I recommend this book, Bill Gates Speaks, to the readers. I admire him not only because he is the world’s richest man for more than a decade, but also the greatest philanthropist of the century.
If people ask me who my idol is, I would say I’ll never have idol, because I am a Christian. I really appreciate Gates for his contribution to the world. Gates once expressed the hope that each home has at least one computer, and his wish came true.
The retirement of Bill Gates reminds me of the end of the Lord of the Rings. It seems to have happened about eight times. I remember him announcing stepping down as CEO, stepping down as Chief Software Architect, announcing his retirement, doing his last CES, doing his final developers keynote, doing his wacky retirement video, announcing his retirement date and now, finally it seems, actually leaving (except he’s still doing one day per week at Microsoft).
Gates is the standard by which all other technology entrepreneurs will be measured. No doubt there were better coders than him but there is no better strategist. Even though Apple saw the potential of Xerox PARC’s Graphical User Interface first it was Gates who recognised hardware didn’t matter and staked his entire company on that insight. And won.
Even his fiercest critics acknowledge the debt owed to MS. By creating a common OS platform for other developers to build on MS made the personal computer accessible and help laid the foundation for the explosion of the Internet. Yes MS engaged in some rather fruity behaviour down the years but even now, with their power on the wane, we must admit we are better off with them than without.
These days those insights are as sharp as ever. It was Gates who put in train the company’s greatest innovation – the Xbox – and with it the one genuinely distinctive product, Xbox live. In 2003 he predicted the computerless home in an article which I have not seen bettered for its brevity and insight. And now instead of wasting his money on yachts he is giving it away to promote education and combat disease. If he does to malaria what he did to Netscape the world will be a better place.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Jack Welch Speaks
I recommend this book, Jack Welch Speaks, to readers who are seriously thinking of becoming a great leader in any form of organization.
Jack Welch's goal was to make GE "the world's most competitive enterprise." He knew that it would take nothing less than a "revolution" to transform that dream into a reality. "The model of business in corporate America in 1980 had not changed in decades. Workers worked, managers managed, and everyone new their place. Forms and approvals and bureaucracy ruled the day."2 Welch's self-proclaimed revolution meant waging war on GE's old ways of doing things and reinventing the company from top to bottom.
Today, GE with its unique learning culture and boundaryless organization is one the most admired company in the world.
The techniques and ideas that Welch has employed to move GE forward are applicable to any size corporations, small, medium, or large.
Jack Welch's goal was to make GE "the world's most competitive enterprise." He knew that it would take nothing less than a "revolution" to transform that dream into a reality. "The model of business in corporate America in 1980 had not changed in decades. Workers worked, managers managed, and everyone new their place. Forms and approvals and bureaucracy ruled the day."2 Welch's self-proclaimed revolution meant waging war on GE's old ways of doing things and reinventing the company from top to bottom.
Today, GE with its unique learning culture and boundaryless organization is one the most admired company in the world.
The techniques and ideas that Welch has employed to move GE forward are applicable to any size corporations, small, medium, or large.
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Warren Buffet Speaks
I recommend this book, Warren Buffet Speaks, to readers who are keen on investing, for words of wisdom in terms of investment and commerce, from the world's greatest investor. He is also best friend of Bill Gates, and CEO of of berkshire hathaway.
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Google Speaks
In many ways, Google is the prototype of a successful twenty-first-century company.
I recommend this book, Google Speaks, to readers who are seriously thinking of forming a startup in the near future.
Google Speaks puts these incredible entreperneurs in perspective and shows you how their drive and determination have allowed them to create one of today's most powerful companies.
I recommend this book, Google Speaks, to readers who are seriously thinking of forming a startup in the near future.
Google Speaks puts these incredible entreperneurs in perspective and shows you how their drive and determination have allowed them to create one of today's most powerful companies.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Where to find Innovation?
These days heard a lot of people talking about innovation. Almost 50% of seminars in recent months are relate to the topic of green sustainability.
As the nation's energy demands continue to grow, so will the role that the renewable energy industry will play in the coming years. Government policies, such as the federal government’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, and more importantly, its Mandatory Renewable Energy Target will certainly help drive growth in this sector. It’ll take awhile for any emissions trading scheme to come into full effect.
Government’s renewable energy targets of 20 percent of Australia’s energy needs met by clean energy generation by 2020.
Australia is particularly exposed in this area due to most of its emissions coming from carbon intensive coal-fired power stations.
To meet this demand, a large amount of new capacity will need to be built over the coming years which will mobilize about $20 billion in investment.
The current global financial crisis certainly put a dampener on this outlook. The contraction in the capital market is going to play a very big role in the amount of new wind farms and hydro projects that we can build.
As the mining sector has been hit particularly hard by the economic slowdown, the costs of building new projects in the next few years could come down substantially as competing demand from the mining sector reduces.
The challenge is to come out the other end of the financial crisis in better shape than we went in and be set up to make a substantial leap forward.
The capital constraints in the lending sector mean ‘bad businesses’ will be weeded out and companies that have a good track record for delivering what they promise will actually come out ahead.
The so-called global financial crisis is in fact a blessing for humanity. We are now going to tackle the big issues – the causes of our problems rather than just the symptoms. Without the global financial crisis we may never have got that insight.
