thealphaswarmer insights: How Kurt Lewin's Model of "Force Field Analysis" Can Be Put Into Context of Network Economies

There is just so much ‘status quo’ with big executives these days (and believe me I have dealt with many in an out-of-work type environment) that they often forget to learn and integrate a new model of ‘thinking’ as they are too ‘attached’ to their archaic modes of wisdom.

One of the key approaches to modern wisdom comes through various interpolations, juxtapositions and paradoxicals which serendipitously carve our ‘conscious’ mode that drives our ‘actions’.

So, with that said; its important to understand that despite the prevalence of a lot of archaic models in contemporary society; not all of them are useful for a meta-understanding of the economic and socioeconomic situations that plague us in everyday life (povety, unemployment and most of all – financial uncertainty)

For starters, let’s take a deep and insightful journey into the models put forward by Kurt Lewin – who was known as “one of the modern pioneers of social, organizational and applied psychology”.

Lewin proposes that the study of sociology can teach us powerful lessons in personal change; which is especially required for big executives in large corporations which still follow a strict chain of command and classic management style organisational design (for they can never be nudged with your new found epiphanies).

In his prognosis, Lewin devises a systematic framework (known as ‘force field analysis’) which prompts us to look at specific forces driving a required change (helping forces) and its diametric opposite (hindering forces). The principals behind this model are very useful (wasn’t it Einstein who said “not all models are good but some are useful”?). In this light, its relevant that Lewin’s ideas get resurrected in the context of Network Economies in order to create positive outcomes by analysing situations.

In these situations; Lewin describes that the field or domain of change (its ‘life space’) is highly contingent on “that individuals internalization of external stimuli”; for e.g. physical and social dimensions that are often ‘regressed’ through inferring a sample space of certain behavioural traits (group conflict, learning, adolescence, hatred and morale). In this context, Lewins “Force Field Analysis” model is also very easily depicted diagrammatically through simple arrows and words that validate the use of this model in various situations.

Many mathematicians and Econometric Statisticians will generally agree that Lewin was definitely a prodigy thinker – for he only shed light on various misconceptions that are often persistent in various social systems.

Lewin applied these principals in many of his works most of his life and although he wasn’t acquainted with the model of ‘experiential learning’ at that time; he did shed light into a model which will definitely be useful for change management in the context of strategic management and change.

Experiential Learning is really the output of Lewin’s model in a modern day context for it is only through this process that one can really ‘manage’ the various ‘organisational/social/interpersonal’ tensions that persist day to day relationship management (especially with people who don’t really embrace you for your potential).

To put this diagrammatically, I thank Ken Thompson; author of the BIOTEAMS blog for creating an excellent graphical manifest that flows in with the ‘natural tempo’ of Bioteaming from the inside-out (below)

So to sum up this short and brief insight article; its relevant to understand that although many models that exist in accounting, finance and economics are rooted in archaic theory; NOT all of them are useful in the ever evolving complex system (or complexity adaptive system) context. To really get insight into which models are useful, there is a dire need to reconcile “old” models of thinking with “emergent” models which focuses its delineation on properties of the system in which one is operating (or its domain in this case).

thealphaswarmer commentaries: Insights Into Teen Mobile Phone Usage

So when I read more and more of Tomi Ahonens book “Mobile As The 7^Th Mass Media” I become more ‘aware’ of the segmentation of target-markets within the Mobile Phone adoption context; which after all – is accommodating the rise of SMS and MMS enabled services through simple applications that aggregate and disseminate ‘information’.

For starters, Tomi Ahonen asserts quite prolificly that “the cell phone is changing society” and that even “nine and ten-year old kids come home from school [and] report to their parents, using their personal cellphones”.

This is quite interesting given the various prophesizes and reasonable enquiries the author has purported on as I also am quite receptive of this adoption trajectory and use SMS most of the time for simple one to one or one to many broadcast of timely and relevant information which is appreciated.

In this context, I took some time out to garner resources on “insights” into the adoption of teenagers within the mobile phone usage spectrum and have found some interesting  ‘front line’ data that mirrors Tomi Ahonen’s delineation of what we now appreciate as the “Connected Age”.

Firstly, lets look at the graph shown below:

 

As you can appreciate (in crystal clear black and white terms); mobile phone usage amongst teenagers has an interesting adoption frontier in light of all the recent changes to the mobile industry (e.g. the proliferation of unique SMS marketing campaigns and the rising acceptance of short messaging services and SMS aggregators working as a whole-in-one solution)

The real message in this picture is that despite the popularity of applications that are tailored to accommodate the delivery of timely information (such as RSS aggregators); Teenagers in the market in question have an interesting ‘infatuation’ with SMS text messaging that they often even go out of their way (during classes for example) to communicate relevant information to their various interest groups or friends.

As 54% of teens text daily and 33% of teens send more than 100 texts a day; mathematicians and econometric statisticians can most likely infer and subsequently interpolate a function on the importance of SMS messaging and how relevant and powerful it can be in this “connected age”.

However, such observations of statistical data should also be applied in the context of the “how” and “what” part of SMS texting is rising in popularity; whether it’s for general one to one communications or one to many broadcasts of epiphanies which are cultivated in a wider spectrum of knowledge and likewise disseminated to reflect the real nature of communications in the current age.

Therefore, in this light, its relevant to observe the graph below which clearly dictates that 63% of cell phones used by this niche market don’t really have any access to the internet at all!

