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A Simpler Time

Posted by Constance Ward on November 27, 2012 | Comments Off

In a September New York Times article titled “Seeking a Simple Respite” writer Anita Patil claims, ”It seems we’re taking a collective deep breath, stepping back and reassessing our complicated lives.”

The latest marketing buzzwords, the article points out, are ”simple,” ”simply,” ”simplicity,” ”easy,” etc.

In the UK, one of the most ubiquitous — and annoying — advertisements on air (see the embedded video below) involves promoting how simple doing business with that particular insurance company can be. The end of the commercial, a meercat stands up and shouts ”Simples!” and clicks its teeth.

So even animals are catching the spirit–the Zeitgeist–of our time. Are you? Are you finding effective ways to simplify your communication, your organizational structure, etc.? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged leadership, simplicity

Global Thought Leaders Tackle Tough Water Issues

Posted by Constance Ward on November 23, 2012 | Comments Off

On the eve of the American Water Summit, about 40 global water leaders met in Chicago on 13 November 2012 to discuss how best to communicate the value of water to the public. The CEO-level roundtable dinner was sponsored by the renowned trade publication Global Water Intelligence and its sister publication American Water Intelligence.

Among the goals of the roundtable dinner were the following:

to provide a networking opportunity for thought leaders in the industry
to create a body of influence for promoting and communicating the value of water
to determine the best path forward for the group

One additional question posed at my table yielded some interesting answers: What makes a water leader a leader?

Water leaders, according to participants, are or should be conservative, compelling and clear ambassadors for the value of water.

This question prompted a discussion of the specific skill set needed for water leaders, but the description applied equally to all thought leaders.

Water leaders, according to participants, are or should be conservative, compelling and clear ambassadors for the value of water (or their own value proposition.) They need courage and confidence as they champion the cause of water (or their company’s cause), and they should do so with an authentic voice (as all thought leaders should).

Collaboration and alignment of interests will help build a stronger sense of community as water leaders (or any other thought leader). A partnering mindset will help break down silos, which will be necessary to move the water industry (and any industry) forward with one voice.

Highlights of the full water conference can be found in this ”Top Tweets” post from the Twitter feed #aws2012.

Tagged american water summit, chicago, conference, water

Top Tweets from American Water Summit, Chicago, 2012

Posted by Constance Ward on November 23, 2012 | 1 Comment

Key question at the conference is embedded in theme ”Business Models of the Future”: How do we advance the state of water? #aws2012

Bob Bailey, CH2M Hill, opened water conference with observation that the future is closer to now than ever before. #aws2012

Bob Bailey, CH2M Hill, explained the challenges of water industry that’s complex, fragmented and slow to react. #aws2012 Continue Reading…

Tagged american water summit, chicago, conference, twitter, water

Management Coach vs. Message Coach

Posted by Constance Ward on November 16, 2012 | Comments Off

A communications coach helps leaders clarify their message and focus messaging strategy.
Illustration by hikingartist.com

One question I’m asked frequently is how does what I normally do differ from what a traditional management coach does. It’s difficult to explain because a management coach and a communications coach actually are similar.

Both types of coaches help managers lead better, so I would certainly call myself a management coach. We both help CEOs and senior leaders clarify and then make choices.

But my unique service offering is that of being a so-called message coach. I channel rather than challenge management choices leaders make, and then I in turn challenge the leaders’ choices for communicating such decisions.

In other words, a communications coach helps leaders choose the right strategies, tactics and approaches for communicating their management choices. These types of message coaches not only help leaders choreograph their communication choices, they also help craft the best messages for a particular situation and audience.

Communicating well up, down and sideways in an organization, as well as communicating appropriately to a wide range of external audiences, requires making the right choices for the immediate, short-term, medium-term and long-term horizons.

