Global distributed organizations can attract the most talented in the world

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Forbes has a nice story about the history of WordPress and the role the open-source software plays in the for-profit business Automattic. The article at one point says:

Automattic has an idiosyncratic workplace. As a legacy of its open-source roots its 120 employees are spread across 26 countries and six continents. Although most work alone at home, each team–usually made up of five or six people–has a generous budget to travel. “All of the money we save on office space, we blow on travel costs,” Mullenweg laughs. Groups have gathered in Hawaii, Mexico and New Zealand. Once a year everyone meets for a week at an accessible destination with a solid Internet connection. A distributed workforce means Automattic can hire talent from around the world–without having to offer the perks and pay of Google, Facebook and Apple.

This brought a response from Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg:
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Creating a Return on Investment (ROI) calculation for Enterprise 2.0 and internal social media

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A major challenge for organizations that are considering internal social media initiatives is that a business case including a financial justification is frequently required.

To be frank, I think ROI calculations for social initiatives are in most cases a waste of time, because so many of the benefits and costs are unknowable before the initiative. A leap of faith is required, after which calculations using real data can be done to help refine strategies.

However if the organization requires a financial case, then those seeing the opportunity need to do what they can to create the case.

Chapter 16 of my report Implementing Enterprise 2.0 is on Building a Business Case. One of the resources I provide in the chapter is a table to help make ROI calculations. All that is required is to put numbers against each of the value and cost items in the table below, where appropriate using a back-of-the-envelope calculation to support them. Not all of the items will be relevant, and you may find other items that are applicable, but it provides a good starting point to generating numbers that can be used in an ROI.
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Entrepreneurial migration: It’s not brain drain, it’s global network formation

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I was recently interviewed by ABC TV for a segment on Australian entrepreneurs moving overseas. My key message was that we absolutely shouldn’t see this as “brain drain”, but the formation of rich networks that are enormous enablers for the economy and entrepreneurial opportunities in the future. The same messages apply to any country, but Australia represents a great case study.

There has been massive attention in the Australian media lately about entrepreneurs who have moved to Silicon Valley. Among other programs, ABC’s Foreign Correspondent did a one-hour feature called The Revenge of the Nerds featuring the Aussie startup scene in the US, the Sydney Morning Herald has a video series on Digital Dreamers, and a long series of articles with titles like Brain drain: why young entrepreneurs leave home.

Even Bloomberg has weighed in with a segment titled Oz Tech Entrepreneurs Set-Up Shop in Silicon Valley, shown below.


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[VIDEO] The world’s first full motion-graphics presentation

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In late April I gave a keynote at TheNextWeb 2012 conference in Amsterdam on The Future of Crowds.

I have for many years intended to develop a full motion graphics presentation. I have long used highly visual presentations to accompany my keynotes, often including numerous videos without sound as well an array of full screen images. However they primarily consisted of static visuals.

I decided TheNextWeb conference was a good opportunity to create my first full motion-graphics presentation. Below is a video of the keynote’s visual presentation.


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We’re looking for an Admin Assistant With Amazing Digital Potential (PT) in Sydney

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Continuing my series of posts on talented people we’re looking for, we want to grow our core team in Sydney with an admin assistant who will take on a variety of administrative tasks at the core of the business.

Every person who has been in a junior role in our business has moved on to project roles, and we’re looking for someone who not only has that potential, but can immediately assist on our ongoing projects.

It is a part-time role, and since we’re based in Surry Hills, students at UTS would find it particularly convenient. However we’re of course open to anyone who is highly talented and enthusiastic and seeks some flexibility in their work.

Read details of the admin assistant role here and be sure to look at our principles on how we work with highly talented people.

Disruptive innovation in professional services: the value in expertise

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The concept of disruptive innovation is now well-recognized in business. It was originally described by Clayton Christensen almost exclusively in terms of products – often technology-based – such as storage devices.

Disruptive innovation can happen in any industry, however it can need translation and interpretation for other domains such as services.

I recently I ran a presentation and interactive workshop on the future of professional services to kick off a law firm partner strategy offsite. Among the more specific challenges, opportunities, and responses that the professions face, I ran through some of the core principles that could disrupt their industry.

In fact a broad range of expertise-based industries are being subject to disruption, however with quite different dynamics than in product industries. The 3 key drivers of disruption of expertise are remote work, process automation, and artificial intelligence.

Four expertise-based services industries that are being disrupted are:
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Designing content for the reality of multi-screen access: smartphone, tablet, PC, TV

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The relatively recent rise of smartphones and tablets has changed how we use tech and how we consume news. However, while they have eroded usage of the long established interfaces of PCs, laptops, and TVs, they certainly haven’t supplanted them.

This has lead us to the dawning of new phase in which a large proportion of people in the developed world consume content and use applications across four different primary screens: smartphones, tablets, laptops and PCs, and TV (or more generally the primary large screen in the household).

Google is clearly interested in understanding how people use these four screens on their own and together, and has sponsored an interesting study The New Multi-screen World: Understanding Cross-Platform Consumer Behavior, also embedded below.


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The law of requisite variety: Why flexibility and adaptability are essential for success

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I first came across the law of requisite variety almost 20 years ago. Ross Ashby proposed the idea in his 1956 book An Introduction to Cybernetics (see p.202-218), and expanded on it in his paper Requisite variety and its implications for the control of
complex systems. The idea became one of the foundational concepts of the field of Cybernetics.

The law is developed mathematically, using essentially what we would now consider game theory. Ashby states it as:
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Prediction: Video-conferencing will help drive increased business travel

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Yesterday I gave the opening keynote at Global Business Travel Association Australia/NZ’s annual conference, on The Future of the Global Economy: The Opportunities.

My keynote focused on the major economic, technological, and social shifts under way and how they impact business travel and how it is managed in organizations.

Clearly a particularly pointed issue in the world of business travel today is the rise of video-conferencing, which many companies in recent years have latched onto as a substitute for travel, largely for cost-saving.
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Looking for a genius projects/ marketing/ web/ publishing manager in Sydney (PT)

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We have recently launched our We’re Looking For Talent website, which represents a new phase in the growth of the companies in the AHT Group.

The first role we are very actively recruiting for is a genius projects/ marketing/ web/ publishing assistant or manager. The ad says in its capabilities section:
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