About Management consulting activities

2012-01-22T14:22:00.000+01:00

Security but freedom

Any concerns about Windows Azure security?

2012-01-22T14:02:00.001+01:00

Have a look at this Channel 9 video, explaining the security controls and components in place.

KPMG Cloud computing publications

2011-12-02T06:38:00.001+01:00

KPMG International is publishing some interesting perspectives about adopting cloud computing solutions (what are the risks, the benefits, the financial impact etc.)

Embracing the Cloud | KPMG | GLOBAL

KPMG Europe launches Talking shops

2011-10-03T09:54:00.000+02:00

The KPMG Talking Shop is a collection of short films in which KPMG experts provide their thoughts and opinions on how various issues or sectors are likely to develop.

The Coming Cloud Wars: Google+ vs Microsoft (plus Facebook)

2011-07-21T05:46:00.001+02:00

The next year in tech will be all about building connections between PC and post-PC devices, whether phones, tablets, game consoles, e-readers or next-gen SmartRoombas. They’ll be connections without cords, built on shared interfaces, proximity-based communication, and storage, syncing and computing infrastructure increasingly shifted to the cloud.

That’s what Tuesday’s release of OS X Lion is all about: building on the App Store and iCloud. That’s what Microsoft’s forthcoming Windows 8 is all about: building on unified IDs on everything from Windows Phone 7 to Office to Xbox and Skype.

And I’m going to convince you that this is even what Google+ is really all about. You can see this already in Google+’s mobile apps for Android and iOS; we’ll see it more as Google continues to integrate more of its web properties into the social network.

Read further Tim's article on Wired web site

E-Reader Ownership Doubled in 6 Months, Growing Faster Than Tablets

2011-06-28T18:13:00.003+02:00

Ownership of e-readers is exploding, according to a survey by Pew Internet Research. Over the past six months, ownership of e-readers such as the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook has grown from 6% to 12% of U.S. adults. E-readers are more popular than tablets devices such as the iPad or various Android slates like the Samsung Galaxy Tab which are owned by 8% of U.S. adults.

More info, read here

Expert news video on KM - part 2

2011-05-08T08:58:00.001+02:00

Expert news video on KM - part 1

2011-04-10T13:50:00.005+02:00

If you're interested to get a fresh view on what's knowledge management, just watch this video. It's an interview of Larry Lucardie, CEO of Knowledge Values.

ECKM 2011 on September 1-2 - Germany

2010-12-11T06:42:00.006+01:00

Looking for a knowledge management conference in Europe? Then, save the date for this yearly european conference.

12th European Conference on Knowledge Management - ECKM 2011
University of Passau, Germany
1-2 September 2011

Conference Chair:
Prof. Dr. Franz Lehner, University of Passau, Germany
Programme Chair:
Prof. Dr. Klaus Bredl University of Augsburg, Germany

The conference will be located almost exactly at the geographic centre of Europe. Passau is close to the metropolitan area of Munich. According to a statement attributed to Alexander von Humboldt, Passau is referred to as one of the seven most beautiful towns of the world. Passau is spectacularly located at the confluence of three rivers, one of them being the river Danube, the second longest river of Europe.

Put your MS Office docs in Google cloud !!

2010-11-23T18:13:00.001+01:00

Google this week unveiled a limited beta test for its upcoming Google Cloud Connect for Microsoft Office tool, giving its customers a way to utilize its Google Docs service with Microsoft's popular Office suite in a fairly seamless fashion. The tool is billed as a way for Google customers to more easily migrate, over time, from Microsoft Office to the less capable (but free) Google Docs.

"Google Docs [is] 100% web: It provides real-time collaboration in the browser, with no software to install, manage or upgrade," Google Group Product Manager Shan Sinha wrote in a blog post announcing the tool. "With Cloud Connect, people can continue to use the familiar [Microsoft] Office [applications], while reaping many of the benefits of web-based collaboration that Google Docs users already enjoy."

Google Cloud Connect works with Microsoft Office 2003, 2007, and 2010, providing users with a way to sync documents to Google's Docs-based services. Because these documents are stored in the cloud, they can be accessed from anywhere, using multiple devices, and they can be shared with others—each document gets a unique URL—and retain a version history.

Google Cloud Connect is a rebranded version of DocVerse, which Google purchased back in March. It's currently available only in a limited beta, but you can sign up to be notified when the tool is more broadly available.

Europe 2020 Flagship Initiative for Innovation Union

2010-11-01T16:48:00.010+01:00

Despite the financial crisis, the European Commission has communicated some crucial agenda points for an innovative union:

EU and member states need to continue to invest in education, R&D, innovation and ICT.
Those investments should be performed hand in hand with reforms to get more value for money and tackle fragmentation.
Our education systems at all levels should be modernized.
Researchers and innovators must be able to work and to cooperate across the EU as easily as within national borders.
Access to EU programmes must be simplified and their leverage effect on private sector investment enhanced, with the support of the European Investment Bank.
We need to get more innovation out of our research.
Remaining barriers for entrepreneurs to bring 'ideas to market' must be removed (better access to finance, affordable Intellectual Property rights etc.)
European Innovation Partnerships should be launched to accelerate research, development and market deployment of innovations to tackle major societal challenges...
Our strengths in design and creativity must be better exploited.
We need to work better with our international partners.

What an exciting agenda :-) !! The full document can be downloaded here.

Libraries will survive !!

2010-09-16T17:52:00.004+02:00

Have a look at the video that some librarians made some days ago. It highlights the social dimension, the service minded approach of this profession and all the kind of information you can get in a library (and not on Google ebook or on Amazon). As they believe, I thought that knowledge sharing was not on the Internet only, but also on the coffee machine or in a reading room....?? So, maybe yes, they're right...libraries will survive !!

Web 2.0 and Public sector publication

2010-08-04T07:50:00.004+02:00

KPMG International has released an interesting paper on Web 2.0 technologies within the public sector...you can find the document on several KPMG web sites, like on the Belgian site (the official title is 'Dynamic technologies for smarter government' and is available in PDF format).

Social Science Research network

2010-06-28T09:06:00.012+02:00

Did you know that you can access thousands of social science research papers and articles online? See the last stats we had from the SSRN eLibrary:

Papers & Authors:

Abstracts: 289,990
Full Text Papers: 240,676
Authors: 138,281
Papers Received in Last 6 months:27,36

Cloud computing and knowledge management

2010-06-20T19:19:00.004+02:00

As I already quoted on LinkedIn, I'm a surprised by the lack of public european initiative on cloud computing and secured cloud architecture within the european region. I'm really convinced that cloud architecture could boost the european ICT adoption (with offering cheap and secure data storage for european citizens) and make it cheaper for the weakest european countries.
If you're not convinced that Europe is waiting too long to adopt any plan, check what happened last month in Washington on the Knowledge Management level....

