C-Suite Network™

Menu
Search
Close this search box.

Category: Technology

Categories
Best Practices Growth Management Personal Development Technology

Today’s CIO: The Chief Innovation Officer

Today’s world of business is not just changing—it’s transforming. The difference is that change is doing something in an incrementally different way, while transformation is doing something so drastically different that it becomes a qualitative shift. The fact that we began watching movies on VHS tapes that we’d have to rewind, then moved to DVDs that we didn’t have to rewind, followed by Blu-ray discs for enhanced quality—that’s a change. But going from discs of any kind to a multitude of streaming services that we can watch both on our smart TVs and our mobile devices, bringing not only our movie collections but television and Internet videos with us wherever we go? That’s a transformation.

As we all know, technology made this transformation possible. I’ve spoken to CIOs who are not only using software as a service (SaaS), but who are implementing hardware as a service, connectivity as a service, collaboration as a service, and security as a service. The real excitement was around implementing everything as a service (XaaS). Clearly, IT is quickly becoming an integrated collection of intelligent services that are on-demand, on the move, and on any device.

The visual, social, virtual, and mobile transformations are creating a new golden era of technology-enabled innovation, and the CIO needs to be leading the charge.

So what has enabled the business environment to go from merely changing to transforming? It has to do with the three change accelerators I often reference in my writing: advances in computing power, bandwidth, and storage. I have tracked their exponential trajectory for years, and they have entered a new phase that has transformed every business process.

Based on technology-enabled Hard Trends that are already in place, how we sell, market, communicate, collaborate, innovate, train, and educate will continue to transform. If you don’t anticipate the disruption that comes with this transformation, someone else will. And with all the business processes technology is transforming, nothing is transforming more than the role of the CIO.


The New Role of the CIO

The CIO’s role was traditionally in managing information, IT systems, and cost management, but it has now transformed to be one of creating new competitive advantage, new products, and new services. The CEO was the innovator, but many of today’s CEOs and their C-suite counterparts are unaware of what is technologically possible now or in the future. However, the CIO does have interest, access, and the understanding of that type of information and knowledge, which is why the CIO position needs to transform into the Chief Innovation Officer.

Of course, not all CIOs will embrace their new role. As our environment transforms, human nature is to stagnate, as we are drawn to comfort. Many will be far too busy doing what they have always done, and many will spend a lot of time protecting and defending the status quo solely because they’re familiar with it. We know how it works and we have an investment in it that has made a lot of money for us and gotten us to where we are today. Therefore, the mindset is that we have to protect and defend it in any way we can.

An additional burden the CIO has is the nature of their work itself. They have to maintain the existing system to make sure it’s working in order to keep the organization running smoothly during the transforming period. But if all you’re doing is maintaining what’s already there, then you hold a legacy role and your relevance is decreasing every day. So while you do have to maintain your current and past systems, you also have to spend some time truly innovating, as innovation is increasingly technology-driven and the CIO is in a perfect position to be the driver of it.

Ultimately, it’s about increasing your professional and personal relevance, paying close attention to the Hard Trends transforming your industry and becoming more anticipatory as to what digital disruptions are heading your way and causing disruption before someone else disrupts you and your organization. For example, the old way was about technology centricity; the new way is about technology-empowered business strategies. The old way was information management; the new way is information intelligence. The old way was IT systems management; the new way is platforms that enable new value chains. The old way was cost management; the new way is business transformation and rapid growth.

The ability to innovate has never been easier and has never happened faster. In today’s transformational business landscape, you must anticipate disruption and change, turning it into opportunity and advantage. If you don’t change the focus of your CIO role, someone else will.

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Health and Wellness Industries Technology

The Cybersecurity of Healthcare

Prior to 1992, the thought of cyberwar, cybersecurity and hacking was predominantly constrained to Hollywood fantasy. Fast-forward to present times, when connectivity is commonplace, and the level of data breaches and hacking has become horrifyingly real.

The reality is that every day, our data is used or even copied, often without us knowing. As a generation that willfully inputs their information on multiple websites, we seem to concern ourselves less with the concept of cybersecurity until disaster strikes.

Trust Must Be Earned

In contrast to not fully considering the importance of cybersecurity, we greatly consider our trust in a company with our data, like our bank, our hospital, our insurance companies, our primary retailer or even the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). We’re quick to assume that if they ask for our sensitive information, they must be taking security measures to prevent that data from being leaked into the wrong hands.

We can never be too sure that a company or even the whole industry is up to the cybersecurity standards that must be utilized in today’s ever-changing digital world. Shockingly, one large industry that suffers financially from data breaches and hacking is the healthcare industry.

Generally, one would think that healthcare and all the sensitive data involved should be buttoned up pretty tightly, but it is quite the contrary. The overall cost of a healthcare breach is about $408 per patient record, not including the loss of business, productivity, and reputation of the entity involved.