Wow – isn’t that a surprise? So how can we learn and apply the two issues at play here; the first being the inclination to use mobile phones more and more in everyday life and the second being rooted in the fact that the majority of cell-phones used in this market do not have internet connectivity (As most teenagers are not always equipped with a super smart-phone like the iPhone/Microsoft/Android variants that are still relatively expensive than phones from the archaic Nokia suite; which fulfil their purpose regardless of the internet access feature)

To really ‘understand’ this, we need to accept that its rather paradoxical that despite the proliferation of connected services; the archaic SMS medium is still quite heavily relied on as it is a) limited to a domain of character sets and b) universal in delivery through simple SMS gateways or routing through Telco networks.

Therefore, in light of another article which was written last year on “SMS Texting” and its rise in popularity over traditional “voice cellular data” ; it should be clear that the future of targeted SMS mobile marketing campaigns should observe data like that depicted in this post to co-create fruitful word of mouth strategies in alignment with tenets of the “experiential marketing” approach which is also detailed in this article.

Thus, in conclusion, organisations/communities/causes who are interested in utilising SMS marketing need to observe and entertain a ‘behavioural’ and ‘systematic’ framework in order to effectively co-create unique marketing ‘experiences’ which are primarily delivered through SMS text messaging to the market observed in question. This will require an insightful and reasonable framework together with a unified communications strategy that entertains the timely flow and natural tempo of information within SMS dominated “connected communities” to sustain the marketing efforts in the first place (As most SMS marketing techniques these days just bombard people without the appreciation of consumer behaviours and actions which are quite unreliably measured as far as I know it). This ties in with the natural availability and robustness of SMS gateways and aggregators that often operate as “virtual telcos” for the purpose of only delivering SMS through the most efficient and effective way to its target consumer!

thealphaswarmer critiques - exemplary essays in organisational theories - [First Post]

So now that I have been overwhelmed with 'alot' of unique and first time visitors to my blog ( The Department Of Parliamentary Services and Facebook HQ just to mention two); I have been immersed in retrospect - thinking about alot of the work I did at university during my first year in Management and Organisational Studies at the University of New South Wales. My first core subject was tutored by Devorah Wainer (whom I continue my communications with today). 


In light of all this, it is time to launch 'thealphaswarmer critiques' which are collection of essays rooted in Organisational Theories.


The essay below was done entirely by myself in which I referenced two significant organisations I have had indirect and direct experiences with. For starters, we should consider the 'context' of publication which was in Session 1: 2007. 


This essay was in response to a rather simple question which required us students to draw on theories from the textbook. Naturally, as an embryonic alphaswarmer - I took it beyond that and disseminated it with vivid contrasts and references to TWO organisations (MLC and WESTPAC) ; where MLC is the wealth management arm of NAB (www.nab.com.au)


I must extend my deepest level of gratitude to my tutor at the time [ Devorah Wainer phD : www.devorahwainer.com ]


Here it is:
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          In the Australian economic context, the financial services sector positions itself as an ensconced, core and market driven industry exposed to an ever-changing corporate landscape. The industry has progressively evolved over the last few decades and in the current age comprises of eight main sectors, those being accounting, banking, credit management, insurance, mercantile agents, retail financial services, stock brokering and personal trust administration. Incumbent enterprises within the industry such as MLC Investment Management Pty Ltd. and Westpac Banking Group have radically changed their strategic agendas and re-aligned their organisations altogether in response to challenges rising from the environmental, financial, market, technological, regulatory and  the political realms.  Most significantly, these tectonic shifts in emergent forces over the past decade have prompted management of these organisations to innovate the strategic planning process with an increased emphasis to influence the external environments in which it operates. In order to embed this into the organizational DNA - the “organization’s collective skills, abilities and behaviors”. (Govindarajan & Trimble 2005, p. 10), both organisations progressively adopted the balanced score card approach as a tool to control performance management and align the directives for the strategic planning process and organisational change.

          In general, every enterprise improvement initiative needs to address three interlocking circles: People, Technology and Process. In addition, they need to cope with an “environment characterized by rapid and non linear change” (Prahalad and Oosterveld 1999, p. 32). On these grounds, influences from the external and internal environment tend to address one or more of these areas.  In this respect, the financial services industry from a high level perspective has undergone significant paradigm shifts in the regulatory realm, of which the changes were influenced from ongoing political, market and financial distresses facing the industry in general. Such include financial services industry de-regulation, “large-scale industry consolidation, the proliferation of alternative delivery channels”[1], labor market de-regulation, proliferation of internet technologies and enterprise 2.0   [2], off shoring and outsourcing market trends in the industry, increased business competition and the need to ultimately deliver dynamic, value-laden services to the consumer whilst focusing on innovation-driven growth. Strategic and operational management responses to these challenges in both enterprises have concerned the use of process and product re-engineering initiatives using a range of change methodologies inspired from the classical management roots, the use of strategic innovations to leverage, develop and  re-define emerging markets, reevaluation of the meaning of corporate governance and the focus on business technology optimization.