Knowledge management and communication

2010-06-06T09:43:00.004+02:00

I'm very pleased to see that the editor World Scientific Publishing Company announces a book about KM and communication for September 2010. Most of the time, we find a lot of books on ontologies, document management, KM strategies with IT connections, but I believe that the academic community does not emphasize enough the communication skills we need to practice KM every day. The complete title of the book will be 'Communication and knowledge transfer: theories and cases in Journalism, Public relations and advertising (series on innovation and knowledge management) and it's written by Seow Ting Lee and I-huei Cheng.

Un bel exemple de gestion de connaissances - Agri-Réseau fête ses dix ans !

2010-04-30T09:08:00.001+02:00

Une information, aussi importante soit-elle, sert peu si elle n’est pas mise à jour, communiquée et exploitée adéquatement par la bonne ressource au moment opportun. Mais encore faut-il qu’elle soit disponible et repérable. À la fin de 1999, pour palier au départ à la retraite de nombre d’experts en agriculture, de leurs connaissances et de leur expertise, le ministère de l’Agriculture, des Pêcheries et de l’Alimentation (MAPAQ), de concert avec le Centre de référence en agriculture et agroalimentaire du Québec (CRAAQ), annonçait la mise en ligne d’Agri-Réseau. Dix ans plus tard, Agri-Réseau constitue LA référence sur le Web dans toute la francophonie en matière d’information technique et scientifique dans le domaine.

Plus d'information sur l'expérience d'Agri-Réseau

ICT 2010 Event conference, 27-29 September 2010, Brussels

2010-04-28T14:25:00.001+02:00

Europe's most visible forum for ICT research and innovation.
ICT 2010 will focus on policy priorities such as Europe's Digital Agenda and the next financial programme of the European Union for funding research and innovation in ICT.

This biennial event has become a unique gathering point for researchers, business people, investors, and high level policy makers in the field of digital innovation. ICT 2010 will focus on policy priorities such as Europe's Digital Agenda and the next financial programme of the European Union for funding research and innovation in ICT.

Registration for ICT 2010 will open in May 2010

Go to related site

Brett Johnson on GoogleTalks

2010-04-26T04:24:00.005+02:00

If you're interested in understanding what's the LEMON HR model, just follow this 44 minutes presentation. Johnson explains what are the different layers of his analysis (Luminaries / Entrepreneurs / Managers / Organizers / Networkers) and why it's important to adapt your communication for each profile.

Management references

2010-04-10T07:50:00.001+02:00

If you're looking for some good management Consulting references, i tried the library of Edward de Bono and Robert Heller. The link to the site is http://www.thinkingmanagers.com where you will find various management articles, classified in well known categories...

Publishing and blogging on the fly

2010-04-04T09:47:00.002+02:00

I downloaded a blogging application (BlogPress) for Blogger - testing some connectivity and publication possibilities for the Iphone...and except for the painful keyboard, it works !

-- Post From My iPhone

KM within European SME's

2010-03-19T06:29:00.002+01:00

If you're interested in practicing or implementing knowledge management within SME's, check the EJKM web site - where all the academic papers are available online.

In their current Volume 8, Issue 1, Italian academics folks performed some research within 25 SME's (South of Italy) and they propose a questionnaire about some KM practices.

Download the full article on the Electronic Journal of Knowledge Management site !

Considering the impact of cloud compu...

2010-03-05T16:41:00.001+01:00

Considering the impact of cloud computing on Business models

I had the opportunity to follow a very interesting KPMG seminar on Cloud Computing and the impact that this 'style of computing' will have on organizing future businesses. And guess, what? We believe that the shift will be tremendous, that a lot of the current 'fixed asset' and tangible IT (or Telco assets) will be changed, with adapted billing models (how are you structuring your billing scheme when your customers are 'renting' or paying as a service your product? what are the implications for tax purposes? where do you have to pay your VAT when your service is running on a centralized cloud server?)

For those who don't know what cloud computing is, Gartner defines it as a style of computing where massively scalable and elastic IT-related capabilities are provided 'as a service' using Internet technologies to multiple external customers. Find more info everywhere on the web, but especially some good references on the wikipedia page

The Problem with the Data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom Hierarchy

2010-02-03T21:35:00.001+01:00

The data-information-knowledge-wisdom hierarchy seemed like a really great idea when it was first proposed. But its rapid acceptance was in fact a sign of how worried we were about the real value of the information systems we had built at such great expense. What looks like a logical progression is actually a desperate cry for help. Read the HBR article further here...

1st DEVCOM Brussels

2010-01-22T14:28:00.003+01:00

1st DEVCOM Brussels

I'll be jury member for the ebusiness forum on web, mobile and e-marketing. The DEVCOM event will take place in the Brussels stock Exchange (very nice building !!)

CKO Forum group

2010-01-20T15:53:00.002+01:00

Have you heard about the CKO group on LinkedIn?
Noop?? Click here and share your ideas!!

Major KM events for the coming year

2009-12-18T10:31:00.002+01:00

2nd Iranian Knowledge Management Conference30 - 31 Jan 2010, Tehran, Iran
KM Forum 10th Annual Conference24 - 25 Feb 2010, Henley on Thames, United Kingdom
3rd Annual Global Learning Summit03 - 05 Mar 2010, Singapore City, Singapore
5th Knowledge Management International Conference25 - 27 May 2010, Terengganu, Malaysia
KC UK 201015 - 16 Jun 2010, London, United Kingdom
World Library and Information Congress10 - 15 Aug 2010, Gothenburg, Sweden

Knowledge management and climate change

2009-12-13T10:28:00.002+01:00

I was googling this morning and tried to see what were the results for "knowledge management + Copenhagen"...and guess what? It returned a lot of KM initiatives that have been taken for preparing or explaining the role of managing the knowledge in a globalized economy. Who thought knowledge management was not a trendy activity anymore?

See for example an initiative of the Copenhagen Business school or Climate-L project...

Some competitive creativity...

2009-11-04T14:47:00.003+01:00

Pretty cool, hu ? I can easily imagine what David could have done without Michelangelo :-)

ebusinesses guide helps SMEs to self-diagnose their competences

2009-10-28T17:20:00.000+01:00

The new on-line service "eBusiness Guide for SMEs: eBusiness software and services in the European market" is now available at the European Commission's Europa portal . The eBusiness Guide for SMEs is an intelligent online tool that helps enterprises to self-diagnose their eBusiness competences and related ICT needs. Based on this diagnosis, the eBusiness Guide proposes a range of suitable solutions, as well as local ICT service providers that can offer information and advice.

All that ICT providers have to do is to register and enter into the platform detailed information on their products and services in their national language. The procedure to register and enter the relevant data into the e Business Guide for SMEs is rather simple and can only offer benefits to the local ICT providers which will be very easily accessible and thus promoted in a pan-European level. This marketing instrument that has been funded by the European Commission is offered totally for free of charge and aims at the promotion of ICT awareness in SMEs. So far, over 1000 e Business solutions providers and 1.500 products, including open-source solutions have joined this tool.