Annually, the healthcare industry sees $5 billion in costs to correct data breaches, hacking and all-around poor cybersecurity measures. In addition to the cost to find a solution to these errors, healthcare entities are being fined by the Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights, sometimes as much as $28 million annually.

Why So Costly?

The steepness of these fines is the result of a lack of preventative measures. The severity of a data breach in the healthcare industry is immense, where once the damage is done, it is essentially permanent. So, who is responsible once a patient’s records have been breached, and what are the repercussions of this? Financial penalties are prevalent; however, what about breached trust? Is there permanent damage between the patient and the entity?

If a customer goes to a local store and the customer’s data is stolen, the trust the customer had is almost instantly gone, like in Target’s hacking issue, where customers ultimately boycotted shopping there as a result.

Now imagine going to your doctor about personal medical issues, only to be contacted later in the week about how all your personal information is in someone else’s hands now. You would feel incredibly violated and likely wonder if even your doctor was the reason it got out.

Hacking a School

Hackers traditionally target industries with a lot of data and very little security. School districts are examples of this in recent years, the reason being the lack of funds and tight budgets they have to spend on internal cybersecurity.

In contrast, the healthcare industry has a much larger budget in all capacities, making it questionable as to why they seem to be behind the ball. How can a hospital better anticipate what’s to come by realizing the Hard Trend of cyberattacks and pre-solve problems before they occur?

Finding a Solution in Anticipation

A cyber-risk assessment is an option, with many hospitals using a more cost-effective outside vendor to do the job. Preventing cybercrimes is a 24-hour-a-day venture with criminals pinging systems thousands of times a day, so it would greatly benefit healthcare entities to outsource this responsibility to a company with the capacity to monitor security around the clock.

As an entrepreneur, it is safe to assume that cyberattacks on sensitive data hubs in healthcare are a Hard Trend, with the cybersecurity market for healthcare being a burgeoning one with a greater purpose. But if cybersecurity is not your passion, cyber insurance is another option, where covered entities must conduct a thorough assessment of the threats and vulnerabilities, implement reduction measures, and ensure that any vendor or organization handling private health information is security compliant.

Both criminally savvy individuals and the rapid advancement of digital technology are Hard Trends; therefore, healthcare companies and outside entrepreneurs alike should pre-solve future problems before they become disastrous and use their anticipatory mindsets to help move the healthcare industry safely forward.

If you would like a free perimeter test to check for vulnerabilities in your cybersecurity defense system, please contact us. We have identified best-in-class cyber testing companies that will provide the results of their tests and recommend immediate actions that can be taken to stop any uncovered leaks in your system. 

Ask for your free perimeter test at: https://www.burrus.com/contact-us/ 

Categories
Best Practices Growth Industries Personal Development Technology

Infrastructure vs. Extortion Structure, and Economies of Scale vs. Monopoly and Coercion

We’ve seen the real effects of climate change: More evaporation, heavier rain, warmer waters, higher temperatures, longer and hotter heat waves, increased brush growth, increased dry fuel, downed power lines, wildfires, heavy winds, firestorms, unhealthy air, loss of housing, loss of business, loss of forests, loss of life, higher utility rates, higher taxes, higher insurance prices. YIKES.

A hundred years ago, a centralized power and distribution structure seemed like a good idea. Cheap power with the cost of infrastructure spread out over a long period of time. Power companies were even telling us to use more power in the 1950s and ‘60s! And why not? It was so cheap!

But fast-forward to the ‘90s and the aging infrastructure and conventional power generation required more money. But because the power company monopoly was the only one in town, they simply raised the rates. By the early 2000s, they told us to cut back. And the costs were going up—of course we should cut back.

Addressing the Elephant in the Room

Because “underground was too expensive” as the system expanded, they decided to use high-tension lines through forests. These overhead lines came with astoundingly expensive liability, ironically enough. So is the cost of undergrounding lines still too pricy?

At the same time, regulators allow power companies to increase their rates—they were “too big to fail”. Does this sound familiar? Recently, we even read that the power company agreed to pay to make up for municipal costs during the fires. But where does this money come from?

It all comes down to this: When an infrastructure-based company grows to be big enough, they can just raise the rates, and regulatory agencies will allow it.

The Silver Lining

The good news? The movement to go off the grid keeps growing. The local Sutter Hospital just finished putting elevated solar panels all over their parking lot. Their spokesman, Shaun Ralson, said, “The impetus is really sustainability and self-reliance so that we don’t have to rely on PG&E.” He then said, “There’s a desire to be off the grid because we don’t want to deal with the vulnerability.” For any business or even your home, this is food for thought. This solar initiative will provide enough power to service 500 patients.

But back to the wires and fires. Not only will the power company charge their customers for their own mistake of creating a dangerous infrastructure, but now they’re also cutting power during periods of high fire risk. Hospitals must run 24/7/365. They can’t afford to depend on an unreliable system.

And—don’t we need power to pump water to put these fires out? And don’t we need power to operate the electrical doors and gates that block our escape? What about the hospital patients that are on life support? Power shutdowns are dangerous as is, but now that we rely on vulnerable infrastructure, shutdowns are the lesser of two evils.