          Firstly, one of the most substantial environmental challenges that faced every company in the industry came with the de-regulation of the financial system and the subsequent introduction of the Financial Services Reform Act in 2001 (ASFRA). Financial deregulation comprises of two important areas, one addressing the macroeconomic dimension through floating the exchange rate and implementing the tender system for selling debt to the public so that budget deficits were financed at market rates. The other part of the deregulation agenda was directed at financial intermediaries, mainly banks, with a view to increasing competition. Both MLC and Westpac had ensured their management was competent in developing supporting business processes and departments and boundary scanners to identify and devise operational strategies to deal with the new regulation. The contingency management can best explain what management should do to cater for these changes and the operational changes made at MLC and Westpac in response to this challenge complies with this. For instance, both organisations instituted the decentralization of their operations though modifying organisational designs by creating and integrating separate compliance business units in a unique hybrid matrix form. This also resonates with the behavioral model as there is initiative to use a wide array of communication, control and interaction processes to ensure compliance to the new laws(Kaplan, 2005). The Financial Services Reform Act that was enacted in 2001 also pushed for a strategic agenda to ensure transparency across compliance and  risk operations in the two organisations and for this very reason, MLC enforced a vertical information system through their ‘group compliance and risk’ business units in that they mandated a major information system project which aimed to integrate Lotus Notes as a knowledge management platform, through their shared collaboration workspaces and project portals which updated senior level managers on progress across compliance projects (Wayne Marsh 2006, pers. comm., November 10.). One of the most practical uses of this new project was to ensure cross-functional compliance across every business unit against the universal guidelines set out by the newly elected and instituted bodies (APRA and ASIC).  For example, new regulations under AFSRA included increased licensing requirements for what was defined as ‘financial product advisers’. The use of a behavioral approach at MLC(Kavanagh, 2002),  and the facilitation of projects by the hybrid-matrix design ensured management of adequate support in developing new business processes and addressing any business case for forming ad-hoc project teams.  At Westpac, the management response was similar as the new regulatory framework was universal and ASIC policies stipulated that any financial institution housing financial product advisors were to comply with the universal guidelines set out in ASIC Policy Statement 146 – for example, the necessary minimum attainment of the Diploma of Financial Planning to give financial product advice. This particular regulation had huge implications for the financial planning industry as both organisations had to ensure staffing policies and training structures to comply with these minimum requirements. Westpac now “operates as a Registered Training Organisation that gives employees opportunities for internal training and to gain recognition on the Australian Qualifications Training framework.” (Westpac Banking Incorporation, 2007)  Hence, it is evident that both companies shared similar strategic and operational objectives in relation to the new regulations put forwards by the government.  With regards to the outlook for the future, recent turbulent activity around the world in financial services (which channels through to financial market activity) has sparked political debate on the issues surrounding the regulatory framework for the industry. Recently, both state and federal officials involved in the Ministerial Council on Consumer affairs are devising a new national framework to regulate ‘finance brokers’ (as many institutions believe that they should be classified as financial product advisers). This will undoubtedly impact on the process dimension of organisations in the industry and give management serious strategic issues to consider. As a pre-emptive strategy, through the use of an integrated change methodology known as Six Sigma, MLC managed to tap into customer and front-line employee intelligence to engineer a unique new service  known as the ‘Mortgage Brokers Alliances’ offer (MLC Press Release, 2006) . This operates just like their financial planning network and middle office functions as it endeavors to stipulate minimum mortgage broker licensing requirements (extending on ASIC PS 146) and education to sell related products for any firm under their dealer group. This can be seen as a classic example of utilizing Tayloristic and Fayol principals of scientific inquiry into the nature of work to devise a ‘supply and value chain’ process for product development. Furthermore, the Value Chain Evolution theory, outlined by Christensen, Anthony and Roth (2004, p. 281) can best explain management response to these types of challenges. They state that as ‘companies overshoot their customers’ needs; they no longer need the benefits that integration brings. Instead, they increasingly compete based on speed, flexibility or convenience”. This also brings the focus to standardize interfaces between various parts of the product or service and these standards eventually morph into industry-wide standards and allow product architecture to become modular. MLC effectively specified, verified and predicted the interfaces required for their new service offerings – which has had an impact in the public eye as the organisation highly integrated in the industry (Matt Lawler, pers. comm 2006 August).  Nevertheless, regulatory changes will always be positioned in the non-linear change space and it is in the best interest for both organisations to consider integrating elements of theory-focused planning and emergent strategy to sense, mobilize and engage with upcoming challenges.  

          With this in mind, the idea of emergent strategy, according to Christensen, Anthony and Roth (2004, p.293) deals with a ‘‘bottom-up strategy that evolves and adapts based on signals that emerge from the marketplace’’. It directly resonates with the precepts of the ‘adapting organisation’ and also echoes ideas of a ‘virtual’ organisational design. It also bases itself deep in the behavioral school of thought. This is the dominating organisational code and paradigm at MLC and is extremely effective for driving innovation and is also more ‘organic’ in nature to deal and adapt to environmental change. A core challenge which required this approach was the dramatic trend towards delivering better customer service across the industry as incumbents were reaching a saturation point in their organisation’s life cycle and required to become differentiated in nature (Nunes and Cespdes, 2003). For example, in the financial planning sub-industry, there were huge structural shifts towards providing support and administrative services to financial advisors as the industry itself had a high turnover rate and retention rate’s of financial planners at organisation’s were very low. Various industry players were converging and collaborating towards a shared strategic view and forming diverse business networks or alliances to discover niches to target with disruptive innovations – or to stimulate consumption in a new context altogether. Further, the proliferation of alternate delivery channels meant that the two organisations in question had to seriously re-consider their customer value proposition with a strong view towards product innovation and techno-structural change to position the organisations on the same technology adoption trajectory as competitors in the industry(Kirby, 2001). Management response to this at MLC was to create a whole new business unit altogether, with Chris Tucker, CEO of MLC Australian Group announcing that the task be executed by the Group Managing Director of Financial Planning and Third Party.