Infrastructure planning and Design guides

2009-10-26T11:50:00.004+01:00

Struggling with IT architecture design ? Don't know where to begin ?

The Infrastructure Planning and Design guide series gives you architectural guidance for Microsoft infrastructure products. The IPD guides help clarify and streamline design processes for Microsoft infrastructure technologies, with each guide addressing a unique infrastructure technology or scenario. You can download the Microsoft IPD guides by following this link.

KM World 2009 - US event

2009-10-19T23:33:00.002+02:00

The Official Conference Blog on the KMWorld 2009 Conference & Expo (November 17-19, San Jose, CA. Coverage is already underway - check here often for in-depth news on keynote speakers, coverage of topic areas, show updates, meetups, entries from KM thought leaders, and anything else that surrounds this year's show!

Last year’s KMWorld keynote speaker and information architecture expert, Peter Morville, pointed me to a discussion of search as a wayfinding system for websites. Author of the discussion, David Hatch, says web users are moving toward “search as being a standard, hard-wired, lizard brain reflex when confronted with moving through the vasty content spaces that are out there. The Googles have had no small impact on our wayfinding approaches. “ He also believes Jared Spool of User Interface Engineering would not agree. Jared is a speaker at KMWorld 2009 so it will be interesting to hear what he shares about making an intuitive interface design.

Where is Europe and Europeans in there ? why is that impossible to have the same kind of events in EU countries ?

Digital Maketing event in Brussels

2009-10-19T23:01:00.003+02:00

Haven't heard about the DMF event at Tour & Taxis, in Brussels on October 22 ? Not registered yet ? Hope to see you there !

Digital First Marketing : The Belgian marketing event of the year!

More than 2,000 marketing professionals are expected for this 4th edition of the Digital Marketing First exhibition in Tour & Taxis. On the agenda of this edition: 75 exhibitors, more than 50 workshops, 8 keynote speakers, the Emakina Academy… not to mention the presentation of the Mixx Awards in which more than 500 professionals will participate in an unforgettable evening.

The audience is made up exclusively of interactive marketing and communication professionals. Entrance to the exhibition is free, but requires advance registration via this site.

Gartner and social media prediction

2009-09-01T18:26:00.002+02:00

Any doubts on the future of Social Media ? And what about using those knowledge sharing tools as change management techniques?

Have you heard about FISHA framework ?

2009-08-11T17:34:00.003+02:00

FISHA - A framework for information Sharing and Alerting - is a collaborative project run by an EC consortium. The project addresses the issue of improving security awareness amongst home-users and SME's through the creation of a European information sharing and alerting system. The expected output of the project includes:

an inventory of relevant existing initiatives targeting home-users and SMEs
a requirement analysis and the specification of key components of the system
a web portal prototype for information sharing and alerting
a specification of the information sharing and alerting protocol
a prototype software implementation
roadmaps for the involvement of Member States, the European Commission, ENISA [European network and information security agency], academia and consumer protection experts in maintaining the system
a communication plan for home-users and SMEs, to be published on the FISHA website

For further info, check http://www.fisha-project.eu/

Just being back after four weeks

2009-08-05T10:19:00.003+02:00

Being back after four weeks on holidays (!), I've been screening some new social media content on the Internet and I was especially interested in the Web 2.0 Expo / summit series. The event is divided in two parts: the expo (will take place in NY in November) and the summit, that will be held in San Francisco a little bit earlier (October 20-22, 2009).

The marketing around the summit is fantastic, knowing that you have to request an invitation to pay and assist to the event, which is - if you think on it - absolutely in contradiction with a democratic Web 2.0 approach (all is transparent, accessible and most of the time, free of charge)...

if you're lucky enough to get an invite, let me know...otherwise, just check - as I do - some good presentations on YouTube...

Check out our successful professional sequence on YouTube !

2009-06-11T13:21:00.004+02:00

As I'm always keen to see how the Big four are communicating about their business on the Internet, I searched the YouTube channels with a 'KPMG Belgium' query.
And guess what...? I found an interview of Guido De Grefte, one of our most innovative partner in Advisory. Worth seeing, really !

Check the successful professional section with Guido here.

Google University, Knowledge Management and YouTube

2009-04-28T07:21:00.004+02:00

YouTube proposes finally some interesting education content (and not only the last Joe Six Packs video or the last Paris Hilton car crash), with a real focus on Knowledge Management. Check here below to have a sample of it...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZ52ORG89Yg

OECD resources - Research, education and knowledge management

2009-03-20T11:37:00.002+01:00

Have you seen some OECD resources that are available on their innovation and KM site?
Check the directorate for education (click here) and you will have all the recent publications available (for free, of course).

OECD resources - Research, education and knowledge management

2009-03-20T11:37:00.000+01:00

EC is organizing SME weeks

2009-01-20T11:55:00.000+01:00

What is SME week?

The first European SME Week, taking place from 6 to 14 May 2009, is a campaign to promote entrepreneurship across Europe and to inform entrepreneurs about support available for them at European, national and local level. It allows SMEs to discover an array of information, advice, support and ideas to help them develop their activities.

Throughout 2009, events are taking place to inform, assist and connect existing and potential entrepreneurs and also help them develop new ideas and benefit from personalised information and support.

The SME Week encourages and supports SMEs to reach their full potential. It also marks an opportunity to inspire potential entrepreneurs to 'take the plunge' and work towards achieving their aspirations.

The European SME Week is co-ordinated by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Enterprise and Industry, but most of the events and activities taking place during the SME Week are organised by business organisations, support providers, regional and local authorities, and others in the participating countries. The SME Week is one of the measures implementing the Small Business Act, the first comprehensive SME policy framework for the EU and its Member States.

The SME Week seeks to:

Inform: provide and disseminate information on what the EU and the national authorities are offering by way of support to small businesses

Support: create an EU-SME partnership, underlining how Europe is stronger with more competitive SMEs and also the fact that the EU is ready to offer them support and advice

Inspire: motivate existing SMEs to broaden their outlook and further develop and grow their business

Share: float ideas and share the experiences of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs

Encourage: convince young people that entrepreneurship is an attractive career option

You can discover more on this site

Power.com: a portal for social networking

2008-12-06T14:26:00.001+01:00

Have a look at the this new Brazilian Internet startup and some of the proposed features. The founders have as ambition to be a central connection point for the social life and social activities on the Internet, centralizing with one login screen a multiple social network access.

Read further on the Blog of the NYtimes !

