New gas markets are opening up
One of the major issues we are all facing is the looming energy crisis. Dwindling oil supplies, pollution from dirty energy sources (such as oil and coal) and growing fears around global warming are all combining to create a fairly bleak future. The solutions are...
PodCast Update – Radical Proposal for Executive Pay
Graeme Codrington recently wrote about a 'radical proposal for Executive pay'.Here's an exert from the post: A century ago, executives earned anywhere between 3 and 20 times what the average worker in their factories earned. According to research by global human...
Who might be the big winner in cloud computing and virtualization
It's not who you think... But, then it never is, is it? Video games didn't come from Mattel or Waddingtons. Horse and cart manufacturers never really got into motor cars. Fountain pen manufacturers didn't come up with the ballpoint. And Google didn't come from the...
After healthcare reform – quick predictions for the path ahead
This started as a note on my Facebook status update last night, as I watched the historic vote in the US in favour of healthcare reform. I truly believe this is a step in the right direction for America. But, the build up has proven how deep the divides run in America...
Airport security is a sham
My team and I travel a lot. We have literally millions of air miles between us over the past decade. And we all hate airports and airlines. We mainly hate them because they lie to you. It can't be that difficult to keep passengers up to date with what is happening...
Forget creating customer loyalty and focus on building friendships with customers
I'm not talking about the glib friendships companies try to encourage by inviting their customers to be friends or fans on Facebook, but rather intimate and deep relationships that come from having a vested interest in the people that make their business possible. I...
You’re going to have to change your management style
I spend a large part of my year in conversation with managers working hard to try and understand today's younger workforce. The pain they're feeling is palpable. The evidence of change is overwhelming. Making the necessary changes, at times, seems impossible. The hope...
You're going to have to change your management style
I spend a large part of my year in conversation with managers working hard to try and understand today's younger workforce. The pain they're feeling is palpable. The evidence of change is overwhelming. Making the necessary changes, at times, seems impossible. The hope...
A Radical Proposal for Executive Pay
Everyone agrees that something must be done about executive pay. One of the major contentious issues emerging out of the financial crisis is the way that senior executives and manager, especially in the financial industries, are remunerated. These days, executive pay...
The future of money
For years banks and credit card companies have held a strangle hold over the movement of money and charged exorbitant rates for doing so. Now this is changing and fast. Michale Ivey the founder of Twitpay has devised a system, using code that PayPal made available to...
Twitter 10 Billion – quality not quantity
In the last few hours the 10 billionth tweet was tweeted on Twitter. As one would imagine there was all kinds of hype and excitement, as Tweeps with the necesary skills attempted to predict the time it would happen, and I imagine even be 'the one'? My last tweet was...
When social media grows up… it will change everything
Download a copy of this article in PDF format – right click here. The contents of this article can be presented as a keynote or a workshop for your team - we call that "Beyond the Hype". Contact our UK or South African offices to find out how. PS - make sure you read...
Cars that talk to each other – the future of road safety and driving
Since seeing a presentation by Andy Stanford-Clark of IBM on "Tweetjects" - objects that tweet. It's not just tweeting though. The promise of "augmented reality" is that objects around us will be able to capture, store, transmit and even analyse the data associated...
Gen Y are not a pushover
Miranda Devine is a Sydney Morning Herald columnist, and recently wrote an excellent piece on Australia's Gen Y (young people now in the teens and early 20s). She had just witnessed a group of 400 of them grilling Kevin Rudd, the Aussie PM - and they had given him a...
The Internet? Bah!
Many years ago, in a South Africa finding it's way to it's first democratic election, a friend of mine would often say, "Don't be a victim of your own words." He of course was referring to saying things that might come back and bite you down the road. And in an...
20 Inspiring Women To Follow On Twitter
I've become a big fan of twitter. For me it is a great example of how people want to share ideas and connect, it's a huge social triumph. Every day I find new and interesting content and connect with very interesting people. It's a great ideas portal and I hope...
Relationship without investment – the example of online dating sites
My business partner, Barrie Bramley, has come up with a fantastic phrase to describe one of the foundational principles of social networking: "Relationship without investment". I think he's spot on with this. That's why the Oxford Dictionary voted "unfriend" the word...
School sport as an indicator of Talent
Malcom Gladwell's book Outliers has been one of my break-through books of 2009 in the area of 'Talent'. If it does anything to the reader, it will surely have them asking deeper questions around what talent is and how we should be assessing for it? It did at least...
Learnings around working from home
One of the emerging requests/trends in today's business environment centers around the mystery of 'working from home'. Many people talk with much gravitas about the 'ins and outs'. However, in my experience, once you dig under the surface a little, you discover how...
Gen Y in Japan not consumerising
Interesting article from CNN Go Asia on 8 Feb 2010 about Japanese Gen Y simply not buying. How times have changed. Japan's Generation Y have become famous for hating to buy anything. They were first reluctant to buy cars. And now we find out that Japanese youth are...