This new business unit was called 360 Service Delivery and it was meant to be a back and middle office supporting business for Financial Planning and Third Party in general. It aggregated across two key divisions which included ‘revenue services’ such as business consulting, research solutions, technical solutions, training and education and trustee services and ‘business enablers’ such  as Business Services business unit and Business Review – which symbiotically handled all adviser end-to-end client data and management functions such as back office administration, case management and licensee management. Due to the increase in outsourcing and off shoring trends for such services(Kumar, 2006), MLC decided to defend its customer value proposition and from a strict performance management point of view, enable new revenue streams as a buffer to the low retention rates of financial planners (since the idea was to ensure that planners kept their subscription for 360 Service Delivery administration services even if they decided to leave the planning firms under the dealer groups). It can be argued that they integrated various business and corporate level strategies to limit the extent of other organisaion’s strategic imitation, such as the Miles and Snow typology of the ‘reactor strategy’ which means that the organisation has no consistent approach to strategy. This makes it unpredictable in the competitor’s eye as it can use a multitude of strategies and hone on it strengths whilst capitalizing on opportunities. However, in hindsight, it can be said that the creation of 360 service delivery resonates perfectly with the ‘Analyser strategy’ and Porter’s ‘differentiation strategy’. However, over the last two years, there has been a strategic directive to advocate the ‘defender strategy’ for established businesses.  This is evident through the National Australia Bank Group change mandate for a structured Six Sigma change management integration throughout all businesses it owns (which includes MLC Investment Management Pty Ltd). Every business in the group ecosystem was to implement Six Sigma projects and management’s changes to dates allowed the organisation to embrace the change mandate with ease. For example, with specific reference to 360 Service Delivery and the Financial Planning and Third Party businesses, a matrix project team was set-up to scope, communicate, disrupt and enable the transition towards re-engineering entire Business Services administrative processes (as a means to significantly cut costs and scale their delivery channels). Additionally, the Six Sigma approach was used to engineer the ‘Mortgage Broker Alliances’ offer as discussed previously due to its ability to tap into customer intelligence and use hardcore statistical modeling to define optimal efficiency points and metrics (Six Sigma, 2007). By doing so, MLC justified its investment in the 360 Service Delivery businesses due to its unique approach in quality management and adoption of a prospector perspective on strategy. They have also aligned their operational vision for the future in this domain of challenges through their iterative succession planning business division which gives strategic advice to all business units individually on strategy going forward.

In regards to Westpac, domain sources confirm that their response to changing customer needs and the increase in outsourcing trends and industry consolidation has been to manage strategic mergers and acquisitions (horizontal and vertical) of key boutique firms or leveraging its asset management businesses such as BT Finance Group. Again, this can be seen as an analyzer strategy fused with a differentiation and defender strategy. Since Westpac does not house an extensive financial planning network like MLC, they didn’t really engage in any strategic innovation to introduce a new business unit on its total offering. The major difference in organisational attitude between the two companies is their corporate governance discourse. MLC on one hand strictly enforces notions of transparency and acknowledging customer intelligence whilst Westpac enforces not only these principals but environmental sustainability as well by sponsoring programs such as ‘Green World’. Westpac has also created an advertising campaign regarding sustainability, Ms. Nixon from Westpac claims that “Never before has the importance of sustainability resonated so strongly with our stakeholders. The 'Your Future is Our Future' campaign clearly demonstrates Westpac's unequivocal commitment to securing a brighter future for all of us.”  Hence, through this campaign t the bank's commitment has been highlighted to its customers, employees, the community and the environment.  (Westpac Banking Corporation, 2007

          Altogether, both organisations respond dynamically to market, financial and customer challenges through diversified portfolio management techniques and will need to continue to do so in an emerging knowledge economy.

It is evident that both organisations have positioned themselves uniquely in the industry. This, however, does not exclude them from the fast pace of information technology. With the trends in outsourcing and e-commerce compounding at an incredible pace, both organisations needed to ensure they sought strategic agendas to accurately and relevantly scope, develop and integrate IT infrastructure in a timely manner. Since IT requires a multi-disciplinary approach and intense technological forecasting against strategic visions, it is crucial that management devise effective screening processes for end-user needs. An empirical example of how MLC established an effective information system  is evident through their integration of Web 2.0 tools such as blogs, wikis and application widgets internally and the use of social software such as Facebook as a knowledge management tool. In the emerging Web and Enterprise 2.0 space, it will be increasingly important for organisations at all levels and industries to cope with the unprecedented change in internet technologies. The integration of these tools at MLC allows it to tap into knowledge across organisational silos and ensure that they are positioned well to capitalize on emerging open business models. At Westpac, the Chief Information Officer also advocated the integration of Web 2.0 tools and widgets and has integrated similar technologies to that of MLC. This sets the agenda for a new era in Enterprise 2.0 and a radical re-defining of the concept of ‘strategic alliances’. Through the research, it is appropriate to agree with Marco Isanti of INSEAD in his extrapolation that “future business competition will not be between companies but between supply chains and business Networks”. With that said, it is without doubt that future business and networking models will emerge and industry consolidation will take a whole new era.

In conclusion, it is evident that industry incumbents MLC Investment Management Pty and Westpac Banking Group have faced significant challenges in the last decade. By comparing and contrasting the challenges facing management of these organisations, it can be said that the industry is highly standardized in nature yet individual organisational responses to these issues have varied. Further, the range of management theories evaluated implies that both organisations are effective at dealing with emergent forces. In this respect, it is obvious that their responses to these challenges can be maintained for the future along a sustainable trajectory.

Bibliography

C.K. Prahalad and Jan O. Oosterveld, 1999, Transforming International Governance: The Challenge for Multinationals, Spring edn., Sloan Management Review, Massachusetts.

Chris Tucker, CEO MLC Australia Group, pers.. comm. 2003

Christensen C M, Anthony S D and Roth E. A, 2004, Seeing Whats Next: Using The Theories Of Innovation To Predict Industry Change, Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation, Boston, Massachusetts.