Are you at an inflection point in your career and getting ready to make some management choices? Are you prepared to make the right communications choices at the same time? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged coaching, communications, consultants, executives

Those Magnificent Men and Their Thinking Machines – Part 2

Posted by Constance Ward on November 11, 2012 | Comments Off

Jose del Millan robotics Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Robotics thought leader Jose del Millan from the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne; Photo: Alain Herzog / EPFL

At the recent TEDx conference in Zurich, another thought leader in robotics, Jose del Millan from the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, introduced the audience to a different type of robot from Davide Scaramuzza’s flying machine.

Dr Millan’s robot is controlled only by the mind, as he demonstrated with a fellow researcher on stage in Zurich. With wires and electrodes taped to his head, the researcher voluntarily modulated his brain signals to think about a particular direction, and the ”brain robot” moved that way — hundreds of miles from Zurich in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Transferring thoughts remotely into brain machines may sound like a scene from a Brave New World, but the futuristic technology has arrived and is waiting to be commercialized.

In the meantime, how effective are you at projecting your thoughts and ideas remotely to employees who live and work far away from the ”mother ship”? Have you mastered the art of long-distance communication? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged communication, robotics, technology, TedX Zurich

Those Magnificent Men and Their Flying Machines – Part 1

Posted by Constance Ward on November 8, 2012 | Comments Off

Not many conference presentations require the presenters to get clearance from the local airport control tower, but one of the demonstrations at the recent TEDx Zurich conference did.

Davide Scaramuzza, a thought leader in robotics from the University of Zurich, brought a small, vision-controlled autonomous flying robot to the innovation event for ”show and tell.” Because it was literally a flying machine, the Zurich Airport control had to give it clearance to fly around the stage at the event.

The audience was amazed by the technology that will allow the robot to conduct search and rescue operations by ”sight” rather than using lasers or GPS. The visual system gives the robot more accuracy in finding survivors and avoiding dangerous hurdles to reaching them.

At TEDx behind the “safety net.” Can you spot the object in flight?

Are you as a business leader relying only on others to bring you the information you need or are you using your own ”vision system” to see for yourself what is being reported? Can you clearly see the obstacles in the way? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged robotics, TedX Zurich

Insights on Networks and Nodes at TEDx Zurich 2012

Posted by Constance Ward on November 5, 2012 | 1 Comment

I took my yearly ”intellectual vacation day” on 25 October to attend the third annual TEDx Zurich conference. With 500 people in attendance and about the same number viewing the event live, TEDx provided food for thought and discussion and a chance to hear from and network with some mighty impressive thought leaders in their chosen fields.

As I did last year, I’ll try to give you a few highlights of the conference and focus on the innovative ideas I heard that apply to business today.

The first couple of segments of the conference were more generally thought provoking and inspiring. With compelling graphics and animation, the opening film illustrated how winning the war on poverty begins with educating girls across the globe and networking them together.

Then Mikael Colville-Andersen, an urban mobility expert from Denmark, asked the audience to clap their hands to a rhythm of 96 beats a minute to illustrate the number of people who die every minute in car accidents around the world. Building better networked bike paths in urban areas was one solution he offered for this problem.

The third speaker was more directly connected to the world of business. James Glatterfelder compared the organizing principles of our economy to nodes of firms in a complex system of ownership networks.

He pointed out the systemic risk in a ”network of global corporate control.” The 43,000 transnational companies (TNCs) who control the world make up 36% of the world’s corporations but create 95% of the value.

Out of those transnational companies, the top 337 companies can control 80% of their total value of these TNCs, and 146 of the key players have the potential to control 40% of their total value. With an estimated 13 million ownership relations shared among the TNCs, this network is too connected to fail.

How does your company measure up in this global world of connectivity? Are you too connected to fail? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged connectivity, networks, TedX Zurich

Senior Leaders versus Seasoned Leaders: Which Type are You?

