Kevin Benedict is a TCS futurist and lecturer focused on the signals and foresight that emerge as society, geopolitics, economies, science, technology, environment, and philosophy converge.
Yesterday was the first day of the Mobile World Congress 2013 in Barcelona. It is reported there are 70,000 people here. I counted 69,901. I explored miles of aisles filled with mobile and wireless software vendors, equipment, accessories and devices manufacturers over 8 massive halls.
I have been tracking down mobility experts to interview. I tried to upload some of the interviews yesterday, but my hotel wireless appeared just enough to tease me before disappearing again.
Today I will be speaking at the Power of Enterprise Mobility session in Hall 8. There are seats for 250, but over 2,000 registered for it. Yikes!
Here is the first of many interviews I recorded with experts in mobility and M2M. This interview is with M2M / Internet of Things guru and Fred Yentz, CEO of ILS Technology.
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
I came across this quote from Thomas Jefferson recently that I found interesting, "He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessoning mine; as he who lights his candle at mine, receives light without darkening me. Ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition...this [capability] seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them."
Thomas Jefferson was ruminating about collaboration - mobile and global collaboration. He was sharing his belief that good ideas should be shared widely for the benefit of all. Allowing your best and brightest minds, no matter their geographical location, to contribute their good ideas using mobile and collaboration technologies is a system, as Jefferson worded it, "benevolently designed by nature."
If you are the software designer of the collaboration platform, you may desire more credit than Jefferson bestowed, but you are in fact, part of nature:-)
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
In this short video I review the findings and predictions from Gartner and comScore for 2013 mobility and other digital trends. Enjoy! Video Link: http://youtu.be/YYmKYkQwWnw
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
Next week I will be speaking at the Mobile World Congress 2013 in Barcelona and also interviewing all the mobility experts I can track down. I recognize that many of you reading this post may not have the opportunity to attend, but have questions you would like me to ask some of the mobility experts. If so, please post your questions in the comment field below and I will do my best to track down the answers on your behalf.
Wow! Eight halls full of mobile experts!!! See image below.
OK, I am almost ready to get off of my soap box about how enterprise mobility and collaboration platforms, working together as part of SMAC (social, mobile, analytics and cloud), are creating a huge sea change in how businesses are run. In this short video I share some additional areas that will be impacted by these changes. Enjoy!
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
Last week while speaking with CIOs and IT strategists in Europe the topic of enterprise collaboration came up often. Of course, I was usually the one to raise it, but it is a natural extension of enterprise mobility so I am justified! You can now have real-time communications with all of your brightest minds via mobile devices. Why not use it! Why not provide real-time collaboration apps that enable you to have full situational awareness within your company? You can keep updated and contribute to all the important discussions and debates no matter your geographical location.
In this short video, I discuss the impact mobility and collaboration platforms are having and will continue to have on many different aspects of your business. Enjoy!
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
This week I had the pleasure of teaching a SMAC (social, mobile, analytics and cloud) strategies workshop in Brussels for a very large insurance and banking company. Following the workshop, my colleague in the mobility practice, Hugo Taborda, took me to see a visiting display of the Terra Cotta Army from China.
For those not familiar with the Terra Cotta Army, it is a collection of over 7,000 terra cotta statutes found by a Chinese farmer in 1974. Seven thousand soldiers and horses in long lines, standing silently, ready to escort their king into the afterlife.
Yesterday on my return flight to Boise, Idaho I had ample time to meditate on terra cotta statues. They were buried around 210 BC. They have stood silent, ready for duty, for over 2,000 years. Whether their king journeyed into an afterlife or not, they remained buried in Lintong district, Xi'an, Shaanix province, China. They were immobile. They have withstood the ravages of time (most of them), but cannot share their experiences or witness to the events of history. I know, as I tried to interview one.