In the end, real freedom is a form of onsite power production, or at least small micro-grids with local power generation. The sooner we reach this goal, the better.

Moving Forward: Rethinking corporate infrastructure

Forces like climate change and terrorism can lead us to rethink how we rely on corporate infrastructures. We can no longer afford to financially support their mistakes. But what we can afford is an alternative method of home power generation. Solar costs are at record lows, meaning it’ll pay for itself even more quickly considering the increases in mainstream power costs.

Advances in wind power, better batteries, and fuel cells running on biogas are all waiting for you. Have you considered pulling the plug?

Gold was first discovered in old California, at Sutter’s Mill. Maybe Sutter Hospital has discovered the new form of gold. Many of us have already cut the cord that connected us to landline phones and cable television. Is the power cord the next to go?

For more, read on: http://c-suitenetworkadvisors.com/advisor/michael-houlihan-and-bonnie-harvey/

 

 

 

Categories
Best Practices Culture Growth Health and Wellness Industries Leadership Technology

Smart Cities – Seeing the Invisible and Doing the Impossible

The word “impossible” connotes something that cannot be done. But we all know the impossible isn’t completely out of reach. For centuries, humans have been achieving the so-called impossible by developing conceptual understanding and making visible that which we’ve been previously unable to conceive. When we develop this sort of understanding, previously unknown opportunities and solutions become clear — doing the impossible then becomes just a matter of commonsense problem-solving.

A new iteration of this concept is appearing in cities around the world. Data analytics and technological innovations provide new levels of clarity when it comes to issues like sustainability, pollution, energy conservation, and crime, giving us greater insight into how the many different facets of our cities truly function. Both local leaders and major companies are paying attention to these Hard Trends, becoming more anticipatory in their thinking and thus developing a solution by creating “smart cities.”

Transforming Our Cities

Cities themselves present an array of challenges: CNBC reports that 55% of the world’s population now lives in cities, being mostly responsible for the world’s energy consumption. These numbers mean our urban resources, including water, energy, and even the police, are under considerable, unsustainable strain.

However, high-speed data analytics allow urbanites to more clearly see their resource consumption, providing clear, pragmatic solutions to the crises our cities face. These crises are considered a Soft Trend — a pattern that we can change through Anticipatory thinking and technological prowess. By making our cities part of the Internet of Things (IoT), we can gather high-speed data analytics and transform our cities into smart cities.

For example, during a DOT Smart City Challenge, where cities planned smart solutions to address transportation, sanitation, connectivity, and safety issues in their communities, Denver pitched to increase public and private electric vehicle use, install pedestrian detection systems at intersections to improve safety, and establish a connected freight system, allowing trucks to coordinate deliveries to reduce congestion. Denver was awarded $6 million to fund the connected vehicle network and pedestrian detection system.

Another fantastic example of transportation efficiency was pitched by Columbus, Ohio. During the DOT Smart City Challenge, Columbus pitched the idea of a connected platform to improve resident and visitor mobility, which involved creating an integrated “multimodal trip planning/common payment system application,” simplifying the sharing economy for commuters. Cities often have several different transportation apps, including a variety for parking and public transit, but by creating a single app that allows residents to pay for all modes of transportation, mobility around the city becomes simpler and thus improves access to available options.

Smart City Benefits

Smart cities can be utilized in resource conservation, which is paramount to cities the world over. Even something as simple as a “smart meter” for energy or water usage can drastically reduce costs and conserve resources by 20% to 25%. Trends for 2019 in smart city water technology empower utility customers to reduce water loss. A growing number of utilities are engaging their customers in helping to manage their water usage. Water utility customers have access to engagement tools, enabling them to see their personal consumption data daily, hourly, monthly, and annually via their devices, empowering and educating them. This helps mitigate questions about water rate increases or leaks and reduces response time — all of which can improve efficiency and support water conservation efforts.

While getting citizens to truly care about conservation and sustainability in their cities might be somewhat of a Sisyphean task, everyone cares about local crime. England has roughly one CCTV camera for every 11 citizens, coining it the “most-watched country in the world.” But when Verizon installed CCTV video monitoring in several U.S. cities to create real-time situational awareness, crime was reduced across the board by 5% to 20%, and these cities saved an average of $1.50 for every dollar spent.

This notion of saving money in the long run by spending a little bit of money now seems lost on many cities. By refusing to make these simple financial concessions, city leaders are essentially using legacy thinking to solve tomorrow’s problems today. Saying no has become a financial and environmental liability; it’s much more expensive to say no to the kind of technology that stands to provide huge quality-of-life increases for your city.

Part of changing this system of governmental city management relies on educating mayors to city planners in learning to think in a more anticipatory way. The local heroes of tomorrow, the ones who get re-elected and really push their cities forward, will adopt my Hard Trend Methodology — that is, paying attention to the trends that will happen — and the emergence of new technology to benefit their cities and the people they serve.