Audit firms : Commission consults on ways to help create more market players

2008-11-20T06:09:00.001+01:00

Internal Market and Services Commissioner Charlie McCreevy said : "European capital markets have become much more integrated in the last few years. However, the European Union seems to face fragmented audit markets. In order to ensure a sustainable international audit market, more players are needed to meet the demand by international companies. This is especially true in the light of the current financial turmoil, which might also contribute to widening the existing gap between the Big 4 and the mid-tier audit firms. We all need to think of how to bring new capital into the audit profession. Some have suggested that we should do away with ownership restrictions in audit firms and allow other players - not only audit partners - to invest in an audit firm. Audit firms fear that such relaxation could reduce the quality of audits and pose a risk to auditor independence. I want to hear more about both sides of the argument.. I encourage all those who have a view or experience in this field to share it with us."

Possible ways forward

In October 2007, the Commission published a study prepared by Oxera. On the basis of this study, the Commission invites stakeholders to give their views on two possible options for opening up the international audit market :

particular focus on deregulation of the capitalisation of audit firms (unbundling) as the catalyst for opening up the audit market. Deregulating the capital structure implies modification of Article 3 (4) of the 2006 Directive on Statutory Audit, which requires that auditors hold a majority of the voting rights in an audit firm and that a majority of auditors control the management board. This should however not be to the detriment of robust independence rules.
wider focus on a range of catalysts. Oxera identified other barriers than access to capital which also play an important role in affecting the entry and could also be discussed : reputation ; quality and expertise of staff ; low switching rates (reasons for companies not to change their auditor) ; differences among firms in their international outreach ; and differences in independence rules.

More information about the consultation is available at :

http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market...

Post from slideshare

2008-10-24T06:39:00.001+02:00

Web2

From: Web2Expo, 21 hours ago

Web2

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: web2expoeu08 web2expo)

SlideShare Link

Mental models

2008-10-05T15:50:00.001+02:00

A common term to different business topics (knowledge management, organizational development, learning organization strategies) are linked, and even often based, on the principle of the modern philosophy of 'phenomenology' [where each individual understands and reads the reality thanks his own schemes of time and space]. To my understanding, I always understood that the community business translated that old concept in the more explicit and understandable term of mental model.

I copy you here an interesting link to a specialized portal. Check the site of Gene Belliger by clicking the picture.

Always looking for new learning content?

2008-09-07T10:56:00.001+02:00

I'm happy to regularly post here about the multimedia content that is made available by all the
universities in the world (when you think on the impressive amount of courses, information and
knowledge that is available in the labs, the cupboards and the computers of all the research
centres of the world !). A special mention for the New Jersey Institute of Technology which is
proposing on iTunes the HRM 301 (Teacher Naomi Rotter) series about Organizational Behaviour.

In a nutshell, you have there about 25 lectures (movies) about learning processes in organizations,
Decision Making in the Organization, Leadership etc.
Have a look within iTunes > iTunes U or make a simple search query on New Jersey Institute of Technology...

Is KM dying (or is it already dead?)

2008-08-12T19:33:00.001+02:00

The same question is regularly posted on the net, with most of the time, KM people certifying that they are still active and innovative within the KM area, but ...this time, APQC releases the yearly question via Steve Denning (previous CKO at the World Bank and famous author of a story telling book). Check the discussion here online...

My opinion is that as long that people are raising the finger to know if KM is still alive, it is a good sign of vitality. Plus, if you are still not convinced, check the number of publications that are foreseen in 2009 on Amazon - with a knowledge management title...amazing :-)

My view is that we all started, very excited, in that new KM track, not really knowing how to structure the field - but, that in the meantime, a lot of research and progresses have been made. A lot of companies, that started some KM initiative in late nineties are now considering to grab the fruits of their investments. And all other organizations that stopped those projects (or merged it with some IT or HR department) are now considering to restart something...maybe with another package but to achieve the same general goals.

Holidays and plans for the summer

2008-07-03T06:13:00.001+02:00

Finally, I took some days out of the office, with some free time for the family and an article...I bought a book about social networks (in French, from Pierre Mercklé, Sociologie des réseaux sociaux, Ed. La découverte) in order to try to establish a connection between the networks (and communities) and some Barak Obama elections strategy...This should be published in September in the Banking and Finance review magazine.

PS: If you still don't know who is Barak Obama, I suggest you take a serious break ;-)

Using Windows Live Writer on an ex-Blogger (Google) Blog note

2008-06-18T18:29:00.001+02:00

I just installed the new 'Live' editor, enhancing Blogging capabilities and enriching the Blog posts with Tag, Video and Maps (all from Microsoft), but with enhanced features (compared to Google Doc options, with the pretty cool one stop click option - posting your post from your online document).

Some plug-ins have been developed (but I did not test it yet), but a first good point was the automatic language dictionary download (French, English and Dutch in my Belgian case :-)

I also imagine the combination of two specific Microsoft 'content' editors that are MS Office Sharepoint Designer 2007 and this Live Writer tool. Working and editing content with those two software should lead to rich and dynamic content. I will tell you more about that in some next posts.

BTW, tomorrow I will have a KPMG Belgium Alumni cocktail (the alumni group is also virtually existing on LinkedIn for web experts). Normally, we will have some nice professional pictures to show about that...

2008-06-09T18:58:00.000+02:00

I just started to use my brand mini (tiny?) EeePC - with so many useful and simple features on it (a basic 7 inches screen, 3 hours battery :-) and a 4Gig RAM on a good stable WinXP. Super !! It starts in a few seconds, with all loaded and a ready to surf interface. This will definitely be the future of mobile computing (900 grams in the pocket). A very good and cheap investment.

2008-04-28T23:12:00.000+02:00

I mentioned earlier the Architecture Journal n°15 from Microsoft, where the monthly focus is on the role and definition of what's an architect (in software development, in business roles or in systems). And a good initiative has been taken by the IASA (International association for Software Architects ) for trying to streamline the profiles, the core competencies that are needed etc. I believe they are right with that kind of exercise, because every job category needs some basic foundations - which are currently lacking in the software architecture world.

2008-04-26T06:20:00.000+02:00

MS Office SharePoint Server 2007 standalone training made available!

Microsoft has had a good idea with proposing standalone courses around web development, presenting the whole course track with Knowledge Management topics. Clearly, this means that the education material has been made available with a human readable lingo, with clear concepts like "Collaboration", "Enterprise Content Management" or "Search".

There is also a good mix between readings and video sessions, just to see theory in practice.

You can download the MS SharePoint Server 2007 standalone training version right here

2008-04-23T10:22:00.000+02:00

Top ten Architecture articles and tutorials - December 2007

A good selection of technical articles and some documentation about the important software development shifts that are happening with Agile and SOA concepts.

Check this out on the IBM side: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/architecture/topten/ar-toptendec2007.html

Check also a special edition of the Architecture journal on the Microsoft side, with the edition 15 "The role of an architect" (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/arcjournal/default.aspx)

Happy reading!

