Comments on: Is Management the Problem?

By: burdickrobert

burdickrobert — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 13:27:38 +0000

There is another link under the category of personal finance but it has nothing to do with finance. If you have difficulties in making payment, you can click the link named wachoviabank.com. You will have an expert helping you to fix your problems and you don’t have to go out of your home to get the service. What you need to do is to choose a button between the two “call us today” and “we’ll call you”. Don’t you think this service shows the attentiveness and consideration of the Wachovia? It’s really good in my opinion.

By: Burdick

Burdick — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 13:14:50 +0000

I never heard about www.wachoviabank.com like this before. Thank for this.

By: Isis

Isis — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 08:28:07 +0000

I was just going through this post and found it really very interesting, thanks for posting such a high class post, I just loved reading it, looking forward to read more of you. Keep interesting posts like this coming.

By: moniquejenin

moniquejenin — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:17:55 +0000

no, the person who handle is the one who make problem..

By: Andrew Meyer

Andrew Meyer — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 01:48:34 +0000

Prof McAfee,

let me add a different perspective that I have come across as an entrepreneur trying to implement a W2.0 solution.

Many managers see the benefits of free information flow. They know their judgment is impeded because they are operating on limited information or the “happy talk” which makes it up the corporate communications chain. They love the idea of free flowing information. They have one major difficulty, they have to solve business problems.

Costs from poor information don’t show up in any accounting measure, so allocating funds to investigate “information improvement” approaches is very difficult.

W2.0 vendors have not made their lives any easier. Many vendors lack the patients and understanding of business budgeting processes and fair to articulate the value of their products in ways that make trying them palatable.

If you look, there are a good number of corporate bloggers at the VP and EVP level. Clearly they understand the communications problems and are trying to address it.

A W2.0 company has three challenges:
1. Articulating their products value in a way that businesses can budget for it.
2. Creating a business model which allows for a price point which is acceptable.
3. Have the patients and constancy of purpose to survive the six to eighteen month sales cycles which are probably necessary to make these sales.

Understanding and then making those three challenges align has occupied a lot of my attention over the last fifteen months since I started my business.

Of course, I could be missing something…

By: Lim Boon Chuan

Lim Boon Chuan — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:09:16 +0000

Permit my differing in opinions on the 3 reasons that was given. I would feel that the Internet is so widespread that it is more or less a way of life, Enterprise 2.0 being an extension of Internet to the business world IMHO is seen as a natural development, given the widespread and pervasive use of the Internet. It would seem that the managers expect this to happen as something that will be naturally evolved and hence no barrier to their implementation.

By: Katrina W.

Katrina W. — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:07:06 +0000

Managers are part of the problem in command-and-control types of organizations – they may not be outright against collaborative tools, but they discourage their employees to venture outside the “proper channels” of communication.
They also bring up many of the questions listed in your June 30, 2008 posting, which delays or stops the implementation of collaborative tools.
In my organization, the most resistance has come from Human Resources and other managers, not from IT.

By: R. Todd Stephens

R. Todd Stephens — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 10:01:02 +0000

My first question would be how do we define Â“wildfireÂ” growth? Based on my experience, the first year you should see 1000-2000% growth and the second year 200-400% growth. After that, you might settle down into 60-90% per year. I have often said the first year of growth isnÂ’t hard but by the fourth or fifth, thatÂ’s when you separate the wheat from the chaff.

However, the real question you asked was what these gentlemen stated about their implementation accurate. The clear answer is yes but with a slight twist. What you are hearing is the Â“Culture MythÂ”. Theorist and even consultants tend to grasp on to the popular thoughts of the day. Take a look around the Internet and you will find no shortage of people discussing the cultural issues of deploying Web 2.0 within the enterprise. Contrast this with people who are actually doing it and a different message emerges. Yes, in any large scale implementation you will have cultural, social, and political issues to deal with. What people donÂ’t say is that the percentage of these when compared to the user issues is relatively small. Based on my implementations, I would say less than 5% of your success or failure will be determined by culture. Hence, we see the Â“Culture MythÂ” emerge and continue to live on.

Reality aside, itÂ’s still more fun to talk about culture, social, and political issues than to focus on the real needs of the user. Users need to be aware of the offering, they need to be educated on the use, and they need to mature in how they utilize the applications.

By: anne marie mcewan

anne marie mcewan — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 10:18:08 +0000

In the link to your post on the 9X Problem, you describe the endowment effect as “valuing items in our possession more than prospective items that could be in our possession, especially if the prospective item is a proposed substitute”.

I had not come across the endowment effect until I read about it in this week’s Economist (June 21st – 27th). A huge light bulb went on in my head when I read that article.

My expertise is new ways of working. It has baffled me that we know so much about what is effective in creating workplace environments and support systems that encourage and facilitate learning, innovation and sharing. Recent research on employee engagement and the take-up of new working practices is discouraging. Enterprise 2.0 technologies are not alone in slow dissemination.

I anticipate that I will have my work cut out for me as I seek to grow my business (working with senior executives to evaluate and implement management innovation). Just because the medicine is good does not mean that the patient is willing to take it.

As the Economist article concludes, “All in all, the rational conclusion is that humans are irrational animals”.

By: Brian

Brian — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 16:16:41 +0000

Frankly, based on what I’ve seen as a business consultant is that management still doesn’t give a hoot about E2.0 and won’t until they have to put their name on the line in front of higher-ups who will expect results. I think for now, most of them are content to allow their employees to move toward something like E2.0 as long as it isn’t high visibility. In the mean time, E2.0 looks a lot to the those not in the know like just another version of smart “regular” practices.