Looking Forward, Backwards

Farhad Manjoo argues in today's Wall Street Journal that "there's plenty" of innovation going on, despite the grumblings that their isn't.

His main argument is that "the smartphone and the tablet 'are' the next big things."

Manjoo tells us to "grow up" and calls us "spoiled children," because we are not satisfied with these and simple future enhancements of this. 

He would have us accept that there won't be "anything as groundbreaking in a generation." 

Well, looking back at past innovation and calling that as our current and future innovation is like looking back at our past successes and simply resting on our laurels as good enough.

Unfortunately, no business can rest on their past successes--they must constantly innovate to stay relevant in the marketplace and meet their growth targets for revenue, profit, market share, and customer satisfaction.

As they say in financial prospectuses, "past success is no guarantee of future success."

Similarly, as individuals we do not just settle for past success, but we strive everyday to make a contribution, to learn, and to grow as long as we have the strength to try.

When we stop striving, we may as well be heading downhill in the cycle of life, because as we all know, "if you are not moving forward, then you are moving backwards."

Life is not stagnant, and yesterdays innovations are not todays creative breakthroughs or tomorrows leaps forward.

The rate of innovation is no longer measured in generations in the 21st century--and for those who think it is, they would have us accept defeat in this highly global, competitive marketplace. 

While we should not be greedy, why are we so ready to say good enough, instead of really critiquing ourselves (e.g. calling a dry spell, a dry spell) and continuing the tough journey into the future. 

At least Manjoo cites incremental work in privacy, enterprise technologies such as cloud computing, and robotics as tech trends - so maybe there is still hope. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Looking Forward, Backwards

Giving--Coming Right Back To You

I love this video!

It is about a giving man who helps a hungry child pay for food that the child had stolen. 

The man throughout his life cares and provides to those in need. 

Later in life the man gets deathly sick and needs an expensive operation.

The doctor in the hospital provides a bill to the man's daughter, but all the charges are zeroed out. 

It turns out that the doctor is the hungry boy from years ago and he recognizes the patient as the man that had saved him.

It is now his turn to pay it forward to the man who gave all his life. 

One act of giving can influence and spark countless other good deeds. 

Never underestimate the power of giving to others. 

It is the one thing that we can do universally to help. 

Giving--Coming Right Back To You

The Money Pit

So I'm visiting this absolutely delectable Italian bakery in fancy-schmancy Las Olas.

The Sicilian pizza by the way is amazing.

We are there for a while enjoying the food, conversation, and ambiance. 

My wife offers to take a picture of me in this great place. 

The lady behind the counter is so nice and let's me join her behind the counter for a moment.

In comes an obviously wealthy customer and as he sees me going to take a quick photo, he makes a big "Hmmmmm!"

The lady graciously says "Just one moment sir."

And irritably waiting for just this brief moment, he blurts out, "I'm the customer and my money comes first!"

When he said this, another lady in line made a huge shocked face--as did we all.

It is incredible how some people's money goes to their head and they don't realize it all comes from G-d and can just as quickly be taken away.

Wealth, health, our loved ones, and happiness--they are ephemeral and we should be ever grateful for them for as long as we have them.

Being arrogant and thinking we are better than the next guy--that we are somehow more deserving or above it all--is a huge fallacy and G-d sees all. 

Maybe this rich guy's money comes first to him, but I imagined the Master Of The Universe hearing these words and having the last eternal laugh. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

The Money Pit

Who Hasn't Been There?

So I was teaching a course this week in enterprise architecture, and some of the students asked about EA having a bad rap and brand (i.e. that it seems to not work so well in many organizations) and why is that? 

We had a pretty robust discussion around this--why some organizations fail and others succeed with EA.

We discussed the critical success factors that as the CIO or Chief Architect you can impact, and how these can drive planning and implementation for the organization to succeed. 

At the same time, we also acknowledged how--to be frank--not everything is in our control.

This was a class full of CIOs and Vice Presidents, and I gave an example and said you are all successful now in your jobs and careers, but raise your hand if you haven't been there--where you were on the outs and you boss or colleagues just didn't like you?

This was a class of about 20 people, and out of all these highly achieved folks, only one hand went up--a young kid--with only 3 or 4 years out of school, and still learning the ropes. 

Yes, this one person had not yet been on the losing end, but everyone else--all these successful people had been--ALL of them!

The point is not to say that success is just a chance event--it isn't! 

You have to work hard and try your best-- but no matter how much you think of yourself--it's even more important to remember that you don't control all the factors of your life that determine whether you succeed or fail.  

The same people that now had big, successful jobs, were the same people who had in a prior job or time been the person who could do no right at work. 

I tell myself to remember that there is personality, chemistry and fit at work; there is timing--and it is everything!--and there is how the stars are aligned. 

It helps a lot to be humble and learn, grow, work hard, never give up, have fun--and have faith in a mightier power above. 

From what I've seen, life is a cycle and today you may be down, but tomorrow you will be up (and the opposite is true too--so don't kick the person that is down and hurting). 

"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heavens." (Ecclesiastes 3:1)--for everything and for everyone. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Who Hasn't Been There?