2008-04-14T09:46:00.000+02:00

As KM finally grown up? is the title of an interesting article you can read on the Knowledgeboard (check http://www.knowledgeboard.com/item/2874) where Jane McKenzie analyzes 4 major trends of evolution:

1. The globalization and the partnership structure (involving more stakeholders in your business value chain) has a dual side. Being more flexible and acquiring knowledge on demand has a price: adding a partner is adding a layer of complexity and cultural perceptions. This is a real challenge;

2. The customer is always right: increased expectation on the customer side requires more innovative ideas and approaches. That is why innovation is a real KM topic and why knowledge managers and workers have to take care of it;

3. Knowledge on the move: The HR challenge resides in the knowledge expertise and knowledge retention. All companies in the world need to identify, share and acquire available and experienced knowledge before it leaves the company (on retirements for example);

4. Keeping the peace and the pace: in that final point resides a potential good future for the KM practices. Knowledge managers could play a strategic role in companies for accelerating innovation, decision-making, improving knowledge sharing in international networks etc.

An interesting prospective reading!

2008-04-03T16:38:00.000+02:00

I mentioned earlier on this Blog the MIT (Sloan Management School) resources that were very interesting and helpful in a life long education track. Check also regularly the Podcast the school proposes, where you will have hundred of good listening session (listen to the Intellectual Capital series from Intellectual Capital: Alan White's World View).

2008-03-16T19:08:00.000+01:00

Have you seen the Web 2.0? No? If you want to guess what could be the site of the future today, just check the MIX community site, with a very clever M I X of web development, architecture, new UI concepts and a lot more on http://sessions.visitmix.com/

This site gathers a lot of new web trends (I discovered it thanks to the Microsoft architecture center) and proposes a lot of presentations and good content. Check it out !

2007-11-23T18:04:00.000+01:00

If you wonder how to keep your important emails attractive and eye-catching, take a look at Chip Heath's article in the McKinsey Quarterly briefing.

Six basic traits are advised:

Simplicity. Messages are most memorable if they are short and deep. Glib sound bites are short, but they don’t last. Proverbs such as the golden rule are short but also deep enough to guide the behavior of people over generations.
Unexpectedness. Something that sounds like common sense won’t stick. Look for the parts of your message that are uncommon sense. Such messages generate interest and curiosity.
Concreteness. Abstract language and ideas don’t leave sensory impressions; concrete images do. Compare “get an American on the moon in this decade” with “seize leadership in the space race through targeted technology initiatives and enhanced team-based routines.”
Credibility. Will the audience buy the message? Can a case be made for the message or is it a confabulation of spin? Very often, a person trying to convey a message cites outside experts when the most credible source is the person listening to the message. Questions—“Have you experienced this?”—are often more credible than outside experts.
Emotions. Case studies that involve people also move them. “We are wired,” Heath writes, “to feel things for people, not abstractions."
Stories. We all tell stories every day. Why? “Research shows that mentally rehearsing a situation helps us perform better when we encounter that situation,” Heath writes. “Stories act as a kind of mental flight simulator, preparing us to respond more quickly and effectively.”

If you want to read the whole interview, have a look at http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/Governance/Leadership/Crafting_a_message_that_sticks_An_interview_with_Chip_Heath_2062

2007-10-19T09:07:00.000+02:00

Interwoven has organized, early this week, its GearUp 2007 event in London. The Document management system company presented the new development road map for their products and I have to recognize that I was impressed.

The major focus will be on the development of the Universal Search engine (we will retrieve our personal documents, within the billions of the corporate docs, in a few seconds...finally :-) that comes on top of other tools (like Microsoft Sharepoint 2007 for example).

If your are interested in the Interwoven products, check http://www.interwoven.com

Change Management workshop in Jubail

2007-09-11T15:45:00.000+02:00

We just had a nice workshop in Saudi Arabia, in the city of Jubail with some KPMG colleagues.

It is all about implementing change managers (or change agents) within a company, how to motivate people and how to reward them as change catalysts.

See what has been stated in Wikipedia about the theory of "changing" within organisations via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change_management

And, by the way, if you do not know where Jubail is, check: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jubail !!

2007-08-07T17:40:00.000+02:00

I just read an article in a Belgian magazine about Banking and Finance. It was all about The growing importance of intangible assets in the stock markets. The article highlighted the fact that traditional audit procedures and processes were only taking into account the evaluation of tangible goods and that the intangible part of our economy was quickly growing.

And the author (Marc Luyckx) is right. And I’m still amazed that nobody drives seriously a community about the assessment of intangible assets, sharing information and research results like for some Open Source projects or any ordinary Wikipedia article.

The pending question here is to know who has to take the lead in that kind of research. Does the private accounting and audit sector need to work on some evaluation tools (and on what the market will put the credibility and the neutrality of the KPIs into questions) or do we need to have a public ‘political’ initiative, like the European Commission leading some specific research projects? Are economic metrics a public property or do the markets have to intervene within the discussion in order to get some fair evaluation criteria?

If you are interested in the intangible capital evaluation, just have a look at http://www.neskey.com. It’s one of the started public initiatives.

2007-08-05T23:58:00.000+02:00

Using the Nokia LifeBlog application is impossible with Blogger accounts (except if you include the API code to the Nokia application yourself - which is probably nearly impossible for 99,99% of the common blogger - thank you folks for the solution). But anyway, the Nokia LifeBlog app is pretty cool and allows you Blog postings directly from the phone.

See here:

Lifeblog automatically collects your images, videos, text and multimedia messages, sounds and blog posts into a single diary that you can easily browse, share, store, and search.

Lifeblog is also available for PCs. Store more, browse more, share more of your life with Lifeblog PC. For more information, visit www.nokia.com/nseries/lifeblog.

So, my solution is to create a new Google doc and to insert LifeBlog pictures and elements for posting it from Google doc (where the automatic log in is perfectly working). The other easy solution is to drop your Blogger account and go for a TypePad compatible one ;-)

2007-08-03T09:51:00.000+02:00

An amazing experience,

I'm just back from Saudi Arabia, where we had a business trip with some KPMG colleagues...

It was a fantastic learning experience, where I discovered the booming reality of the Gulf region.

2007-07-11T13:17:00.000+02:00

If you are an I-Pod user, your can with the 7.3.0 (latest version) of iTunes download a new category of free Pod casts from some Universities. For example, the Stanford University proposes a 45 long series pod casts about the Stanford Technology Ventures Program. You will find in that 'album' plenty of lectures and debates about technology issues and future development. I bet that this kind of 'culture' on the I-Pod is just the beginning of a whole new area of personal and organizational learning changes.

2007-06-26T12:15:00.000+02:00

Always being eager to share some free learning resources on the net, just to let you know that Microsoft is currently offering a time limited access on its e-learning portal. If you are planning to develop (or to lead some projects where some work flow or mobile development is needed), you can access the Microsoft site via this link: http://www.microsoft.com/learning/windowsvista/dev/default.mspx

I believe that a lot of project managers working in the document management area will have to cope with work flow foundation, like the software proposed by Interwoven, Metastorm and/or Microsoft.

