I have been invited to join “My Half Time Pep Talk for 2009,” a collection of posts about innovation as part of the Board of Innovation’s 24 Hours of Innovation event, May 15-16, 2009.
I have been asked to contribute a blog post about anything innovation-related from the state of innovation so far in 2009 to cool new products, projects or services to global innovation. My interest is in the people side of innovation, and the future of work.
Please send me your thoughts on innovation as it relates to leadership and management (self and others in the workplace) by May 14, 2009
What are your favorite digital tools and how do you use them to tell stories? What trends do you see in leadership and management? What does the evolution of the workplace look like ? If I include your comments in my post I will give you proper attribution.
Share your thoughts and predictions and check out what others are saying about innovation around the world by following and joining 24 Hours of Innovation May 15-16.
Thanks!
UPDATE: Read my post here
At last there is a growing recognition that management and leadership are not the same thing, and the dawning realization that how we educate leaders needs to be fundamentally different from how we educate managers. Leadership is about the future, it’s about aspirations and supporting every person through the realization of their full potential. We can’t give people the tools they need to take on leadership roles through traditional, case-based, retrospective educational methods. Leaders create futures for their companies and their communities, so we need to equip aspirant leaders with the future-forming tools of creativity and visioning.
Hi Linda:
I welcome your questions about favorite digital tools and the what the evolution of the workplace looks like. I think your two questions are inextricably linked. As a marketing director and business manager, I am seeing a clash between the traditional business environment and new communication tools. Whether or not we are willing to address it, the new communication tools are rendering the conventional workplace useless. Young people don’t get it, and I can understand their dissention. They are wired into life, embracing everything the digital revolution has to offer. Did I say embracing? They demand all the best the digital world (and workplace for that matter) has to offer. Their mantra is “Make it better, easier and faster if you want to hold our attention.” Telephones are background noise. Email is text messaging’s slower cousin. The written word is being challenged. Writing papers is punishment barely endured in school. They are learning, shopping and socializing and playing online. These kids have grown up with a vast amount of visual electronic stimuli, which makes the tools of the traditional workplace something to put in the museum next to the caveman display. In many ways this is good news for creativity. The “new kids on the block” are thinking and communicating on impulse–leaving less time for their brains to repress their intuition. While this is exciting, it is causing havoc in the office. Business doesn’t know how to deal with the creativity of its youthful constituents (big surprise). Their split-second mode of communication seems abrupt, rude and disruptive. Forget about chain of command–there’s no such thing online. It seems no wonder to me why the walls of business are breaking down–this is an epic evolution–one that will change the workplace as we know it. It’s a beautiful think when you watch it from afar. It can be hell when you live in the midst of it.
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Thanks for your replies Geoff and Linda. I posted my pep talk and included a link to your comments. Enjoy the marathon.