Check out my new Anticipatory Leader System, I’ll teach you my Hard Trend Methodology and how to use it to elevate. Your business and personal strategies to transform results.

Categories
Best Practices Personal Development Sales Technology

The Communication Hierarchy

Cosmo, our Bengal cat, is spayed. But that doesn’t prevent him from sniffing things out or marking his territory. It is fascinating how much information is shared with just one spray. He knows everything about the other cat—where they’ve been, how often they stop by, and who they are. He uses many other means of communication too, including body language, to tell us what he thinks and wants. He cries in different ways that tell us if he’s hungry, just caught an animal, or wants to take a walk. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if us humans could communicate that easily and efficiently?

Not only do we have much more to say, but we also have a few more ways to say it. That’s the tricky part. We have to communicate our message clearly and effectively in order to avoid misunderstandings. By understanding the values and limitations of each communication method, we will be able to use them the right way.

You can choose to talk to anyone via email, text, telephone, video, or in person. Sure, we can use other methods, like audio recordings, video recordings, and social media platforms. We can even go the traditional route and write a letter. But for business purposes, we depend on the big 5 when it comes to communication methods. Let’s discuss each method’s strengths and weaknesses so we can make the right decision every time.

Communication Methods: The Big 5

1. Communicating in person
Through experience, we’ve found that face-to-face communication is the number 1 way to effectively get your message across, especially when you’re getting approval on a proposal or making a sale. This is why:

First of all, you actually see who you’re talking to, in real-time. You can see their to-the-second reactions to what you say. Misunderstandings can be prevented. With its 20-plus muscles, the face can create hundreds of unique expressions. Why not use this constant and powerful feedback to absolve differences and misinterpretations as they occur? A person’s body language can also tell you if they’re truly interested, or getting defensive.

Secondly, they know they have your undivided attention. You aren’t multitasking or checking your messages. This conveys a singular commitment of your energy and time. You have the benefit of the doubt! You have nothing to hide behind, and you may have to answer difficult questions. This shows you’re sincere, and it’ll build a bond that will foster a sense of familiarity in your relationship.

For first meetings with anybody important, this method is crucial and to display your continued commitment to repeat customers. Of course there are drawbacks—it’s time-consuming, you can’t multitask, travel might be involved, and you’re put on the spot.

2.  Communicating via video

When you aren’t able to meet in person, video is the best option. It has most of the same advantages without the inconvenience of traveling. And, you can meet with more than one person at the same time no matter where they are. Communicating over video is great for meetings where everyone’s looking at the same document or presentation, and it’s a great way to get the positive benefits of communicating face-to-face.

When you can see someone’s face, even on a screen, you’re more likely to assume they have good intentions. This is why we prefer video over telephone. The drawbacks that come with video communication are poor user knowledge (where applicable), the possibility of poor connection, and the fact that different platforms have different features.

3. Communicating via telephone

Talking on the phone is much more personal than email, and it happens in real time. It’s easy to immediately figure out a misunderstanding that might’ve occurred over email. Once your emails go back and forth trying to prove a point or figure something out, it’s time to pick up the phone. After all, nobody ever said all of your communication must be in writing!

Speaking on the phone also allows for intention and tone. You can tell by their voice if you’re agitated or sincere. Their tone might tell you if today isn’t a good time to discuss a certain issue, for example. Imagine blindly continuing email communication without being able to provide and receive this crucial level of feedback!

When it comes to two-way conversations, we prefer phone over email. But the phone is less personal than video—you can’t read the other person’s facial expressions. It’s much easier for the other person to interrupt or be abrupt. When you talk on the phone, you’re only a voice. It feels like you aren’t as worthy of respect as someone who can be seen. After initially introducing yourself via video or in person, using the phone to communicate is ideal.

4. Communicating via email

Communicating via email is an effective way to document what was said during a phone call or meeting. It’s also good for transmitting documents. On the other hand, it might be the worst way to have a disagreement. Each side feels obliged to have the last word. And if you want to change your mind, guess what? Your message exists forever. When communicating through email, some things are better left unsaid.

Most people have yet to discover the behavioral expectations that come with email communication. For example, if you have a list of requests, your recipient is likely to only address the last one. To get around this, we always recommend one email per request. And if the paragraphs in your email aren’t short enough, your recipient won’t read them. We recommend always cutting your paragraphs off at 3-4 lines. We’ve written at length about getting the most out of your emails, all based on real procedures we used in our business.

The biggest drawbacks to email communication are the risk of not having your message heard because of too much text, misunderstandings that result in a never-ending back-and-forth, saying something you may end up regretting later, and the overall impersonal nature of an email message in itself.

5. Communicating via text

Communicating via text is a great idea when you can’t speak in person or on the phone. It’s also a good way to keep everyone updated about the status of a meeting, for example. Keeping up with friends and family is also ideal to do over text. But you’d better be close to the other party—this level of communication can put someone off if they don’t feel as familiar as you do.

