Around the Corner

A little over three years ago the National Academies published Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future. The Gathering Storm report is the Academies' response to a request by Senators Lamar Alexander and Jeff Bingaman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources to “conduct an assessment of America’s ability to compete and prosper in the 21st century – and to propose appropriate actions to enhance the likeliness of success in that endeavor.”

During this global economic crisis the Gathering Storm report seems even timelier than when it was written. The findings in the report come as no surprise: that America faces serious and intensifying challenges to its competitiveness as do Americans to our standard of living; that pervasive information and communication technologies (ICTs) have intensified competition for high paying jobs across national boundaries; and that knowledge and innovation are crucial to American competitiveness as well as each individual’s standard of living.

Since the Gathering Storm report was issued, the mortgage crisis impacted both employment and our standard of living in ways the Academies did not anticipate, yet the recommendations of the report remain all too relevant. Just last month before the House Appropiations Committee on Commerce, Justice and Science, Norman Augustine, Chair of the National Academies committee that produced the report, testified that “It is perhaps appropriate at this point to note why the Gathering Storm committee placed such great emphasis on science and engineering, including the endeavors of research and education. The reason is that while scientists and engineers comprise only four percent of the nation’s workforce, they disproportionately create jobs for the other 96 percent … and jobs for all citizens is what the Academies report was really about. Numerous other studies have shown that over the last half century between 50 and 85 percent of the growth in Gross Domestic Product is attributable to advancement in science and engineering. In the current century, the Knowledge Century, this effect is likely to be even more prominent.”

The World Economic Forum’s Global Information Technology Report (GITR) provides a framework to understand how 134 nations comprising 98% of the world’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) are prepared to emerge from the global economic crisis. This framework called the Network Readiness Framework (NRF) measures the extent to which economies benefit from the latest ICT advances where benefit means each nation’s competitive position ranked according to an associated Network Readiness Index (NRI). The NRI includes weighting for many factors mentioned in the Gathering Storm report and although the GITR focuses only on ICTs it serves as a useful companion to the Gathering Storm report. Most importantly, Figure 1 demonstrates a high correlation between the NRI score and Per Capita GDP providing solid evidence of Mr. Augustine’s claim that growth in GDP is attributable to science and technology.

So how competitive is the U.S. three years after the Gathering Storm report according to the NRI? We rank at #3 overall, up one place from last year and four places the year before. Again it’s no surprise that countries ranked high in the World Bank knowledge economy index also rank high in GITR, with Denmark once again ranked #1 and European nations taking 7 of the top ten spots. Our strengths are in venture capital availability (#1), quality of scientific research institutions (#1), and business internet use (#1), and e-government participation (#1). By contrast we score low in the following criteria: effectiveness of law making bodies (#33), property rights (#26), quality of math and science education (#48), government prioritization of ICT (#18), importance of ICT to government vision of the future (#28), government success in ICT promotion (#21), ICT use and government efficiency (#18), and presence of ICT in government offices (#16).

So the GITR has some good news as well as a useful comparative analysis supporting our future planning. I hope you'll take the time to read either the report highlights or browse the interactive version.

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Have you noticed the person sitting next to you might have different work habits, values or ambitions? The workforce is now comprised of four generations (4-G): Matures, Boomers, GenXers and GenYs (also called Millennials). Matures are born before 1946, Boomers between 1946 and 1964, GenXers between 1965 and 1977 and the GenYs after 1978.

Generations differ in their approach to work. We all want to get work done, we just do it in different ways. Sometimes it's the events that have shaped our lives; sometimes it's what we need in our lives at a given time that shapes the way we work. You might work with Boomers who work tirelessly in the office on a dedicated task and prefer face-to-face communications. In contrast GenXers or GenYs may prefer to work remotely in coordinated groups using email, wikis, text messages or telephone conferences. Don Tapscott, in his recent book Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation, explores the significant workplace changes being wrought by Millennials and those who have grown up immersed in technology.

Of course, our goal is to work together productively and understanding one another's styles is a big part of doing just that. But it's no easy task in the 4-G workforce. Respect for different approaches is a good place to start. Team members may specialize in areas where they're most productive or best suit the team goals. Matures or Boomers may serve as excellent mentors and GenYs may bring a fresh set of eyes or a technology-based approach that is a big help.

Supervising the 4-G workforce requires leaders who can build trust across widely diverse styles, behaviors and individuals. Some may lean towards enforcing policies, others towards autonomy with the hope of an increase in productivity. There are no easy answers, but we are stronger together than we are as individuals. Recognizing the strengths each generation--and each individual--brings to the workplace is a good place to start.

You can share your experiences here on Around the Corner.

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As I mentioned in my recent post called The Language of Innovation, Gary Hamel is onto something truly vital with his work on Moonshots for Management. Inspired by the National Academy of Engineering’s Grand Engineering Challenges and the work of the X-Prize Foundation, Hamel and a group of the world’s most recognizable innovators spent two days together last May defining twenty-five make or break challenges for the future of management in the 21st century. Why define these make or break challenges? As Hamel explains, many of today’s management techniques originated in the late 19th century with one specific purpose: train semi-skilled human resources to repeat manual tasks at ever increasing levels of efficiency. Simply put, these management techniques are ill suited to today's organizations which operate not in an industrial, but in a knowledge economy.

So what’s a knowledge economy and why is it important to management techniques? The term knowledge economy was introduced into the mainstream by Peter Drucker in his 1966 book The Effective Executive to differentiate an economy where organizations profit by the labor of employees who worked with their heads, not their hands. Since its introduction the idea of a knowledge economy has become widely accepted. Today the World Bank ranks nations annually in its Knowledge Economy Index according to the four pillars of its Knowledge Assessment Methodology: economic incentive and institutional regime; education and training; innovation and technological adoption; and information and communication technologies (ICT) infrastructure. As one might suspect, in 2008, eight years after adoption of the Lisbon Strategy, European countries dominated the knowledge index ranking with Denmark at the top. The U.S. currently ranks number 9.

Lawyers, doctors, software engineers, teachers, scientists and public servants are all considered knowledge workers. The twenty-five moonshots Hamel and his colleagues defined speak volumes about how to manage knowledge workers so they can be most effective. Moonshot #2, Fully Embed the Ideas of Community and Citizenship in Management Systems, makes a lot of sense to me. As we all know too well, knowledge is a precious commodity and as professionals we all need and learn from each other. It seems today that things change so rapidly it takes an entire community to master a discipline. As do moonshots #6, Reinvent the Means of Control and #7, Redefine the Work of Leadership. When managing knowledge workers we must transcend the dichotomy between discipline and innovation as mutually exclusive opposites. And if it takes an entire community to master a discipline, leaders must evolve into social-systems architects who enable collaboration and innovation rather than constrain decisions. Moonshot #5, Reduce Fear and Increase Trust as well as #8, Expand and Exploit Diversity, strengthen both the culture and the effectiveness of an organization. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, describes in this conference video how the effectiveness of the Google organization is embedded within its culture. Finally Moonshot #15, Create a Democracy of Information, articulates a very optimistic view of how information technology can empower us all to act on behalf of the entire organization.

These are just a few of my favorites. Please let me know yours. I hope you enjoy challenges as I do. Whether you’re a knowledge worker, a leader or a manager these Moonshots are our challenges together.

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