By the way, I also tested last week the Google Docs&Spreadsheets editors which are fantastically easy to use and to submit to any Internet user you know (simply via the e-mail address). A kind of good compromise between a private document and a wiki...

Moreover, if you are a Blogger account user, you can automatically publish your document on your Blog. Who spoke about work flow here ?

2007-06-15T14:56:00.000+02:00

I was yesterday and Wednesday in Paris at the Economic Intelligence fair (http://www.i-expo.net), where we met a lot of interesting people.

A lot of conferences, dynamic products demo and some useful contacts have been made around the Competitive Intelligence topic.

Interesting to note is that Web 2.0 is taking the lead within the new trends, even for competitive intelligence people (your learn so much with reading between the lines of a blog :-)

Podcasting on Blogger ?

2007-06-01T10:29:00.000+02:00

I just found a good documentation for adding some podcasting features to your Blog, thanks to the Feedburner conversion. Check this out here.
Who has tried this already ?

Community leaders

2007-06-01T10:16:00.000+02:00

I received today a Linkedin connection from the previous community leader on the KnowledgeBoard, Ed Mitchell. Ed is now an independent community facilitator and coaches several initiatives around the Internet and the Communities. If you're interested in that topic, have a look at http://www.edmitchell.co.uk/blog/
A refreshing insight on the (off and online) community administration...

Some good learning resources for free !!

2007-05-14T23:56:00.000+02:00

Hey, good news friends ! The MIT puts a lot of resources online for free ! check the opencourseware policy of the university online. That's at least a super example of what European institutions and universities should propose...isn't that all public money after all ?

Informal education website

2007-05-04T10:51:00.000+02:00

Preparing a huge Learning Organization project for a major client, I was studying the system thinking approach of Peter Senge. And during my reading, I discovered an excellent social learning educational site. If you have some interest in the question, check the Infed organization.

Magma Consulting at Solutions Business (Charleroi, Belgium)

2007-04-19T13:57:00.000+02:00

A good initiative has been taken by the Walloon region with hosting an important innovation conference. The proposed themes were all around IT, marketing and innovation. And...guess what ? some KM themes were presented as well. More info about all this can be found at www.mlg-consulting.com/websites/solutions-business.

Universal Vodaphone 3G testing

2007-02-26T21:19:00.000+01:00

I'm currently involved in a beta test for rolling out a universal Vodaphone access in Belgium. This is a real wireless revolution, allowing to update and connect from almost everywhere in major european, american and asian countries. Very concluding and inspiring for many many bloggers, I'm pretty sure!

Magma Consulting coaches !

2007-02-09T07:03:00.000+01:00

I received this month the opportunity to be coach of the Bizidee initiative, an entrepreneurship project sponsored by the Belgian Flemish region. We will participate as project coach, helping the candidates to propose their business plan and to formulate their (business) idea correctly.
This is certainly one of the most exciting moment in a SME life - when you're about making your idea real and concrete, especially in front of a well-known jury...
For more info about the Bizidee project, have a look at their web site.

New Microsoft Architecture journal (n°10)

2007-01-19T16:24:00.000+01:00

Just to mention the two good (amongst others, of course) articles in the latest MS Architecture journal (you will find it here within a few days) about Data quality through Enterprise Information Architecture and a sound approach in 'Better Improvement through better architected software'.
It's all clear we're moving from a line of business driven software development to a real and deep end-user interaction, being able to define and describe, even to design, itself what he needs to have on the screen.

Happy New 2007 !

2007-01-17T00:06:00.000+01:00

Well, it has been a while since the last post, sorry for that. Too much work on projects and internal requests, keeping the nose on the wheel...
But one good resolution for this year will be to start with the UnBla conference in Zwitzerland within one week, where I'll be presenting the KM article I wrote about my experience within KPMG in Belgium. A good opportunity to meet some other information management experts and to share potential new research projects within the FP7.0 of the European Commission's IST programme. Some more feedback will be available online, I'm pretty sure of that.
Anyway, I you want to find some info on the UnBla conference, please check the UnBla site.
See you in Luzern next week ?

Always a communication issue

2006-12-26T16:00:00.000+01:00

At least some well deserved days at home! As every year, I'm preparing my business objectives and what I want to achieve (or the objectives I want to reach) in 2007.
Here are some plans I'm thinking about: I'm pretty sure that our management strategies - in KM or not - is lacking some good communication fundamentals, like a good marketing plans and nice communications tactics. I'll work on that within the coming months, beginning with reading a book by David Ogilvy, one of the brightest advertising genius we had.

MS Architecture journal n°8

2006-12-01T14:08:00.000+01:00

I just read an excellent article in the Microsoft Architecture journal (n°8) about the data quality and why it was so crucial to have reliable systems when performing an online transaction. I found in the resources of the article a link to a specific SOA section (in Microsoft environment, of course) that seems to be interesting.
Check here http://www.msdn.microsoft.com/architecture/soa

Competitive Intelligence in the Pharma sector

2006-11-29T03:44:00.000+01:00

I had Monday an interesting discussion with Lorenzo, currently working at Merck Laboratories. It's good to see how competitive intelligence is organizing itself, taking care of some local cultural specificities, like the language or the sectorial needs (like us the information gathering the same for a consulting business or for pharma companies?)...
BTW, a seminar will be held in Berlin around the CI and pharma topic.
Have a look here.

Competitive Intelligence Resources

2006-11-25T08:40:00.000+01:00

I had yesterday evening an interesting discussion with the owner of a small furniture making company. It still amaze me how difficult it is for people that are not specialized in management (account management, marketing management, financial management etc.) to grow in Europe...Can Internet be a first answer to that kind of problem? BTW, here a good Competitive Intelligence entry page: http://www.bidigital.com/ci/

New Google search engine

2006-11-23T22:37:00.000+01:00

I just read, among other web news, that Google is powering a new search engine. I tried it with several queries - and was impressed.
Just try http://www.searchmash.com/

Web developer 2005

2006-11-22T22:26:00.000+01:00

Today has been a great day. I just had a mail exchange with my friend Patricia Wolf about the Unbla 2007 seminar, held in Luzern in January next year. And I decided to go. Some hours later, and there is absolutely no connection between the two facts, I tried and installed the latest Visual Studio 8.0 version, especially the Web developement express edition. Just to have an idea.

Already heard about Gondola language ?

2006-11-11T03:37:00.000+01:00

I just read something new (for me at least) about a stock markets calculation programming language. Incredible.
I thought we could manipulate data as much as we wanted with any 'common' programming languages like C, C# or Java. And I discovered this night that "the Gondola Language is a language for analyzing stock market data. The language allows you to do a variety of tasks from listing stocks in tables that only match your criteria to creating automated buy/sell paper trade rules. The language is closely modeled after the C programming language, so if you know that language, then you should find Gondola easy and familiar to work with. "

Who said computer engineers were not creative?

