change

There is some disturbing new data for the role of the CIO. Thomas Wailgum of CIO.com says, “Given the… warning signs, it’s easy to speculate that the CIO’s role and the department’s sovereign power might be slip-sliding away.” Half of our Diamond Digital IQ Survey respondents said that more than 30% of the dollars spent on IT is done outside of IT. Power in any organization usually follows those who can create new revenue and value, but our survey shows that 75% of the CIO’s innovation role is internally facing.

There's an emerging field in science called evolutionary medicine in which the causes for some diseases and chronic afflictions are found in the conflicts between the varied rates of change among human beings, the pathogens that haunt them, and the context of the environment in which it all exists.

Can design change the world? Or at least let’s try to change healthcare. Or shall we start with our education system? There are plenty to change and no shortage of ideas. Do we need more new and cool products? Or we just need products that last? Or products that are cheap to repair and not throwaways that are costing our environment?

So many business terms that we take for granted - like "survival of the fittest" - are actually based on Charles Darwin's seminal work on the ways that species adapt to their environment in the wild -- and the way these adaptations are handed down to their progeny. So it's always fun when other innovation bloggers combine smart thinking about corporate innovation with insights about Darwinian evolution. Here, Michael E. Driscoll of Dataspora asks What Can Darwin's Finches Tell Us About the Downturn?

The title of this book caught my attention in a book store in Hong Kong. I didn't open or buy the book, just thought the title was funny. Meeting with a couple of friends here in Asia and the common topic is business is getting tougher and tougher. Out of the half-a-dozen people I've talked to you, all six of them are executing on business strategies that are not creating value in the long term.

This is the garage where David Packard and William Hewlett started their new company in 1938 as fresh Stanford University engineering graduates. This is probably one of the key places in California that can be called the birthplace of Silicon Valley. If you visit this tiny garage, you will find In front of the house a plaque officially declaring the location the "birthplace of Silicon Valley” some 70 years ago. The Valley not only transform businesses, it also transform societies and politics.

by: Sigurd Rinde