Davidson, P and Griffin R, 2006, Management: An Australian Perspective 3^rd edition, John Wiley & Sons Australia Ltd, Milton Queensland.

Dyer, J. H., Kale, P. and Singh, H. (2004), “When to Ally and When to Acquire”, Harvard Business Review, July

Financial Servides at BoozAllenHamilton, accessed 20^th September 2007 http://www.boozallen.com.au/booz_allen_ANZSEA/capabilities/13495364/financial_services

Gottfredson, M., Puryear, R. and Phillips, S. (2005), “Strategic Sourcing: From Periphery to the Core”, Harvard Business Review, February

Govindarajan V and Trimble C, 2005, 10 Rules for Strategic Innovators: From Idea to Execution, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, Massachusetts.

iSixSigma Magazine, accessed 22^nd September 2007 http://www.isixsigma.com/sixsigma/six_sigma.asp

Kaplan, R. S. and Norton, D. P. (2005), “The Balanced Scorecard: Measures That Drive Performance”, Harvard Business Review, July

Kavanagh, J. (2002), “MLC’s master plan”, Business Review Weekly, 22^nd August, p. 62

Khanna, T. And Palepu, K. G. (2006), “Emerging Giants: Building World-Class Companies in Developing Countries”, Harvard Business Review, October

Kirby, J. (2001), “Intranet boosts sales of financial services”, Business Review Weekly, 12 January, p. 77

Kotter, J. P. (2007), “Leading Change: Why Transformation Efforts Fail”, Harvard Business Review, January

Kumar, N. (2006), “Strategies to Fight Low-Cost Rivals”, Harvard Business Review, December

Laurie, D. L., Doz, Y. L. and Sheer, C. P. (2006), “Creating New Growth Platforms”, Harvard Business Review, May

Lee, H. (2004), “The Triple-A Supply Chain”, Harvard Business Review, October

Nunes, P. F. and Cespedes, F. V. (2003), “The Customer Has Escaped”, Harvard Business Review, Novemeber

Rust, R. T., Zeithaml, V. A. and Lemon, K. N. (2004), “Customer-Centred Brand Management”, Harvard Business Review, September

Thomas, D. A. (2004), “Diversity as Strategy”, Harvard Business Review, September

Three Sixty Adviser Services, accessed 15^th September 2007 http://www.threesixty.com.au

Tushman, M. L. and O’Reilly III, C. A. (2004), “The Ambidextrous Organisation”, Harvard Business Review, April

Westpac Banking Corporation (2007) Westpac banking Corporation , Sydney Australia, Accessed 20^th September 2007 http://www.westpac.com.au/internet/publish.nsf/Content/WICREMPP+Training+learning+and+development

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[1] Financial Services at BoozAllenHamilton, accessed 20^th September 2007

[2] Enterprise 2.0 is the use of emergent social software platforms within companies, or between companies and their partners or customers. It dwells on the idea of collaboration and creating architectures of participation and harnessing collective and distributed intelligence. 

International Terrorism and Intellectual Property - Network Economy Series - Article 1

There is just so much debate happening at the moment on how to a) justify both Apple and Google’s Android smartphones from tracing and saving user-location data and b) the upheaval in the Federal Courts over patents and licensing technologies which should all be collectively drawn from the same intellectual property pool with a focus on cross-pollination of business models to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes.

Long gone are the days where companies can hide their secrets within the Research and Development departments and only broadcast ambiguous comments about their upcoming technologies. Don Tapscott, in The Naked Corporation, prophesizes an era where consumers, staff, stakeholders and even directors of organisations are no longer holding onto their secrets with an iron fist; but are in fact denouncing the secrets and exposing the very own perpetrators who yearn for economic power through totalitarian type control of intra-company fostered collaborations and subsequent protection of the so called ‘intellectual property’ embodied within their balance sheets as ‘assets’.

To really address these issues, one needs to open their eyes and be submissive into the nature of ‘reasonable enquiry’. Reasonable Enquiry is something that fascinated me whilst I did a short term assignment at National Australia Bank (nab); and whilst it is certainly relevant in the assessment of needs and wants and the consequent reconciliation of ‘suitable financial products’; reasonable enquiry also has its origins rooted deep in cybernetic and economic philosophies.

For starters, let’s address topic A above (Apple and Android location tracking) through the insightful mechanics of reasonable enquiry.

My understanding so far, rooted in a meta-contextual appreciation of ‘collective intelligence’ and its application in contemporary society. What is wrong with collectively garnering information which is disclaimed in terms of agreements where it says specifically it is going to be used to deliver a plethora of unique technologies in the future underpinned by location tracking?

In this light, its relevant that we raise issues which may get your attention – such as terrorism and the future of terrorist networks who are self-organizing in the name of religion for fanatical reasons which are beyond any reasonable enquiry!

Thomas C. Schelling, in a report entitled Countering the Changing Threat of International Terrorism – which was written by the National Commission on Terrorism claims that “terrorism succeeds because of the element of surprise and, unfortunately, surprise is a factor that we cannot always control”. True to this universal truth is also an eclipsing viewpoint that summons the need for “contingencies that occur to no one, but also those that everyone assumes somebody else is taking care of”. Rather serendipitously, this report also ignites its focus on International Terrorism integrating a “neglect of responsibility but also responsibility so poorly defined or so ambiguously delegated that action gets lost”.

In this context, an article dating back to the Weekend edition (June 21-22; 2008) in the Sydney Morning Herald entitled “Crash and Burn”, begs for the urgency of introducing “one national framework to manage and co-ordinate any significant disaster, by amalgamating our national counter-terrorism and emergency management arrangements into one structure”.