Texting is an efficient way to send addresses and talk to people who are en-route to a destination. Despite texting being more and more common these days, it’s still an extremely limited communication method with many drawbacks.

The person you’re texting may not yet know your name and may only see your phone number. This can get frustrating. We suggest that you give your name in any initial message, or if you believe you might not be in their address book. Most people send text messages in short bursts. If they know you, this comes across as sincere and personal. If they don’t know you, this comes across as irritating. Be careful of saying something you might regret later, despite the guise of it being a more personal way to communicate. Texting makes it easy for people to think they are connected 24/7, leading someone to potentially become offended if they don’t receive a response as soon as they’d like.

Conclusion

Just like Cosmo, our cat, you must choose your communication methods wisely. Make sure they’re appropriate for the party you’re speaking with, and for the type of message you want to convey. Consider the pros and cons of each method—use all of them to reinforce one another. Respect the communication tool hierarchy. And don’t forget—in-person face-to-face will always be at the top!

For more, read on: http://c-suitenetworkadvisors.com/advisor/michael-houlihan-and-bonnie-harvey/

 

 

Categories
Best Practices Culture Growth Human Resources Leadership Skills Technology

Increase Employee Skills to Decrease Talent Shortages

When it comes to the future of your industry, how secure do you feel, not only in your position but in your career and abilities as well? The era in which you go to school for a specific skill or trade, develop your acumen and grow a career until retirement has passed. The future of your career doesn’t depend on whether employment is available at a given company; it depends on how employable you are. This requires constant learning to be proactive in refining the skills you have to fit the market in its current state, as well as its ever-changing demands.

We’re Living in Transformational Times 

As the Three Digital Accelerators (bandwidth, computing power, and storage) continuously grow, new positions emerge in the tech sector, and traditional jobs get overhauled. This means the skills required to do these jobs change, and it’s up to both employees and employers to keep up with these trends.

If your job description isn’t already changing, it probably will in the near future. You can’t afford to stand still in your career like generations past. You can’t simply coast along and not pursue more training or a better education tailored to the skills you’ll find yourself needing.

Many unemployed or underemployed individuals are still having difficulty landing jobs. Even working professionals looking to make a move, whether lateral or upward, are finding difficulty in locating open positions suited to their particular abilities. But blaming the economy is now a misperception: in our ever-shifting economic landscape and technological evolution, many once-common jobs are disappearing. Simultaneously, new roles are opening up, but companies are experiencing difficulty filling these positions.

Specific Skill Sets Needed?

Even many traditional roles, such as medical technicians, machinists, construction workers, or even nurses, are harder to fill because of a lack of up-to-date skills. These are relatively common jobs in our economic landscape; they shouldn’t be too difficult to fill. However, most of these jobs call for developed, nuanced skills that can grow in lockstep with our technologically advancing economy. But it’s starting to look like many professionals aren’t keeping up with the evolving skill demands of their industries.

In addition to these more traditional jobs being difficult to fill, a slew of new roles and professions are offering untapped potential for workers with the right technical knowledge. In the tech sector, the ability to negotiate and manipulate data to extract actionable knowledge has become invaluable. Freelancer, an online outsourcing platform, claims data scientists are in high demand, along with people experienced in the eCommerce arena and the ever-increasing advent of wearable tech.

This disconnect between talent, necessary skill, and employment doesn’t hinge entirely on employees. Many employers are having trouble addressing what’s now being viewed as a serious talent shortage. These employers are failing to meet the changing needs of the economy, especially with respect to teaching new skills to new hires. Even when applicants have the required skill sets, many are looking for higher starting salaries than most talent-strapped companies are willing to offer.

According to the results of a Talent Shortage Survey from ManpowerGroup, 45% of employers globally claim that they can’t find the skills they need. This is up from 40% in 2017 and is the highest it has been in over a decade. The ones most affected by the shortage are large companies of 250 or more employees.

The Solution? 

ManpowerGroup suggests employers overhaul best practices when it comes to recruiting, like redefining qualifying criteria and conveying the image of their organizations as a destination for valued talent with a culture of learning and employee encouragement.

For both employees and employers, education is key. Prospective employees need to be more anticipatory and pay attention to the Hard Trends shaping the future of their industries while continuously augmenting their skill sets in order to remain employable. By studying the Hard Trends I’ve outlined, career-minded individuals will predict what sorts of skills they’ll need to develop and where opportunity for employment may lie.

As for employers facing a talent shortage, they need to develop new recruiting methods and be willing to provide necessary additional training to new hires. From both sides, it’s clear that the most important aspect of this talent and employment shortage is the pursuit of modernized knowledge.

What are you doing to stay ahead of the curve in your industry? How are you growing your career by being anticipatory? Just how employable are you, given the transformational changes that are yet to come?

Learn to turn disruption and change into opportunity and advantage with my latest book The Anticipatory Organization. Don’t wait, get your copy today at www.TheAOBook.com.