Posted by Constance Ward on October 31, 2012 | Comments Off

The journey to seasoned leadership: a long,
sometimes difficult road. Photo: Jeremy Wilburn

I recently ran across a candidate who described himself as a “seasoned leader.” What’s the difference between a senior leader and a seasoned leader, I wondered, so I Google-d and Wikipedia-d and Yahoo-d and LinkedIn my way to this definition:

Seasoned leaders have tenure and clout and gravitas and a broad range of experiences in different industries, geographies and situations. Seasoned leaders are more well rounded because they have perspectives not yet formed in senior leaders. The next stage in the development of a senior leader is to become a seasoned leader. Seasoned leaders and senior leaders alike can certainly be thought leaders.

Of course, it wasn’t easy to ”define definitively” what a seasoned leader is and does. And the term ”seasoned” itself could be misinterpreted. The problem is that a “seasoned” leader could refer to any season – how confusing is that! If you think about what those seasons represent, you might want to steer clear of describing yourself in that way. I’m not sure all four types of seasoned leaders can be considered complimentary.

For example, the description of a “Spring” seasoned leader seems to be contradictory. If leaders are fresh and spouting – or sprouting – new ideas, they can’t be seasoned, can they?

“Summer” seasoned leaders, I would then assume, are in the prime of their lives and careers. They’re sowing in rich, fertile soil in their companies and making hay – or moula – while the sun is shining on their careers.

“Fall” seasoned leaders are clearly not British or they would be “autumn” seasoned leaders, right? But the connotation of that season – fall or autumn – is that things are dying and falling and decaying. It seems to imply that things are ending and winding down as far as the leader’s career is concerned.

Finally, the term “Winter” seasoned leaders would seem to imply that the leaders are used up, dormant, hibernating or dead. That’s not a very appealing description of someone with great experience and honed skills of leadership, is it?

Are you a seasoned leader? What season of seasoned leader are you? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged experience, leadership, seasons

Senior-Level Social Strategy: Building a Virtual ‘Brand You’

Posted by Constance Ward on October 27, 2012 | Comments Off

A solid social media strategy can help a thought leader build a reputation within an industry and among a wider public. You can also gain traction for your ideas and get real-time feedback. And if you are skillful, your virtual presence can reinforce a positive image of an up-to-date “brand you.”

But what channels do you need to use to get your message out beyond the walls of your company? Any and all of them…as long as they are used by your target audiences and are appropriate to the messages you want to convey.

There’s no need to limit yourself by anything but time. A wide range of options exist depending on your purpose.

According to Edison Research’s report “The Social Habit 2012,” Facebook is the dominant social media channel, with 54% of respondents saying they have a profile page on it. LinkedIn came in second at 13%, Twitter third at 10% and Google+ at 8%. The telephone survey of 2,020 people in the U.S. was the 20th in the series, begun in 1998.

Nearly 80% of respondents said that Facebook is the networking service or site they use the most to connect with brands and services, with Twitter in a distant second place with 9%. More than half of Facebook users are accessing sites on their mobile devices, and a quarter of respondents are on the site five or more times per day.

Researchers also found that compared with 2011, increases in social networking were greatest among those 45 and older although over half of social media users are still under 34.

Among other interesting findings, about 10% of respondents are Twitter users; but of those people, about a third check it several times every day. About half of social networkers shared YouTube videos in the previous month.

Clearly, you have choices, but what’s best for you as a thought leader? Do you need guidance and advice as you choreograph those communications choices? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help.

Tagged Edison, Facebook, LinkedIn, research, social channels, social media

Watching your Development as a Thought Leader

Posted by Constance Ward on October 23, 2012 | Comments Off

In my last entry, I introduced you to two popular videos on Vimeo and YouTube that use time-lapse photography to demonstrate how the subjects grew from babies into teens. (Read the full blog entry here.)

If someone put together this type of time-lapse video to reflect your development as a thought leader, what would the result look like? Could viewers “read your face” and perceive the maturation of your leadership skills?

Are you the kind of leader you wanted to grow up to be? When you look at your photos over the years in your role, do they accurately reflect your personality and show your development as the type of leader you want to be?

Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged age, development, maturity, time lapse

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