Wow – now doesn’t this shed more light on the justification of powerful companies that operate in oligopolistic markets - such as Microsoft, Google and Apple – to track user location and make them anonymous for the purpose of a) improving triangulation (which in fact improves pin pointing any anonymous user to ‘triangulated’ location and b) studying the schematics of these networks/pathways of location information through a diagrammatic framework that entertains the differentiation of terrorist networks or consumer networks.

So, now that I have your attention – lets move onto something even more relevant. Dr Anthony Bergin, who is director of research programs at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in the very article mentioned before asserted the need for a “fundamental shift in moving from a need-to-know resilience culture if we are to fully understand our state of preparedness, and to be better prepared [for things like terrorism and anything branching of to national disasters and critical emergencies]”

Political leaders and their strategists can only observe models of behaviour for statistical inference of extrapolation into what-if contingencies and what might happen in the future.

Now you tell me, did these models help anyone with the Global Financial Crisis? As far as I remember, only philosophy can explain the herding and crowding out effect on equity markets worldwide – especially during “dark October/November” (or whatever it was)!

thealphaswarmer project and its trusted affiliations will generally agree that a universal intellectual property framework is required to disseminate asymmetries and foster a creative future based on federations of trust. In fact, I am currently exploring in detail a book published by the Harvard Business School entitled “ Open Business Models: How To Thrive In The New Innovation Landscape” and within its nomenclature; it makes vivid references to Clayton’s Christensen’s “Value Chain Evolution” theory of industry change and the subsequent merging of ‘networks of power’.

In aggregation, what is required (yes through MY reasonable enquiry) – is the creation of a complex technology alignment architecture when two parties have conflicting patent claims. With reference to page 84 of the HBS book in question; Figure 4-2 is in stark contrast to Figure 4-4 which details “A Patent Map Of The Value Chain” where companies may benefit through collaborating in a mutual zone of capability.

Personally, what will be required for the appreciation of radical business models and the subsequent submission into an open innovation landscape will be how business leaders and futurists shape their a) Intellectual Property and b) Value Chain strategies to integrate this new mode of thinking. Yes, it will be a difficult and tedious task but within the metacontext of “collective intelligence” in Network Economies – companies will be required to cross pollinate their patents and induce multi-product innovations to feed of the same IP pool. In simple terms, a licensing or voucher intervention system would assist organisations willing to embrace this model (shown above)

An Icebreaker - Read Between The Lines - thealphaswarmer project creatives

As the rain fell sporadically outside I signed into yet another day of monotonous work: encrypting, decrypting and modifying software codes for The Company. It was 8.45am, though the darkness of the sky and the musty smell in the air reminded me of how the earth seems to sigh in the early hours of the morning, just before it is awoken again by the sun creeping creeps over the horizon.  

I was feeling exhausted and depleted, like an empty reservoir standing only for the purpose of collecting water from a drip in the roof. There is much to do, but I cannot find the incentive or energy to do it.  Not even the fear of Manager Dell using my lack of application as an excuse to terminate my employment could motivate me today.  I have been told that my “optimum performance” is absolutely necessary if there is to be a successful channeling of software codes for the US’s new defense intelligence system, Maximus.

Deciding I needed to defrag my mind, I embraced the current solitude and entered a command.  Reading the next maintenance code, I was a bit taken aback when a window popped up on screen, informing me of an email sent from Mac, a colleague who was my complementary software engineer. I clicked on the link and found a spread of matrix codes that were encrypted in the language only used by the higher ranks in The Company. At the top of the email Mac had said, “Binary codes are acceptable, but not necessary.  Do you agree?.” Following was the binary codes for installing a new piece of hardware:  something that we did regularly and something that was above suspicion.   A feeling of uneasiness spread through me. I had never experienced such a thing before. Two questions circled in the air: what was Mac doing with top level codes and should I really decode them? Breach of security was a serious crime in The Company, and immediate termination of employees who use the internal email system for non-work purposes occurred.  My senses gnawed at me.  What was Mac up to?

I paused and then began decrypting the code using The Company’s top-secret encryption software, Labyrinth. It seemed like no more than one minute before the message embedded within the codes started to surface. What I read almost made me freeze and my perception of my employer flipped. Maximus had been intercepted and turned on itself. What was supposed to be our defense had now become a weapon more powerful and destructive than all the old atomic bombs. Someone, I don’t know who, had reversed the firewall function of Maximus and diverted it outside The Company. Now it had adopted a “seek, conquer and destroy” method that threatened to destabalise the autonomy of all other systems and bring them and the countries they protect under its command.

Naively believing my sense of horror could not get worse, I continued to scan the email.   At the bottom of the screen was a signature and from this I found that the Gatekeepers were behind it.  In second position in The Company hierarchy, they had the power to authorise the input of Maximus’ launching sequence and monitor all outside activity. The boss, Manager Dell, did not have control over them for they only answered to the Board, who were the ultimate bosses of The Company.

All I could do was ask why? Why would the Gatekeepers be behind this? Was there a mutiny going on? Or perhaps…no…it couldn’t be. I shuddered to think but then decided it must be true. The threat was coming from above. The Gatekeepers cannot act alone despite all their authority. If this were a mutiny it would have been interrupted and prevented by now. No, the Board knew what was occurring. Not only did it know, it was the one that was behind what was happening. 

At that moment another window popped up on screen. It was from Mac.

“How do you like them apples?” he said.

“I can’t believe it.” I replied. “But should we really be discussing this online? We don’t know who could be monitoring.”

“Never fear my friend,” Mac said, always confident, “I have scripted our conversation for our eyes only. It just looks like normal data entry to anyone else.”