Categories
Best Practices Growth Industries Leadership Personal Development Technology

Humanizing Your Digital Communications

Video conferencing has been around for a long time. The equipment is usually kept in a special room, always booked by executives due to the high value they derive in using it to enhance their collaborations.

On the other hand, digital communications is very different by definition. Digital communications can take place using your laptop, your tablet, your smartphone, and even your watch, as the software is free, and the quality of the video is at an all-time high. Tech companies, such as Facebook, are now beginning to roll out more devices, such as the Portal, aimed at enhancing digital communications yet again.

However, the heaviest hitter in corporate digital communication is Zoom Communications. Zoom offers services that are now reliable enough for companies to migrate to, using Zoom as a primary means of communication. Zoom’s simplicity, improved security assurance, and rapid increase in visual and audio quality has made it favorable in comparison to the more traditional, in-house video conferencing systems I referred to earlier.

Digitization Disruption

Once again, we find that digitization is disrupting our everyday business activities. This isn’t exactly a surprise, as I’ve mentioned over time, digital disruption comes in waves, and every single industry, no matter if it is construction or IT security, will be disrupted. If your industry has not yet been digitally disrupted, it is likely on the horizon. If disruption has already occurred, it is time for you to start becoming more anticipatory, pay attention to the hard trends that are already shaping the future of your industry, and expect yet another wave of new disruptions that includes new opportunities as well.

While Zoom offers companies the possibility of connecting to meetings both visually and by way of company mobile phones, savvy companies recognize the abilities for employee engagement utilizing other features, such as white-boarding and meeting recording options.

In an increasingly globalized work environment, it was not always possible to meet clients face-to-face for the last several decades. Companies relied on telephones as a means of connecting with distant clients if they didn’t have access to a video conferencing system. But now with visual communications like Zoom, we’ve come full circle. Ironically and pleasantly enough, digitization, in this case, hasn’t taken us to an even more abstract, conceptualized means of communication. It has actually given communications a human face.

The Both/And Principle

In past articles, I’ve discussed the Both/And Principle. The new doesn’t replace the old. In fact, recognizing the interplay between the new and old is an incredibly useful first step in developing an entrepreneurial mindset. With Zoom, we see both online and in-person interactions mixing together, along with online collaboration between everyone given Zoom’s features.

This reflects and incorporates the more dynamic interactions companies have in today’s business environment. It allows for on-the-fly additions to conferences and opens up businesses to new interactions in a safer and secure space thanks to Zoom’s encryption capabilities.

Audio and visual quality now being at a higher level makes online conferencing more efficient. This is only one aspect, albeit a major one, as there are still more possibilities and opportunities to discover in the field of visual communications.

The Future of Digital Communication

Developers are still testing the ways in which visual communications can be pushed further, such as the recording of all communications over these platforms, their easy accessibility for analysis, and troubleshooting. Undoubtedly, digitization opens up visual communications to the benefits of big data. Digitization also provides businesses with easy access to support systems. Tech support can easily access a company’s network to fix any issues. This streamlines a process that once involved sitting on hold for hours with an external customer service center.

One thing is certain: The three digital accelerators being exponential advances in processing power, digital storage, and bandwidth will continue to provide new and powerful functionality to all forms of visual communications, as this highly personal method of dialogue and discourse becomes an even more dominant, prevalent means of communication with businesses around the globe.

Categories
Culture Investing Marketing Personal Development Sales Technology

Brick and Mortar Stores Are Dead? Not So Fast!

The Younger Generation That Chooses Brick and Mortar Stores

You’re a part of Generation Z if you were born between 1997 and 2012. (If Z is the last letter of the alphabet… then what’s next?) This generation actually prefers shopping at old-fashioned brick-and-mortar stores. Why? Simply put—because it’s fun and entertaining! Does this mean we’ve all exaggerated the death of retail? We think so.

According to a recent Morning Consult study, “(They) will be the largest, most ethnically diverse, best educated, and most financially powerful generation ever.” When Gen Z-ers started spending their own money, two-day delivery was becoming the norm. They made their first purchases when the convenience of online ordering and home delivery was the trend. So why didn’t they keep it up and hop onto the online bandwagon? Is ecommerce missing something? Or was it that, when looking at these different shopping experiences side by side, they found that neither was shiny and new? Why did they choose brick-and-mortar shopping over online?

We think it’s the spontaneity that comes with retail. There’s also a tactile experience that online shopping can’t provide. And we think shopping brick-and-mortar satisfies a social need, whether it’s just being out of the house, dressing up, or investing in “retail therapy”. They might find exactly what they were looking for, or they could discover something brand-new! Either way, they’re going out to interact with real people instead of clicking around online from the comfort of home.