You shall build your Green house which save you up to 50% on your energy and water bills, at the meantime, reduce greenhouse gas and waste. So cut energy use, be waterwise and waste less, act sustainably right now! Use hybrid instead of petrol for your car. Add solar to the list and earn free cash.
Innovation has never been more important to companies as it is now. The recession is creating new needs and new forms of value are needed to fulfill them. Yet there remains a yawning gulf between business leaders’ rhetoric on innovation and the reality on the ground. So what holds our companies back, and why is breakthrough innovation so rare?
Here are five factors that prevent successful innovation.
An intolerance of failure. According to expert innovators, Tom Peters, ‘Nothing works first time’, so if you cannot accept failure you are unlikely to see too much innovation, no matter how much money you throw at it.
For this cause, I recommend the little black book of entrepreneurship by Fernando Trias De Bes. A contrarian's guide to succeeding where others have failed. This book is for anyone who is interested in setting up a business.
An excessive customer focus. People are poor predictors of their own future behaviour. Entrepreneurs should take market research and evaluates new ideas in order to help take informed risks and not as a simple yes/no exercise.
Fantasy of miracle or desire for a magic pill. Innovation is an isolated change program. Enterprise should allow its developers to spend a proportion of their time on their own development projects as a way of encouraging a stream of bottom-up ideas.
An unwillingness to cannibalise sales. The only way to prolong success is, paradoxically, to destroy it and create something even more valuable. Technology companies know that they must consistently add new features at lower prices if they want to stay ahead in the market. The same principles are true in other markets.
A reliance on a small cadre of innovators. Relying on a small development team to identify, create and deliver game-changing innovations is unrealistic. You have to cast your net much wider. Entrepreneurs should be willingly to work with external organisations and develop its new growth ideas through these external networks.
How many of these factors are present in your company? Once you are willing to welcome failure, lead rather than follow customers, involve your whole organization and beyond, cannibalise your existing businesses and see innovation as a way of life, you’re likely to make real and material progress.
As the nation's energy demands continue to grow, so will the role that the renewable energy industry will play in the coming years. Government policies, such as the federal government’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, and more importantly, its Mandatory Renewable Energy Target will certainly help drive growth in this sector. It’ll take awhile for any emissions trading scheme to come into full effect.
Government’s renewable energy targets of 20 percent of Australia’s energy needs met by clean energy generation by 2020.
Australia is particularly exposed in this area due to most of its emissions coming from carbon intensive coal-fired power stations.
To meet this demand, a large amount of new capacity will need to be built over the coming years which will mobilize about $20 billion in investment.
The current global financial crisis certainly put a dampener on this outlook. The contraction in the capital market is going to play a very big role in the amount of new wind farms and hydro projects that we can build.
As the mining sector has been hit particularly hard by the economic slowdown, the costs of building new projects in the next few years could come down substantially as competing demand from the mining sector reduces.
The challenge is to come out the other end of the financial crisis in better shape than we went in and be set up to make a substantial leap forward.
The capital constraints in the lending sector mean ‘bad businesses’ will be weeded out and companies that have a good track record for delivering what they promise will actually come out ahead.
The so-called global financial crisis is in fact a blessing for humanity. We are now going to tackle the big issues – the causes of our problems rather than just the symptoms. Without the global financial crisis we may never have got that insight.
You shall build your Green house which save you up to 50% on your energy and water bills, at the meantime, reduce greenhouse gas and waste. So cut energy use, be waterwise and waste less, act sustainably right now! Use hybrid instead of petrol for your car. Add solar to the list and earn free cash.
Innovation has never been more important to companies as it is now. The recession is creating new needs and new forms of value are needed to fulfill them. Yet there remains a yawning gulf between business leaders’ rhetoric on innovation and the reality on the ground. So what holds our companies back, and why is breakthrough innovation so rare?
Here are five factors that prevent successful innovation.
An intolerance of failure. According to expert innovators, Tom Peters, ‘Nothing works first time’, so if you cannot accept failure you are unlikely to see too much innovation, no matter how much money you throw at it.
For this cause, I recommend the little black book of entrepreneurship by Fernando Trias De Bes. A contrarian's guide to succeeding where others have failed. This book is for anyone who is interested in setting up a business.
An excessive customer focus. People are poor predictors of their own future behaviour. Entrepreneurs should take market research and evaluates new ideas in order to help take informed risks and not as a simple yes/no exercise.
Fantasy of miracle or desire for a magic pill. Innovation is an isolated change program. Enterprise should allow its developers to spend a proportion of their time on their own development projects as a way of encouraging a stream of bottom-up ideas.
An unwillingness to cannibalise sales. The only way to prolong success is, paradoxically, to destroy it and create something even more valuable. Technology companies know that they must consistently add new features at lower prices if they want to stay ahead in the market. The same principles are true in other markets.
A reliance on a small cadre of innovators. Relying on a small development team to identify, create and deliver game-changing innovations is unrealistic. You have to cast your net much wider. Entrepreneurs should be willingly to work with external organisations and develop its new growth ideas through these external networks.
How many of these factors are present in your company? Once you are willing to welcome failure, lead rather than follow customers, involve your whole organization and beyond, cannibalise your existing businesses and see innovation as a way of life, you’re likely to make real and material progress.
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