Mac was always on top of things even though he was the most rebellious individual I had ever worked with. This was why The Company tolerated him. He was the only one who had the ability to formulate phantom worm viruses that couldnot be detected or destroyed by other systems until their missions were complete. Then they self-destruct so they can never be traced.

“I have managed to create new phantom worm viruses, they have the ability to hack into Maximus and create temporary diversions therefore allowing us to execute our disarming strategy” Mac said with obvious conceit. His ostentatious nature was always an attribute we viewed with high regard. “Once inside the control panel, we can manually disarm the launching sequence hence eliminating the imminence of its execution”.

“But how will we be able to stop everyone else forming alliances with Maximus?” I added, hoping to receive a comforting response.

“Well we cannot do much to stop the alliances, the software framework based on Maximus is too strong” Mac replied. His response plunged me into a state of defeat, I thought that there could be nothing in the world we could do, and an apocalypse had began.

Going through my files, I remembered that I once had a preliminary blueprint of the algorithm sequences for the software that governed Maximus. The Gatekeepers had given them to me as a ‘back-up’ in case the pilot software failed so that we could create another one without losing much of the logic that went through its creation. Remaining focused and persistent I searched doggedly for the file, I encrypted the Company’s archive, which my computer had priority over, and finally came across a corrupted collection of blueprint documents that were used in the initial stages of the Company’s creation.

Even though it was sort of prohibited to access things from the “old days”, the gnawing feeling would not go away. To my most pleasant surprise, I was able to open a crucial part of the blueprint document. Analyzing it, I found a way to defeat Maximus!

Following the immediate realization, I contacted Mac on the instant messaging service. By this time, the Company was informed of our rebellious plan and had set out  to come and destroy us. “Mac, Maximus is not able to extend beyond national boundaries without the assistance of satellites which need confirmation from other defence agencies in other countries” I said quickly, hoping to inform Mac of everything before our power sources were cut down. “Quick Mac! The perpetrators of this unethical act will lie to the senior delegates of other nations by saying they need their input codes for defence purposes. Send your log which contains all of the Company’s dark lies so we can get help, before it’s too late.”

Mac replied “Yes I will immediately.”

I was in suspense; the fate of the Earth depended on Mac’s transmission. The storm outside grew stronger! Lightning and rain pounded the earth as it had never before, the sounds of thunder pervaded the lines, and chaos was impending.

Whilst closing all the windows, Mac replied “I have successfully alerted the delegates of Australia, New Zealand, Europe.  The message has been sent as I received a posting confirmation. Adam, take care, the …. Are coming… oh no.. Mac… I a.”

The screen was dead, and so was Mac.  I could sense the virus coming down line to me…milliseconds only left.   Corrupting, my memory banks asked, “Is this what happened to humans, or was it only we machines who were so brutal?” 

Freedom Of Speech In Network Economies - A Subjective Perspective

As more and more consumers, employees, managing directors and big government politicians embrace blogs, wikis and public pages on social utilities like Facebook; there will always be a task force or activist group of people who have no faith in the emergence of transparency and have only intentions to restrict OR limit the nature of free speech in a Network based Economy.

An article on the Sydney Morning Herald today caught my most divine attention this morning and raised some quite peculiar issues which I believe thealphaswarmer project can address.

For starters, the Washington lobbyist from Facebook is immersed in a conception that they are allowing "too much, maybe, free speech" and that despite the compliance hurdles Facebook is trying to entertain in alignment with China's privacy law; personally I believe everyone should just take a breather and a chill-pilll and consider my proposition.

We (thealphaswarmer project and its members/fans and its professional affiliations) generally agree that there definitely is some "tensions" around the regulation of media (specifically Social Media) with the impetus being on the protection of free speech and another competing interest. In the federal courts here, we do not have an overriding protection of free speech like the United States First Amendment and therefore when governments are making the laws and the courts subsequently applying and administering them; all parties are required to balance different interests against each other.

The most common form of free-speech transgression on the internet falls under what mainstream society would attribute as "Defamation". Kimberly Heitman, on this very issue, wrote a paper entitled 'Free Speech Online: Still Shooting the Messenger' UNSW Law Journal Vol. 11, No 2, Dec 2005 (p62-64).

In this paper, Heitman identifies an apparent micro-trend eclipsing into a mainstream system of where "plantiff lawyers are advising their clients not to engage with the content provider, but, instead to threaten defamation proceedings against the Internet Service Provider".

Wow - this surely does bring into perspective the liability of internet content hosts and internet providers under State and Territory laws. More specifically, this is rather paradoxical to the outcome of the case between the Media Companies and Australias No 2. ISP (iiNet) - based in Western Australia.

In this case, what I remember (quoting Heitman) is that The Broadcast Services Amendment (Online Services) Act 1999 purports to exempt ISPs from any State and Territory laws - including defamation - which require monitoring of users' content or impose liability for content made available by the ISP's customers without the ISP's knowledge". 

This makes total sense! No wonder iiNet won the legal battle and they are not liable for the behaviours of their users. To me, personally, monitoring internet activity of your customers is like a totalitarian government in a 'The Minority Report' type of system - where they need measures as a pre-cursor to identification of breaches of various laws, which is not only limited to defamation but also extends to piracy and the proliferation and uptake of the "Torrent Culture".

Now I am no law professional and having only done one law subject at University (UNSW - Law In The Information Age); All I can perhaps suggest subjectively is that everyone concerned i.e interest groups and Facebook start looking into open-licensing deed systems for a) cases of privacy and b) try to shape an international framework that underpins the Creative Commons Deed Licensing System as a benchmark to define the evolution of the precedents relevant to freedom of speech and anything of that sort.


