“When play comes first, learning comes naturally.” Playskool TV commercial.

Businesses cannot hope to begin to leverage the innate creativity and learning ability of their people if they continue to rigidly define work, training and R&D as separate, isolated silos.

If work feels like work most of the time, there is not enough play!

“I think, though, that the age of actions without consequences is drawing to a close. Let’s hope so.” Sam Leader, FlyingSolo

Consider:

Educators are increasingly using the Internet to identify plagiarism.
The blogosphere acts as a global fact checker – make claims that are untrue and you will be found out.
It is easier than every before to conduct quick character checks - Google someone’s name!
Email is often used …

Integration - what individuals (and businesses) seek to create within themselves. We are talking about being whole and acting seamlessly together. Where the left hand not only knows what the right hand is up to, but all hands are on deck, united by the same values, and aiming for the same horizon.

Differentiation - the more an individual (or a business) is integrated internally, the more differentiated one will …

Ah, nothing like good old poo humour to laugh out the week, and the financial year!

AngryAussie’s post: alli: Miracle diet pill with teeny-tiny side effect is a very funny read and obviously struck a cord with many - 322 comments to date!

It is a great (and rather extreme) example of how marketing as a profession has devolved to the point of literally spinning sh*t. Many of …

Company structures may well still be based on the factory model. But the cogs of the machine, the workers, are no longer the illiterate and externally-motivated unwashed. In fact, most knowledge workers these days do wash!

It is no longer sufficient to blindly follow last century’s “best-practices” when it comes to “managing” knowledge workers. New processes, tools and strategies founded on the basis of respect and collaboration are the …

I hate dealing with People Telecom. Hate it.

Trying to speak to anyone on the phone has taken up to two hours of waiting (no exaggeration) on more than two occasions in the past. And they make promises they don’t or are not interested in keeping.

Recently, I got a new credit card (a new expiry date to be precise). As I am on an automated payment with People Telecom, …

Sharing information openly with customers empowers them to engage with your product or service in a more intimate way. It gives them more options such as self-service. It helps them understand your product and service. Consider this: the more secrets you keep, the more you alienate other people.

Lenovo is a great example. For every product they make, Lenovo freely provides a highly comprehensive Hardware Maintenance Manual. The …

“CHINA’S former top food and drug regulator has been given the death penalty in an unusually harsh sentence against a backdrop of widening international and domestic concern over the safety of “Made in China” food, pharmaceutical and other products.”

This article by Mary-Anne Toy Death sentence for corrupt food and drug boss in the Sydney Morning Herald made me wonder (not without a huge amount …

Many of (most of? ALL of?) us maintain multiple facades. We are one person at work, a different person when with our friends, parents, partners; and yet another person when on the Internet. And it even varies depending on where on the Internet!

Imagine if we could harness and channel the energy we spend on maintaining these façades towards something more constructive!

The same situation exists for businesses too. We …

Perhaps it is not so much an attention economy (where generating attention is the new currency), but rather an attention-starved economy.

Attention-starved as in: “I want someone to pay me attention and I am prepared to pay for it!”

A service business is not really about the quality of service, but rather the quality of the attention paid to customers. Customer services is more than just serving customers, it is …