Innovation Infertility

Many of you may have probably the seen the movie, "Children of Men,"--it is themed around a time in the future when women are infertile (because of pathology, pollution, drugs, or whatever) and the world is in chaos--for what is life without children to carry on?

Fortunately, in the movie, after 18 years, one woman does get pregnant and bears a child and there is hope in the scientific community for a resurgence of humankind. 

Unfortunately, we are now in a similar period of technology, where big innovation of yesterday has come grinding to a miserable saunter. 

When the biggest news leaking out of superstar innovator, Apple is the potential for an iWatch--uh, not exactly earth shattering, we know we are in innovator's hell!

And vendors from Apple to Samsung and Sony trying to come out with some sort of voice activated television--again, who doesn't hate the TV clicker, but really this is not going to revolutionize our entertainment center days.

With hundreds of thousands of apps available for everything from social networking, eCommerce, gaming, and more, it seems like there are more copycat apps then anything else coming out these days--where's the real wow factor?

Microsoft can't find it's way in a mobile world, the mighty Intel has been supplanted by ARM with mobile chips, Marissa Mayer is trying to figure out how to remake the jump for joy, Yahoo, relevant again, as are the Vanderhook brothers and Justin Timberlake trying to do for MySpace.

With the overemphasis on the form factor making bigger and smaller sizes and shapes for computing devices, we seesaw between iPod Classics and Nanos and between iPads and Minis. But where are the great functional enhancements? Yeah, ask Siri.

Similarly in computing architecture, we have latched unto cloud computing as the next great savior of IT-mankind, ignoring the repackaging again of the mainframe into a cool new computing model again, and relegating the prior go-to architecture of distributed computing as the evil twin.  Sure, we can save some bucks until the pendulum swings back toward more decentralization and agility again.

In social computing, with Facebook what can you say--it's got a billion users, but virtually not a single one would pay a dime to use it. If not for marketers scooping up our personal information online and advertisers annoying us with their flashing and protruding pop-ups, we continue to trade privacy for connectedness, until we lose too much of ourselves to identity thieves and snooping sources, and we fall back clamoring for more protection. 

In security, we are getting clobbered by cyber intrusions, cyber espionage, and cyber attacks--everyday!  We can't seem to figure out the rules of cyberspace or how to protect ourselves in it. We can't even find enough qualified people to fight the cyber fight.

I was surprised that even magazine, Fast Company, which prides itself on finding the next great innovation out there, states this month (April 2013), "Growing uncertainty in tech is creating chaos for startups, consumers, and investors...nobody has a non-obvious new social business model that can scale."

As in the movie, Children of Men, we are suffering from an infertility of innovation--whether from burnout, a focus on short-term profit instead of long-term R&D investments, declining scores in STEM, or a lack of leadership--we are waiting for the next pregnancy so we can have hope again, but are disappointed that so many are false positives or overhyped prophets. 

One of the things, I am most excited about is Google Glass and their concept of augmented reality, but the glasses are geeky and will need to be package in a lot more eloquent solution to really be practical in our futures. 

The next great thing will come--life is a great cycle--but as in the Bible with 7 fat cows and 7 skinny cows, leading to the great famine in Egypt, we are now seeing lots of skinny cows walking around and it is darn scary. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Innovation Infertility

That Special Cane

After seeing one of my colleagues with this souped-up cane at work this week, I learned that this is the special gift for someone reaching their 50th birthday.
This is not an ordinary bamboo cane as you can see, but one with a rear-view mirror for passing, a honking horn for warning people out of your path, and even a little green change purse for the toll. :-)
While I am no spring chicken anymore, I am still not old enough to receive my special cane--oh shucks!
But this did give me pause to think about what it means as we get older and the weeks and months at work turn into years and decades.
Before we know it, the up-hill climb of life, plateau and eventually heads in the other direction.
It reminds me of whenever someone asks my father how old he is...he flips the numbers--so for example, when he was 72, he would say I "turned" 27 and so on
It's not easy getting old(er), we all want to be back in our youth or prime of life, which my father calls the time period, "when the world is too small," and I think what he means is our aspirations are large.
This week at work, I learned that one of my colleagues who retired just a few years ago passed away from one of the horrible "C's" -- it was terrible to hear this.
Moreover, it reminded me of other colleagues who I have seen work hard their whole life, sacrificing and putting off all types of enjoyment, and waiting for that big day when they would retire and then they "could live the good life."
And one guy, I remember, did retire after putting in his time and within about 3 months, he dropped dead of a massive coronary--I don't think he even made it with heart beating to the hospital.
Life is too short! And of course, life is hard--that's how we are tested and grow--but we can't wait for the good times. We need to savor every moment of our lives, appreciate our loved ones , and enjoy what we do day-in and day-out.
Else, we may miss the finest times that we have here on earth and then we really will be left holding that special cane and looking back at our lives in the rear-view mirror wondering why we wasted so much precious, precious time.

That Special Cane

Where There Is Life, There is Hope

After a very busy week, I can really appreciate this video, called Move, where Rick Mereki and 2 friends travel 11 countries in 44 days.

I love how fast yet seamless this video takes us around the world--like flying through space and time.