The Beauty of Brick and Mortar Shopping

As producers who have built a major retail brand, we appreciate the power behind brick-and-mortar. We were lucky enough to offer our products in a large territory to retailers’ existing customers. Unlike the direct-to-consumer business where only a few items are sold at a time, we received one check for one big shipment of many different products. Our brand had the opportunity to be discovered on retail shelves and floor displays. When people buy online, they’re likely to repeat the same purchase of the same brand over and over again. There’s barely any chance of discovering something new! Convenience and time-saving triumph over discovery!

Price-wise, ecommerce is a race to the bottom. Price is always the determining factor online, rather than quality. Both the customer and the producer know that quality is hard to fake in a physical retail store.

Going Shopping—For Fun!

According to the report we mentioned earlier, two-thirds of Gen Z-ers shop for fun at least once per month. Among the list of their top “brands” were Wal-Mart and Target—two of the world’s largest brick-and-mortar stores.

“Free delivery” is a peculiar misconception that has boosted ecommerce as we know it. If everyone working for the USPS, UPS, and FedEx still gets paid to ship “for free”, where does the money come from? Either the online merchants factored shipping into their prices, or they “invested” in delivery costs to compete with brick-and-mortar stores. The customer ends up paying for delivery one way or another in the end. But a brick-and-mortar store will meet you halfway—You drive to them. They offer you prices that don’t include the cost of getting the product in your hands.

It’s been interesting to see Generation Z rediscovering what the Boomers knew all along about brick-and-mortar shopping. But don’t let them have all the fun—let’s go on a shopping trip! We’ll discover something new and meet people along the way!

 For more, read on: http://c-suitenetworkadvisors.com/advisor/michael-houlihan-and-bonnie-harvey/

 

 

Categories
Best Practices Culture Economics Entrepreneurship Industries Investing Management Personal Development Technology

5G Entrepreneurs Creating Billion-Dollar Businesses

Within the next five years…

New multibillion-dollar businesses will appear that didn’t exist before due to 5G wireless technology. Because of this, many industries will either be agile, reacting to an ever-increasing number of 5G innovators disrupting their industry, or they will be anticipatory innovators and use the predictability of 5G capabilities to become the disruptor.

The first generation (1G) of wireless came with the introduction of cell phones constrained to phone calls and high-level executives. The second-generation (2G) gave us better call quality for wireless phones and offered a new capability for text messaging via SMS. The third-generation (3G) facilitated mobile internet browsing and early video calling.

Most recently, 4G brought us useful multimedia networked computers with media-rich streaming applications like Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook, Netflix, and more.

Up next is 5G.

This generation of wireless technology is already being deployed in major cities in the U.S. and other countries. Qualcomm, Ericsson, and Broadcom, as well as network providers AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon, are all putting in maximum effort, with mobile device manufacturers starting to launch their first 5G-enabled devices.

While consumers have become jaded to the 5G terms as seen in commercials, there are many consumer and business implementations of 5G to be excited about. Once deployed and fully operational, 5G would essentially be the solution to deliver complete digital connectivity from the tip of the carrier network and essentially be the death of cables in homes and offices alike.

As it stands today, 5G would function as a set of simultaneous revolutions, all of which must function without any trouble whatsoever, in order to provide the speed and connectivity it boasts. Some hiccups actually go beyond technological functionality and spill into business and social conflicts:

  • Unified Carriers. 5G wireless would essentially place companies like AT&T, Verizon, and the combined T-Mobile and Sprint in competition against Comcast and Charter Communications for services. 
  • Remade Landscapes. 5G allows for smaller transmitters that consume lower power, with smaller 5G transmitters covering much smaller service areas than those typical 4G towers. A carrier would need about four hundred times more than we currently have, camouflaged in urban areas. 
  • Restructured Global Technology Economy. Upon implementing 5G, areas such as Scandinavia where Nokia and Ericsson reside would become the primary hub for telecommunications, and China Mobile and Huawei are jointly responsible for the architecture of 5G, making China more powerful in the data world than the U.S.

The cost is of most concern in many cases. Prices for service would most likely start out pretty high compared to where we are now, covering the costs to implement the technology.

In several articles of mine, I’ve called on anticipatory businesses and individuals to pay attention to the Hard Trends shaping the future both inside and outside of their industries, and the digital disruptors that may affect them directly or indirectly. Implementation of 5G would certainly jump-start those disruptions.

The following are perfect examples of technology-driven changes I’ve discussed in previous articles and their correlation to 5G technology:

  • Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communications and Driverless Automobiles. 5G will enable Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) communication, using the low latency of 5G wireless networking, allowing each vehicle to know exactly what all the other vehicles are doing around it.
  • Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR). Ultra-fast connectivity and synchronicity are important for the user experience, as video communication within corporations will be meshing with VR as remote employees take virtual tours of a manufacturing plant with individuals who are physically there. In the AR world, the very infrastructure of AR glasses and other AR technology is contingent on high-speed connectivity with the amount of data present.
  • Cloud Computing. 5G wireless has the potential for distributed cloud computing services, creating near real-time experiences with edge computing that are much more engaging to users than Amazon, Google, or Microsoft are today.
  • Internet of Things (IoT). Everything from kitchen appliances to parking meters can all be made easier to produce, easier to control, and more connected than ever before. 5G transmitters will become IoT hubs, acting as real-time service hubs for all the households in their specific coverage areas.
  • Healthcare. The availability of low-latency connectivity in extremely remote locations such as Mississippi, where trials of 5G connectivity are implemented, would connect individuals to remote medical professionals for information.