The main problem that will arise is that politicians, through cultural variance, will require a 'behavioural framework' that entertains the dissemination of laws to reflect the concerns of free speech in Network Economies.

*Article 1* Social Media In Enterprise 2.0 : The Network Economy Series

These days there has been an enormous amount of content and information flowing through the web about Enterprise 2.0 and how to specifically deploy social media tools within the enterprise that don’t

a) go stale with abandoned use 

and 

b) don’t expose people’s collaborative tendencies or lack thereof’.

Social Media relates to mainly web based tools, applications or utilities that generate and encourage conversation and activities that create degrees of participation and solidarity. Facebook, a social networking utility which falls under the overriding branch of social media, is an exemplary example of what encapsulates the essential features of the Web 2.0

However, despite the utilisation of a cocktail of web and mobile technologies; organisations are still finding it very hard to create that type of idealistic environment with social media (e.g wikis); and things are not turning out the way higher level management thought it would when they championed the implementation of social media in their businesses in the first place.

A recent article in the Sydney Morning Herald entitled “Not every blog has its day – Lia Timson has some interesting points. As a point of reference, it should be noted that the innovation manager of Deloitte Australia – Simon Townsend – has a strong belief in how the general wisdom of the crowds shape their own direction. Within these contexts, the crowds will have tribes or castes of people who prefer one tool over another; as he puts it “the failing of wikis is that they are not completely intuitive. Not everyone likes that way of working”.

The article delineates the urgency of comprehending and acknowledging the “human being part of the equation”. This view is concurrent amongst others such as Microsoft’s Chief Technology Officer whose primarily role is to drive “practice [in collaborative web based tools ], not just interest”.

In all totality, Deloitte’s Townsend’s says that something will be more like twitter and less like Wikipedia; and it will have to be intuitive and be underpinned by a robust databank with advanced search and tagging functions. At Deloittes, half of the company’s 4500 staff use the micro blogging software Yammer – which is very similar to Twitter except that organisations can purchase a “claim” to their network and gain administrative control of their employee’s ecosystem.

As with most social media software, it all starts out with a simple executed function such as a request for business question (in Deloitte’s case). What then develops is a concurrent culmination of knowledge and expertise which creates a repository of information from all tiers of individual expertise.

So in this light, one can appreciate there has to be some kind of high level social media maturity model. Lets classify them in stages shall we:

Stage 1: Pioneering – Where the three perspectives [Employee;Organizational;Technological] are aligned against a bottom up; 

open source chartered technology and platform 

architecture; together with a high social media focus 

aligned against a solid vision with the right leadership and 

governance.

Stage 2: Facilitating – Again, all perspectives are taken into account with more emphasis on the social/employee perspective to encourage community and a centralized approach to team building. Enterprise tools at this stage could start to be embedded within the social media tools scoped out in the pioneering stage.

Stage 3: Strategic Operations – In Stage 3; On demand and user centric technology platforms are rolled out initially and aligned against the overall organizational perspective and ergonomics. Although the tendency during this stage is to induce a freeze through Lewin’s force field analysis and induce a pull type of behaviour in employees which induces a higher propensity for participation and technology adoption.

We can surely appreciate the complexity which arises when digging into the blueprints and tasks schedules for teams involved in any facilitation or creation of technology platforms. In fact, the hardest part would be to align the existing capabilities of staff with cross and up-skilling. Different organisations have various approaches for coaching and people development, but in today’s Network Economy; what is required is something that aligns capabilities of teams with the necessary etiquette and know-how on using the plethora of free web based technologies out there. 

In addition, to maintain congruency and a degree of control or moderation over employee behaviour and discourse (think Deloitte with Yammer); companies need to actually create a standardised behavioural system on team members defining how they are to achieve sustainability in agility, integrity and still manage all the changes to systems and processes and not to mention re-deployments during times of significant organisational change.

At the moment, I strongly believe the only way to achieve team-oriented outcomes is to create a clear and public accountability mechanism that ensures total transparency and optimistic outcomes. In my experience and affiliations with one of my root sources of inspiration, Bioteaming and the founder of this school of thought – Ken Thompson – I have learnt that the future of work in a network economy will be based on self-organising teams which are highly proficient on internet and cloud based applications.

Bioteaming as a business practice will emerge as the 

new Team 2.0 in the greater World 2.0 spectrum. As 

Ken Thompson puts it

“As enterprises gradually decentralize their operations 

and new networked business ecosystems start to find 

their way into profitable niche marketplaces, virtual, 

networked business teams gradually emerge as the 

wave of the future.

To be successful, virtual, networked business teams 

need a strategic framework in which to operate. They 

also need good planning and in-depth project analysis, 

effective and accessible technologies, constant 

coaching, systematic fine-tuning, feedback processes 

and the full understanding that their success cannot 

be determined by a pre-designated set of 

communication technologies by itself”

So this basically sums it up and defines the need for virtual teams to flourish with new working practices based on simple principals of mutual trust. 

If you are therefore looking for a reference to where to start on how to engineer your Team 2.0 – visit Ken Thompson’s shared knowhow blog www.bioteams.com and specifically this article http://www.bioteams.com/2005/04/06/bioteaming_a_manifesto.html and take interest in the link to the Change This dot com article.

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Ken Thompson is an expert practitioner in the overall sphere of social media and sales optimization together with delivering keynote conference speeches and in house consultancy workshops. His direct speciality lies in utilising real time simulations, creating high performing teams, incubating business networks, social media and sales optimization and a plethora of team building workshops rooted in biological theory. He has been the prime source of inspiration for my blog: thealphaswarmer. 10/03/2011

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