How does a Terra Cotta army relate to social engagement platforms and enterprise mobility? Well here it goes! Many companies are blessed with large numbers of brilliant employees that bring with them in-depth industry experience, vast amounts of knowledge, skills, innovative ideas, and problem solving capabilities, but they are never effectively utilized. They are a modern day Terra Cotta Army, ready and willing, but immobile and silent, there is no effective engagement platform in place.
We have done a good job of automating business processes with ERPs and other systems, but when there are exceptions, problems, disagreements and opportunities, we almost completely fail at providing effective platforms of engagement. ERPs and other tools that capture, standardize and automate the routine, usually operate in silence and with minimal social interaction, however, the real-world operates in a noisy, chaotic, and non-standard place called reality. It is here, where innovation, negotiation, new products, new businesses, brain-storming and problem solving happens. It is here where profits are made or lost.
It is time for companies to research and learn about social engagement platforms. How can you better utilize and benefit from the brilliance lying dormant, silent and waiting to be discovered. I recently read an article where the author predicted the next big productivity wave will come from effectively utilizing existing resources through social engagement and enterprise collaboration platforms. I agree!
As in our personal lives, social engagement is enabled by social networking platforms and tools. Likewise, in our companies, social engagement platforms, purpose built to support effective business engagement and collaboration can provide huge benefits. These platforms will have a mobile first approach. Mobile apps will be the primary means by which participants engage. Apps that enable your best and brightest minds, no matter their physical location, to be able to contribute.
The world already has seven-thousand terra cotta soldiers. We don't need more. Today, we need an army of bright minds, engaged and contributing.
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
This week I was in four different countries in four days teaching mobile and social strategies for the enterprise. While in London, I was able to corner mobility expert and my friend, Ved Sen, and film a quick interview. In this segment, I ask him about the latest trends he is seeing and hearing about in Europe in 2013. If you would like to contact Ved Sen and ask his advice on anything enterprise mobility related click here.
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
This week I am teaching mobile and social strategies and will be visiting four countries in four days. This type of schedule is a blur of airports, meeting new people and learning more about how mobile and social solutions are being used in the real world. While on these trips I have a lot of time to ponder on flights.
I have been thinking a lot lately about the the word conduit - a means by which something is received and/or transmitted, as a useful way of describing mobile devices. Mobile devices are a conduit for voice communications. Mobile devices are a conduit for social networks. Mobile devices are a conduit for email, news, data collection, photos/videos, and now as e-wallets and mobile payments. So much of our lives are now run through this conduit.
In the last couple of weeks I have spent time with over a dozen companies keenly interested in the impact of mobility and social trends on their business. In each case, the impact will be different, but significant. In many cases the impact of these trends will be monumental.
Let's talk about retail financial services for a moment. In the book Bank 3.0 by Brett King, he states, "Retail financial service brands today are a collection of experiences, increasingly defined by multichannel interactions and customer discussions and debates in the social media space." The term multichannel interactions means communicating with a bank or other retail financial services company through a variety of different means including online, call centers, mobile, ATM (machines), physical offices, etc. Increasingly, however, these interactions are via mobile devices.
King uses the phrase a "collection of experiences" to describe a financial services company's interactions with customers and prospects. These experiences, often via online and mobile, are now the discussion of the blogosphere and social networks. As a result, it is critically important that companies invest time and money to ensuring these experiences are the best they can be.
Social networks are accelerators for good or bad. If something good happens, the world can know about it in seconds. Likewise, if something bad happens the world can know about it in seconds. The rules of the PR game have changed. Increasingly people go to their networks for recommendations rather than to the manufacturer of the product or the provider of a service. They trust their networks more than the companies providing the product.
Companies need to operate their businesses and invest in their businesses to meet their customers via the channels their customers are using. If customers are moving away from visiting physical buildings and preferring to interact with a company via a mobile app, then companies need that mobile app to be the very best possible. Companies that resist supporting the interaction channels preferred by their markets are in trouble. If you work for one of these companies - right the ship.
Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