By being anticipatory, many telecommunication providers are pre-solving problems with 5G before they occur by way of moving customers into a 5G business track before most true 5G services exist. It is the perfect time for you and your organization to anticipate what’s to come, and more importantly, what is to be affected by 5G in your industry. By paying attention to the Hard Trends shaping the future, you can stay ahead of the curve to avoid falling behind.

To be certain of the Hard Trends shaping your future, get a copy of my latest book The Anticipatory Organization – I have a special offer for you!

Categories
Best Practices Culture Entrepreneurship Health and Wellness Industries Investing Leadership Technology

Auto Insurance Industry: Disrupted or Disruptor?

Today, we have fully electric vehicles with AI-enabled semi-autonomous features, as well as fully autonomous vehicle applications. But how has this affected insurance premiums, and will those changes deter you from buying a specific “vehicle of the future”?

Presently, most vehicles still put you in the driver’s seat and in control, leaving your insurance unaffected. But now that we have more autonomous features than ever to make the roads safer, insurance is changing.

Disruptive innovator Elon Musk and Tesla have been in the limelight for good and bad reasons in this space. The good being a computerized system more adept and attentive than human beings, but the bad is that initial versions of these features have been limited. Couple that with the fact that there are currently fewer Tesla automobiles on highways than Fords or Chevys, many buying a Tesla will quickly notice their insurance premiums skyrocket.

Auto Insurance Is Changing

For example, entrepreneur Dan Peate, who founded the group health insurance provider Hixme, was deterred from getting himself a Tesla Model X after he discovered that his premiums would accelerate to roughly $10,000 a year. Why should the price vary so much, especially since semi-autonomous features are specifically manufactured to be safer on the roads? If you find yourself pondering this as well, you are definitely identifying the Hard Trend that more semi-autonomous and autonomous vehicles will emerge every year.

Dan Peate identified this Hard Trend and became more anticipatory in his thinking, moving to start a wave of disruption from within the insurance industry. He founded Avinew, a new insurance company that monitors drivers’ use of autonomous features on cars and determines insurance premium discounts based on how and when autonomous features are used.

Avinew has agreements with most manufacturers and customers, allowing it to access driving data in real time and utilizing the data gathered to cut insurance premiums, rather than after accidents occur.

Underwriters and actuaries base insurance prices on the type of risk, and oftentimes they charge more due to not having enough data, as the risk is the unknown and not that the vehicle puts you in danger.

With the interconnectivity of the world today, change is in motion. Policyholders have a more dynamic and interactive relationship with insurers, and much like decentralized currency, have more accurate accounts of transactions. In this case, the frequency of usage of autonomous and semi-autonomous features eliminates frivolous insurance costs.

Some insurers call this an existential crisis, but it is actually a chance for entrepreneurs to turn disruption and change into opportunity and advantage by learning to be anticipatory.

Research conducted at the Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey indicates that premiums could drop 12.5 percent by 2035 with this new wave of auto disruption, and that product lines centered around autonomous features will offset some of the loss, but the gains will remain far behind.

Forecasts like this might make the insurance industry feel like it has plenty of time. After all, that same research above estimates that by 2035, there will still only be 23 million autonomous vehicles on American roads, which is less than 10 percent of today’s total. The problem is they fail to use the Both/And principle, one I have taught for decades that aided me in maintaining a high level of forecasting accuracy. Researchers in the auto industry fall into the trap of thinking future vehicles will either be fully autonomous or not autonomous at all (Either/Or thinking).

Higher Risk?

The future fact is that fully autonomous vehicles will be higher risk due to potential hacking and technology failure issues than semi-autonomous vehicles, so we will see rapid growth in semi-autonomous cars as well as older cars being fitted with semi-autonomous crash-avoidance systems. Fully autonomous vehicles will increase in areas where their use is less risky. At any rate, the numbers of vehicles with semi-autonomous and fully autonomous capabilities will grow far faster than most are projecting.

The insurance industry must move on this faster than projected or be disrupted by anticipatory outsiders. Insurance is needed, but the risk is shifting to vehicle manufacturers, software providers, and tech component system providers. Following this shift to find opportunity will be a key to growth in the years ahead. If the risk is less human and more systemic, said risk becomes systematic and more predictable and preventable.

One way an entrepreneur could look at this and anticipate what is to come is by paying less attention to what Dan Peate and Avinew are currently doing, and focus on what will disrupt them in the coming years. There are individual opportunities for existing insurance companies to anticipate, adapt and grow, or stagnate and fail. The good news is that by using the Hard Trend Methodology, you have a choice.