As editorial director and conference producer of The Pivot Conference, I have the privilege to meet with the people who are bringing about real change inside organizations. During the 2013 conference, I had the chance to interview Dr. Rebecca Harris (@RebeccaHarrisDr), who leads the Social Media Center of Expertise at General Motors in Detroit. Her role is all about transformation and integration as she works across brands and around the world on social strategy, social tools, social processes, points-of-view on…
Leadership Unplugged: Stripping out the noise to uncover a new direction
Guest post by Roland Deiser and Sylvain Newton Twenty years ago, on November 18th, 1993, the music band Nirvana agreed to an unplugged performance at the Sony Music Studios in New York City. It was part of a television series called “MTV Unplugged”, which invited popular music groups to perform their songs “naturally”. Unlike in a studio, the sound of instruments would not be electronically amplified and engineered; the artists had rather to rely on the “raw” performance of a…
The Disconnect Between Aging Management and the Younger Workforce
Are you ready to connect your connected workforce? With all of the discussions around social media and how it improves the opportunity to engage customers and build more meaningful relationships, we tend to lose sight of another important group…employees. As technology impacts behavior and connects customers and businesses in new ways, the same is true for employees. With every new social and mobile network, every new smart device, and the materialization of trend after trend, people become increasingly informed, connected,…
It Takes Empathy
If you look at the picture above, you might see a sunset. Some of you will see a sunrise. Much like the famous philosophical discourse between skeptics and optimists, a glass can only be either half empty or half full. I believe nonetheless that the above picture is that of a sunrise. I’m an optimist. I also believe that a glass is reflective of its current state. Either you just poured into or poured out of it. Otherwise, it’s a…
Dear [insert business name], what’s your promise?
You say you want to get closer to customers, but your actions are different than your words. You say you want to “surprise and delight” customers, but your product development teams are too busy building against a roadmap without consideration of the 5th P of marketing…people. Your employees are your number one asset, however the infrastructure of the organization has turned once optimistic and ambitious intrapreneurs into complacent cogs or worse, your greatest detractors. You question the adoption of disruptive…
4 Strategic Areas Where Facebook Must Invest Post-IPO
Mark Zuckerberg by Brian Solis Mark Zuckerberg and 900 million of his friends hit Wallstreet with America’s largest IPO and has once again made history. Facebook’s first trade was $42.05 giving the social network a valuation of ~$115 billion. In the process, Zuckerberg became the 29th-richest man in the world with another half dozen employees also becoming billionaires. It’s also estimated that U2’s Bono will make more from his investment in Facebook than in his entire 30-year music career. As…
It Takes Courage
It’s inevitable that I will get the question. You’d think by now that I would learn to expect it…that I would prepare for it…or have a response that would be purely second nature. But I don’t. I’ve no standard answer that automatically inspires anyone in the moment to take action. And, to this day, I neither expect the question nor do I have a rehearsed or standard riposte committed to memory. So what is “the question?” The question faces those…
Survival of the Fitting: 10 important trends to survive Digital Darwinism
Digital Darwinism is a phenomenon when technology and society evolve faster than the ability to adapt. And, it threatens rigid and traditional practices everywhere. It’s no longer just survival of the fittest, but also survival of the fitting. Businesses must earn relevance and to do so requires much more than adoption of the latest technologies or launching endeavors in the latest social or app flavor of the month. Indeed, this post requires not only your pinterest, but your dedication and…
A Critical Path for Customer Relevance, Part 1
A key objective for senior executives over the next several years is to use disruptive technology to get closer to customers, to improve relationships, and enhance experiences. It is a considerable move and the result will usher in a new era of adaptive and empathetic business models. However, this is a move that is easier said than done., especially when vision and execution are two sides of different coins. This is a critical path where businesses must not only commit…
Leadership in an Era of Digital Darwinism
As I think about disruptive technology, it’s clear that as an industry, we often get stuck in conversations about products, services, and features. In social media for example, we are enamored with Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, and the like. At the same time, we tend to confuse emerging with disruptive technologies and overly invest in rising stars such as Instagram, Quora and to some extent Google+ before we understand the impact they have on our world and the impact we can…
