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Tag Archives: leadership

Economics of Cognitive Work Part II: Exploring the B2B Paradigm

In a recent blog post I began to explore some ideas concerning the nature and economics of cognitive work in the modern corporation.  I made a distinction between Business to Consumer (B2C) work and Business to Business (B2B) work.  In B2B work, leaders have.

The Economics of Cognitive Work: Some initial ideas

I have been long fascinated by the economics of cognitive work and I plan to explore this topic across a number of blog entries. I use the term cognitive work, not knowledge work, because knowledge work is a slippery slope. As soon as you.

Innovation Lessons From BP’s Misery

The ongoing tragedy of BP’s well disaster makes me both sad and mad at the same time, and I’ve been trying to think if there is anything useful to learn from this difficult situation.  As I’ve been reading about the tragedy, I think there.

Innovating at Scale in a Successful Company: What Microsoft Could Learn from Lo

Large successful organizations have a hard time creating large scale innovations.  When a company’s on the brink of death, they entertain many radical alternatives, but economic health is the enemy of change — which is one of Microsoft’s great problems. Ray Ozzie, now the.

Are You Worldclass Online? Seven principles to think about…

The other day I was talking with my partner Jamie Yoder about a client who was asking him: What does it mean to be a world class online organization?  Here are seven things that I think are critical to be world class online. Frictionless.

Speed Selling & Innovation: Lessons from the master

I want to post some additional thoughts about Gordon Bell’s comments on my previous post on speed selling and innovation.  For those of use who know Gordon, he is a person who defies categorization.  (He is also one of our Diamond Fellows.)  He is.

The Importance of The Sales Cycle in Getting an Innovation Off the Ground

Time hurts all deals. — Anonymous A key reason innovations fail is that inventors neglect to correctly assess how long it takes to sell something truly new, and while they figure this out they usually run out of capital.  I came to believe this.

Innovation and “Noble Failure”: Lessons from Dave Pottruck

My dear friend Dave Pottruck was co-CEO at Charles Schwab (along with Chuck himself) when they reinvented themselves from being just a bricks and mortar discount broker to the best combination of online and offline service in the field.  He was later fired in.

Blue Water Thinking: Why deep innovation is so hard

The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination. –  Albert Einstein Deep innovation is really hard.  If you have ever swum in the open ocean, far from any shore, and at depths too deep to plumb, you know the visceral feeling of.