There is so much to see and do and every moment is a blessing.

My grandparents use to say, "where there is life, there is hope" and we are so fortunate to be alive and have the opportunity to change, grow, and self-actualize.

And while real life is not as smooth as this video--whereever we are, let's try to enjoy the ride.

Have a great weekend!

Where There Is Life, There is Hope

Life Building 101

The Guardian U.K. (2 April, 2011) has this wonderfully inspiring story about a very special body builder.

Dr. Charles Eugster is a dentist and athlete extraordinaire--you see Eugster is 91 years old.

And he says that "At 85 I had a crisis. I looked at myself in the mirror, and saw an old man. I was overweight, my posture was terrible and there was skin hanging off me. I looked like a wreck."

Now, he is doing dips, crunches, chin-ups, and push ups and scoring higher than contestants in ANY other age category.

Eugster says "I'm not chasing youthfulness, I'm chasing health."

Although he was already rowing 6 times a week when he was in his late-80s, he figured he could push himself a little harder and so he joined a body building club--OMG, this guy's attitude is amazing!

What an inspiration...

His outlook is that "We're told that old age is a continuous state of decline, and that we should stop working, slow down and prepare to die. I disagree...one day something will happen and that will be it. But until that day comes, I'm going to carry on working my abs!"

While none of us know when our time us up, it seems that we can choose how we approach our personal maturation--we can look at it as reaching a peak and then going over the proverbial cliff of life OR we can fight to continuously transform ourselves--for as long as we can--and to always try and be the best we can be.

Age, sex, race, color, religion, national origin, or disability--none of these should inhibit us from working our hardest and going for the gold of what is meaningful in life to us.

I remember a wise saying I learned from my teachers--the competition is really not with anyone else, it is with yourself.

So to me it's not really body building we're talking about, but rather life building--and this is something we can all strive for.

Life Building 101

Always Forward and Enterprise Architecture

ComputerWorld Magazine, 26 June 2008, has a terrific interview with Loraine Rodgers, formerly Xerox CIO, Citibank senior VP, city of Phoenix CIO, and American Express director.

Her early years…

Ms Rodgers found out at 16 that she was adopted and was “so angry at being lied to I threw away my merit scholarship and refused to go to college. But I took a programmer aptitude test and I aced it, so I started in IT as a programmer. I started in the weeds.”

Over the years, “I always volunteered for seemingly thankless jobs—challenging assignments that nobody wanted.”

Here’s the best part of what she said and I believe very inspirational…

“I am self-propelled, driven, excited about life, love to learn. I got my undergraduate degree at age 40, and my MBA at 42—all working full time. I move forward always—not necessarily in a straight line, but always forward. I have been fired once, laid off twice and promoted over 27 times. I repackage myself regularly and keep moving forward. I perceive the possibilities. I am not hindered by obstacles. There are no obstacles. Some things just take longer.”

WOW!

Ms. Rodgers is inspirational on an individual and organizational/enterprise architecture level.

Ms. Rodgers story is one of overcoming life’s challenges to succeed beyond probably her wildest dreams and most of ours. To succeed individually or as an organization, there are always challenges. Life is not a straight line upward, but is marked by up and downs, hopefully like Ms. Rodgers professional life, it has generally more ups then downs, and going always in an upward pattern.

Ms. Rodgers idea of always repackaging herself and constantly moving forward is terrific and in EA can be associated with an organization continually looking to reengineer and improve their processes and introduce new technologies to enable the mission and results of operation. The key is to always being grateful for what we have been granted, yet to always strive to improve things one step further: never to be satisfied with status quo or mediocrity.

Similarly, architecting the organization is not a one-time event; rather, it is an ongoing cycle of planning, governing, and transforming. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Whether on an individual or organizational level, we must learn to “move forward always—not necessarily in a straight line, but always forward!"

Always Forward and Enterprise Architecture

Organizational Hubris and Enterprise Architecture

Organizational arrogance is the anathema of user-centric EA.

In Fortune Magazine, 20 August, 2007, in the article “Don’t be Arrogant”, it states “when a company attains extreme market domination, hubris and a sense of infallibility can’t be far behind.”

When an organization (like an individual) is riding high on its fortunes, it forgets that it is not infallible and that we are all vulnerable — whether we know it or not.

Many individuals, organizations, and empires have seen themselves propelled from rags to riches, and then back again. Anyone planning on buying a GM car or seen a Roman legionnaire lately?

Judaism has a really neat view on this, called the “gilgal ha’chozer” which is the cycle of life. In this cycle, anyone can be elevated or lowered in life depending on their deeds (good and bad). Similarly, the Buddhist depict this concept in “the wheel of life”, where lives and fortunes rotate from happiness to despair and back.

User-centric Enterprise Architecture recognizes that organizational hubris is an organization’s eventual downfall. EA’s mandate is to look beyond today, see the potential hazards and changing conditions, and adjust accordingly. Every organization is vulnerable whether to changing market conditions, competitions, or new and unfolding mandates. User-centric EA provides a way for us to recognize changing conditions, plan accordingly, and plot a new course.

Organizational Hubris and Enterprise Architecture