Toffler and the Revolutionary wealth

2006-10-28T09:02:00.000+02:00

In the analysis of the strategic political changes (like "will the USA still lead the world; what do we have to think about the european model etc.), I've been amazed by the wrong opinion they have from the European continent.
Being a convinced European myself, I can't understand that American authors still have a such a wrong perception of this political project. They are putting in evidence that European bureaucracy, poor innovative research programmes, local nationalisms and aging population are not helping to transform our economies in a knowledge economy (which is, by the way, the revolutionary wealth). They're right. For some of their points, but not all of them. Not being precise in their descriptions, making parallels in their reflections make that they follow the 'arrogant American' attitude, telling to the planet how goes the world and what to think about it. This is, at least in my point of view, a major mistake. But, of course, it's only a humble European voice speaking here.

Alvin and Heidi Toffler, the Revolutionary wealth, Alfred Knopf, NY, 2006.

A good reading

2006-10-18T09:15:00.000+02:00

I bought in NY the latest opus of Alvin and Heidi Toffler (Revolutionary wealth) this summer. The book and deductions are in line of what they produced before (Future shock and the third wave) - evaluating the concept of 'prosumer' (all the people doing or performing an act without any monetary counterpart). It has all to do with intangible assets, evaluation methods in practice within institutions (like schools and universities) and about the future of the 'knowledge economy'. A good sociological insight of the new management issues and trends.

Haeckel (IX) - conclusion of his article

2006-10-13T03:21:00.000+02:00

Knowing why makes it possible to know earlier and respond faster. When everyone knows why, it is because leaders have become good architects who articulate and propagate their intent as system context, rather than as an action plan. It is because leaders have declared a context that makes unambiguous to everyone the raison d'être of the organization, what roles they play in achieving it, and the boundaries of acceptable behavior in it. It is also because individuals are supported by role-specific technology solutions that help them know earlier the meaning of what is happening now. Then speed and agility can be exploited to produce coherent and profitable bottom-up responses to the opportunities and threats of the present. Then an organization can systematically exhibit the sense and respond behavior that is a survival competence for on demand businesses.

Haeckel (VIII) and procedures (coded knowledge)

2006-09-16T11:55:00.000+02:00

What is interesting in Haeckel his article is the application he makes from the theory in a real (financial) world. Let's read it further:

Procedures, in contrast, codify know-how. Their design necessarily entails predictions about inputs, contigencies, and the best way of doing something. Their ability to deal with the unexpected is limited by the imagination of the designer, rather than by an on-the-spot interpretation of current reality. When something unanticipated does arise, the best a procedure can do is deliver an exception report - the designer's way of saying, "I hope there is a Marshall Faulk out there to deal with this".

Now, let's have a look at how Haeckel uses his definitions (or vision) in a real business life case: a merge and acquisition (M&A in the financial jargon)operation:

Unless leaders are good architects - wich means they can be clear about organizational purpose an how the parts of the business relate to the purpose and to each other - how could anyone else in the organization know these things? Integrating two separately conceived business models requires the development of a new and different business model, with a newly defined purpose.

[...]The practice of expressing the rationale for any merger or acquisition as a new business systems design should be a required element in the due dilligence phase of decisions on mergers and acquisitions (M&A): Unless it is known from the start how the capabilities of the organizations in question will interact with one another, the expected benefits of lower cost and greater revenue will be at best short-lived, and the acquired capabilities will rapidely become under-performing assets.

Coming back to the Top-down (systems) design

2006-09-02T11:11:00.000+02:00

The top-down design principle does more than identify poor practice. Accordingly, a system design effort should start by identifying the constituents for which the organization must produce outcomes, and that those outcomes are. It is from this work that the purpose, or design point, of the organization should be determined, not from an analysis of the company's existing capabilities. As a result, the design is "purpose down" rather than "capabilities up". (Haeckel)

This assertion from Haeckel is certainly true in project management. When determining what has to be accomplished at the end of the project (like the major deliverable or project result), most of the time, a lot of stakeholders propose some additional features and some 'nice to have' points. This is where the budget gets lost and where the problem are coming from.

Some pictures of the trip

2006-08-17T02:16:00.000+02:00

One or two pictures of the trip I made in NY last week; the idea was to explore any intiatives and business publications about competitive intelligence and knowledge management. I know the US event of the SCIP organisation will be held in Manhattan at the end of the month, but I'll probably attend the european sessions in October 06.

A view of Manhattan (from the Empire State Building - Floor 86)
For the ones that like Pop Art, here a famous picture (MoMA)
Here left, a small market at Union Square. New Yorkers have still green on their tables ;-)

Just back from NY

2006-08-14T12:40:00.000+02:00

We arrived in Belgium this night, after seven days business (and leisure ;-) trip to big apple. A good weather, an excellent sightseeing, a lot of shopping and full of good readings about wining the knowledge game. I'll discuss later on what to understand under the expression.

For now, I'll explain here a little bit more about the connections and the matrix symptom, still based on Haeckel his article.

Matrix management consists of: the lines connecting roles in an organizational matrix are not informed by a systems design. Instead, they are lines of communication connecting people in different silos of authority. These lines almost always increase ambiguity about who is responsible for what.

A 1998 study of multidivisional teams in a large multiproduct company quantified the opportunity cost of matrix conflict in terms of deals lost, not pursued, or not closed because of non competitive bids at more than $10 million, and the company had dozens of these teams in operation at any given time. The root cause was identified as 'lack of clarity about roles, accountabilities, and authorities'.

Applying systems design principles to business

2006-07-30T10:27:00.000+02:00

A system is a collection of elements that interact to produce an effect that cannot be produced by any subset of the elements.

This interesting definition of what is a system guides Haeckel to define the synergy (the glue between the elements):

Defining synergy as a result that is "more than the sum of the parts" is closer to the mark. This definition, for example, is what the corporate office of the General Electric Company (GE) achieves by lowering the cost of doing business for its subsidiaries. Because they are part of GE's portfolio, the subsidiaries benefit from the economies of scope that come from sharing the GE logo: GE's AAA investment rating, GE's worldwide telecommunications network, and GE's 'boundaryless' knowledge, to name some of the assets that are shared accross units. The result is that the units are more profitable as part of GE than they would be as separate entities, which means that GE's revenue and profit are more than the sum of its part would produce as separate companies.

Adaptiveness and sport world

2006-07-26T01:44:00.000+02:00

What is interesting in Haeckel his article is the final conclusion he makes about sports and business:

Moreover, agility - the ability to change directions rapidly - is not enough. The change must be appropriate to the situation, which is why an ability to size up the current situation earlier is fundamental to adaptiveness. How many managerial proponents of velocity, agility, and speed to market understand this distinction?

In the next post, we will analyze what systemic answers and business design principles can be - and what's the relation with KM concepts.

