/idUSTRE54L63T20090522

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