Recently Published Work

'Bring Your Own' Is Not Just About Devices

Mon, 07 May 2012 00:00:00 CDT

On the one hand, it’s all been gratifying. We have been saying for many years that it was inevitable that employees would increasingly own and manage their personal technologies, and that corporate control over employee IT would recede. While many have been sceptical, during 2012 this view has become the conventional wisdom, with one giant firm after another launching various Bring Your Own (BYO) programmes. Industry conferences and the associated punditry have quickly followed suit.

Leveraging the Co-evolution of Marketing and IT

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Today, the combination of powerful consumer technologies and Marketing-IT co-evolution presents business leaders with a major opportunity to expand their areas of expertise and fully participate in some of the most exciting and rapidly growing segments of the IT industry. Perhaps only smart products and the internet of things rival marketing technology in terms of potential business and societal impact.

The Telestick - An Economical and Secure Way to Work

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Exploring Three Aspects of Security in an Increasingly Mobile and Externalized World

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Learning from Web 2.0

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Growing Out of the Socially Awkward Phase: Leveraging the Co-Evolution of Marketing and IT

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Developing an Outside-In Perspective

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 00:00:00 CDT

What does it mean for a business to be outside-in – to really be driven by marketplace signals, needs and dynamics? It’s a question we have been thinking about a lot recently, as digital technology creates new ways to listen to the market and rapidly respond to change.

Emerging Approaches to Improving Business Agility

Mon, 02 Apr 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Following our research into the Future of Retained IT which identified four emerging new models for Enterprise IT, my research over the last few months has drilled deeper into one of these models – the 'Process Manager' (PM) – particularly considering its relationship to business agility. The PM adds value to the firm by leveraging Enterprise IT's deep knowledge of business processes and improving the agility of the firm by applying existing platforms more effectively. To this end, I have interviewed many senior IT executives on the need to improve business agility in their organizations and adopt more of a 'plug and play' approach, especially as IT moves to the front of the firm.

Learning from Web 2.0

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Learning from Web 2.0

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CDT

Technology: The Silver Bullet of Growth?

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Revitalizing Retained IT - Emerging Missions and Models

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Preparing for the Post-PC World

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Moving IT to the Front of the Firm

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Socially Awkward - The Evolving IT/Marketing Relationship

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Social Media as a Platform for Business Innovation

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

The Future of Business IT - Repositioned at the Front of the Firm

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Who are your software 'agents' really working for?

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Take yourself back a century or two. Imagine that your butler was reporting all of your activities – and I do mean all – to the local newspaper editor. How would you feel about your ‘downstairs’ staff after such a breakdown in trust?

Business Transparency - Finding the Right Balance for your Firm

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

In April, it will be two years since Wikileaks came to prominence by releasing a video of a controversial US helicopter attack in Baghdad. Over the remainder of 2010, Wikileaks published several hundred thousand pages of additional US government material, much of it classified as confidential.

Any Given Tuesday

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 00:00:00 CST

Back in 2005, I gave a presentation called Any Given Tuesday which describes two entirely different scenarios for the same day. In the first scenario, I wake up at 6:45 am, spend 10 minutes trying to find my watch, leave the house at 7:15 am, drive like a madman to the station, spend 30 minutes waiting for a train due to cancellation, get to London bridge at 9:15 am, get soaked because it is raining, rush to work missing my coffee, arrive at work 9:35 am, discover my CFO has been trying to call but I've left my phone at home, realize I have football today but no boots as I threw them away last week, my partner calls to remind me it's Mother’s Day and my sister's birthday tomorrow – both of which I've done nothing about.

Marketing and Enterprise IT – An Indispensable Relationship

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 00:00:00 CST

Real-time customer information and the ability to listen to what the online world is saying are becoming critical business requirements, as information technology moves to the very front of the firm. In response, companies are being asked to master a whole new set of previously arcane IT skills such as data analytics, search engine optimization, social media conversations and location awareness.

Learning from Web 2.0

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:00:00 CST

Socially Awkward - Preparing for the Co-evolution of Marketing and IT

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 00:00:00 CST

Socially Awkward – The Co-evolution of Marketing and IT

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 00:00:00 CST

The Next Generation of Digital Game-Changers

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:00:00 CST

The Next Generation of Digital Game-Changers

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:00:00 CST

2011 Study Tour Report: Mobility and the Onset of a Post-PC World

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:00:00 CST

The Next Generation of Digital Game-Changers

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 00:00:00 CST

Preparing for the Co-evolution of Marketing and IT

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 00:00:00 CST

The Global Economy Today, IT's Role and our Research Focus

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 00:00:00 CST

Is IT Making Unemployment Worse? The Debate Has Begun

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 00:00:00 CST

In America, the combination of high unemployment and the start of the presidential election process has sparked a great deal of debate about how jobs are created, and lost. Nothing new there. Similar academic and populist debates have been part of every modern recession, as society seeks both strategies – legislation, fiscal and monetary policies – and scapegoats – corporations, machines, trade, foreigners, etc.

Socially Awkward - The Evolving IT/Marketing Relationship

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 00:00:00 CST

Findings from the 2011 Study Tour - Mobility and the Onset of a Post-PC World

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 00:00:00 CST

Findings from the 2011 Study Tour - Mobility and the Onset of a Post-PC World

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 00:00:00 CST

Key Messages from our Recent Transparency Research – Conceal or Reveal? Transparency Strategies for Business Advantage

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:00:00 CST

Over the last twenty years, information technology – especially the internet – has dramatically increased the amount, accessibility and velocity of digital information. This is causing huge changes in how almost every company is organized and run. In a new LEF position paper, David Moschella and I examine one particularly important change: the growing pressure on companies to share more information and data about their business. We show how some companies are harnessing the power of transparency to become more productive and successful, to innovate more quickly, and to build trust among their customers, partners and investors.

Fusing the Austerity and Growth Agendas – 2012 LEF Research Outlook

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 00:00:00 CST

Keynes called it the paradox of thrift. During recessions, spending cutbacks by individuals, households and firms are to be expected. Yet, for society overall, this type of mass austerity tends to make the downturn worse. Keynes and his disciples have long argued that the only practical way to resolve this paradox is through substantial government spending. But boosting spending in today's debt-laden western economies requires a big and counter-intuitive bet: that even more debt today will lead to more prosperity tomorrow. Many of us are deeply sceptical, hence our vacillating national leaders.

Findings from the 2011 Study Tour - Mobility and the Onset of a Post-PC World

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 00:00:00 CST

Findings from the 2011 Study Tour - Mobility and the Onset of a Post-PC World

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 00:00:00 CST

Conceal or Reveal? Transparency Strategies for Business Advantage

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 00:00:00 CST

Ecosystem and Porter

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 00:00:00 CST

A common characteristic of Next generation organizations (as opposed to traditional), is their focus on provision of utility IT services through an online API and development of an ecosystem to consume those APIs.

The consumption of these API services may represent general use (solving an existing problem, such as providing infrastructure for a corporate web site), or even the genesis of novel and more creative activities. Examples of the latter include early provision of big data Hadoop systems on AWS. Since the genesis of any activity is uncertain (being chaotic) and likely to fail, then the use of utility services helps reduce the cost of failure for those pursuing more creative ventures. The larger the ecosystem, the more likely that creative models of consumption and the genesis of new activity will be occurring.