Sport analogies

2006-07-16T15:26:00.000+02:00

These sports analogies capture an important insight for business leaders - the people who are responsible for creating the enterprise playbook and keeping everyone in the business on the same page. Having an employee like Marshall Faulk is a great advantage only if the business design leverages his skills. Knowing earlier without the ability and opportunity to act on that knowledge produces frustration, not success. [...]
Moreover, agility - the ability to change directions rapidly - is not enough. The change must be appropriate to the situation, which is why an ability to size up the current situation earlier is fundamental to adaptiveness. How many managerial proponents of velocity, agility, and speed to market understand this distinction? Haeckel, IBM Systems journal, vol.42, n°3, 2003.

Marshall Faulk (Part 3)

2006-07-12T22:16:00.000+02:00

What's interesting to analyze is to see how a football pro learns:

"He also knows, from hours and hours of watching miles of game tapes, the patterns and proclivities of defensive players. At a higher level, because of his pattern-recognizing ability to rapidly size up the implications of a given game situation, Faulk knows something much more important: he knows earlier than anyone else on the field the meaning of what is happening now. That is what enables him to play faster, rather than run faster."

Knowledge patterns

2006-07-09T10:28:00.000+02:00

Just to continue the comparison between sport reflexes and intellectual reasoning, let's read further Haecke's article. He continues to argue that patterns recognition is the secret of sport champions, extending the concept to business executives.

"In business terms, Marshall Faulk is an excellent sense-and-respond decision-maker. His decisions are not analytical, or 'data driven', even though he spends an extraordinary amount of time studying films to extract the tendencies of opposing teams and coaches - what they are likely to do under a variety of game situations. As he watches the films, he is looking for and internalizing patterns. When he is given the ball, it is his pattern recognition capability, not his reasoning skill, that enables him to anticipate and respond to what is happening on the field. The patterns he recognizes are systems patterns, not activity sequences. The current relationships between the players, more than the current actions of them, informs Faulk's real-time decisions."

Haeckel's analysis is typically what we do when we learn in several situations, during our life, building on top of the previous experience a new one. This lead to - at least in a professional environment - to a valuable experience employers are ready to pay for. That's why an experienced person is a perfect match in a specific situation, because he has integrated in his mind multiple situations where he can rely on in order to take a decision. It's the same phenomenon that you have in car driving, when without any conscious analysis, you jump on the brake avoiding a car crash.

Leading on demand business-Executives as architects

2006-07-06T12:48:00.000+02:00

I just read an article from the IBM systems Journal (Vol. 42, N°3, 2003) an article from S.H. Haeckel about the similarities between business executives and architects.

The first remark I had is about the opposition between the know-how and the know-why.

"[...] I don't just want to know what everybody has to do; I want to know why. When you know why, you know more...You play faster".

This exceptional athlete [the quote is from Marshall Faulk, a US football player] was not talking about his know-how. He was talking about know-why. Know-how is procedural knowledge, which is action centered and based on practice, and Faulk has a super abundance of it. But it is know-why that distinguishes him from other talented athletes, enabling him to better anticipate what will happen next. He does this not by projecting historical trends, but by deriving meaning in real time from what is happening now. This meaning comes from an understanding of the context within which action takes place, rather than from an understanding of how to perform action."

Why people like to keep in touch?

2006-07-03T22:30:00.000+02:00

I had a light lunch with an old friend of mine I didn't see for more than 15 years.
Of course, we had a lot to say, to tell about our families, jobs and all what had happened in our lifes. But a central question was about the nature of relations (between college friends) - why we were sitting in that specific restaurant, laughing about souvenirs and wondering why some others were a little bit reluctant on (re)taking contacts with a previous (old) community [our last grade class].
Interesting problem and a fantastic time spent together!

CRM week

2006-07-01T07:28:00.000+02:00

A lot of work to perform on our Microsoft CRM project. All the processes to streamline and all the links to establish between the info tables, a kind of nightmare... However, a good blog where I found valuable info: http://microsoftcrm3.blogspot.com/.

KnowledgeBoard 3.0 Meeting

2006-06-24T18:28:00.000+02:00

Just back from Paris - with no computer with me.
The steering group meeting about the Knowledgeboard's future was very positive and useful. We decided there to promote and leverage the site and its content, but with an important and massive focus on the transition period (between the end of it as european public funded portal and January 2007, where it will become a privately run community site).
A lot of ideas and Blog links will be established, certainly from my side (opening the platform to the 'applied' knowledge management - the one that companies want to have, concrete, applied to their business and not the esoterical one, just defining itself for the beauty of the art). To be continued,
PS: we were on the Champs-Elysees on Saterday night, with a fantastic massive joy explosion from the Frenchies, wining against Togo 2-0, passing the next stage in World soccer cup. Very nice to live :-)

Intelligent filters

2006-06-19T21:08:00.000+02:00

3 good definitions I read about 'intelligent filtering':

1. Collaborative (or social filtering): the software compares the user's preferences to those of other users to predict which information will be of interest. Collaborative filtering makes use of agents which learn from other agents. It offers the tantalizing potential for community-building: the software's ability to match up like-minded individuals has important implications for eliminating work redundancies and creating communities of practice accross functional areas or within geographically dispersed organisations. This is like in Ecademy or in LinkedIn interfaces.

2. Psychographic filtering: uses a pyschographic profile to perform the same function as the collaborative filter. Like in MSN or CNN news channels that the user can define to his region.

3. Adaptive filter: this is the most sophisticated of the filters. By asking the user to rate material that has been delivered, the software is able to 'learn' the user's preferences, changing course (along with her). That's probably there that the user stops. I search quite often some technical articles on MSDN, where the search engine asks me to rate the article. I never do it...

Sharepoint 2007 Bootcamp - Ciao guys,

2006-06-17T01:42:00.000+02:00

The week is finished. We had a very positive learning experience with Patrick and all the guys taking part of the Bootcamp. Very instructive and useful to plan the next migration; after the day, I went to the book store for books about management and philosophy, one about UML and modelisation of objects and a last one on Eclipse (sorry guys, it must be a reaction after one extensive Microsoft week ;-)

I tried this morning to read about some system thinking and design (or why in essence more and more top executive have to be busy with architectural concepts). However, the traffic jams wasn't long enough to finish it, so I'll surely blog on that next week. Last point, I just noticed that my good old chap Linux Suze 10.1 is installed and ready for testing. I predict a huge reaction on the Microsoft code, announced (partially at least) open for academics and research projects. Hm hm...

Refonte du site Magma Consulting

2006-06-16T02:42:00.000+02:00

Je me suis enfin décidé à refondre mon site. Dopé par mes cours Microsoft, je prends mon courage à deux mains et me mets (efin, diront certains) au boulot.
Quelques heures plus tard, le résultat ne se fait plus trop attendre...Disons que le nouveau template (épuré) du Blog m'a bien inspiré pour le site en lui-même.
J'ose à peine croire que je vais pouvoir mettre ça en ligne.