Ian M Rountree

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Thoughts from Average is Over

June 6, 2015 by Ian Leave a Comment

On Google Play, where I bought this book, I wrote the following terse book review;

This is not a book that you understand in the first twenty pages.

The concept is pretty simple – boredom and a want of simplicity are keeping us from working with all of the tools we have to build a better world, a better economy, and a better life. However, the volume of detail Cowen goes into on just how that world might look is compelling, dangerous, and a little scary – but in a good way.

I’ve already recommended this to at least 3 people – and will continue to do so in the future.

Average is Over - Powering America Beyond the Age of the Great Stagnation - Tyler Cowen | Google Play Books
Oddly, I found this book via Imgur – not via a business blog.

The ability to work with and interpret for computers is a big deal – and it’ll continue to be bigger and bigger as computers get better. All those soft skills your councillors tried to foist on you will pay off, if they already haven’t. However they won’t necessarily just pay off with people – they’ll pay off with your ability to be the back-channel between those who understand computer work, and those who do not.

This is a core part of what Cowen is getting at, but the reasoning behind it is very important to understanding the why for why this interpretation is so crucial to developing personal and cultural economic success.

Bizarrely, while this is an economist’s book about computing, and it comes very clearly from a statistical thoroughness I can’t possibly recognize in a book review properly, Average is Over feels very much like a galvanizing agent for knowledge workers. It’s not going to teach you to handle margins, do statistics in any real way, or anything like that. What this book offers is an understanding – from a non-business point of view – of just why the rush in knowledge work is so meaningful, against the backdrop of “normal people living normal lives.” It’s also a fairly damning account of just why the middle class is evaporating – though, thankfully, the book has some things to say about why that’s not necessarily a bad thing either.

What I appreciate most, personally, is that Tyler Cowen is and behaves like a knowledge worker himself.

If you follow him on Twitter, or read the blog at Marginal Revolution, you’ll get a broader sense of what fuels Cowen’s work, and where his passion is; making life better through adding value to information, which should be the knowledge worker’s mantra.

Without becoming too exhaustive, I’ll leave some key thoughts I had from the reading of Average is Over – and hopefully they’ll either spark some discussion or urge you to read the book itself;

  • The “average” being discussed is the middle class, without a doubt. Strangely, how I read this is that – and I’m nowhere near equipped to back it against data – there’s going to be far more room to get into the “have” category none the less, for those willing to do so. We’re not all going to like that, on both sides. Barriers to entry to the have-class are going to relate much more to personal effort in the future than legacy advantages.
  • Elitism is OK, as long as it puts on a polite face. We see this in gaming culture all the time. Even the most staunch “git gud son” players of online games can be the best of people – if they understand, and have the soft skills available, how to manage their environments and the people in those environments. As a force for internal personal development, or even external encouragement, “good enough isn’t good enough” is actually really powerful.
  • Median inflation adjusted income is dropping, have we compared this to an increase or a decrease in consumption? What gets me is that, if needs-and-expenses are also dropping, then inflation might be more related to wants. Again, we’re seeing that “effort” as above, may relate to force of will and personal austerity in some areas. Maybe people who don’t get the Apple Watch are the winners, in other words.
  • Your data is your most valuable and irreplaceable currency – and I’ll probably talk about this a little more soon. Tim Cook (Apple) very recently threw a pooh-pooh at Google and Microsoft for making business out of people’s’ data. What’s interesting about this, as relates to the book, is the idea that aggregates most often trump individuals as far as big-enough-data is concerned, and oddly that makes us safer and not less secure.

There’s so much more here as fuel for discussion. What I’m electing to take away from the book en mass though is the idea that setting your expectations, and then learning how to back those expectations out toward reality, is a killer app in terms of thought technology.

Get Average is Over by Tyler Cowan on Google Play Books – or, you know, that other place that used to be nothing but books and now sends you toilet paper overnight.

Filed Under: Reviews Tagged With: book review, books, business, economics, success, tyler cowen

Language Problems – From Verbs to Nouns

May 23, 2011 by Ian Leave a Comment

“England and America are two countries divided by a common language.”

George Bernard Shaw

One of the biggest confusions people can have in communication is using the same words, but meaning different things.

Breaking Through - Ryan Ziegler | FlickrI don’t mean homonyms, stereotype, or any other typifying agent. I’m not talking about the pronunciation of tomato or potato either. I’m talking about literal speech, interpretation, and where it all falls down between people.

We see this kind of improperly filtered language problem all the time with conversation. Whether we’re speaking or listening, we miss bits where they’re important.

If you ask how I’m doing, and I respond with “I’m fine.” – what do you think I mean? Do I really mean I’m doing well, or am I perhaps masking a bigger problem that I’d rather not discuss?

If I tell you things are hectic or ridiculous at work, does that mean I’m struggling with my job, or that I’m in my glory as an organizer and producer?

It’s not just interpersonal communication either – language affects how we do business. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Communication Tagged With: bloggers, Blogging, business, business communications, communication, deliverables, language, nouns, verbs, work, writing

Education and Social Media

May 19, 2011 by Ian 3 Comments

Graduation 2008 - Thirty30 Photography | FlickrThere’s a lot of discussion in professional social media circles – from publishers, to consultants, to agencies – about education. Clients need it, businesses need it, the public needs it – but so do the professionals working in these very complex, highly unorganized fields.

There’s now very little stringent education directly related to social networking as a business communication tool; while there are plenty of dyed in the wool professionals, the building of a knowledge base accessible through higher education seems slow in catching up. This isn’t even a theory versus practice problem – I think it’s an educational system problem.

How can we create education for new kinds of professionals, when education itself is failing?

This article from MENG Blend on May 17th tells a strong story about the state of education in general:

[…] even though the real ROI of college over time is well-documented, college completion rates are falling rapidly.  On average, four year public schools graduate only 37% of their students within four years.  The story at community colleges, which account for 46% of all undergraduates, is even worse:  just 25% of those at 2-year colleges graduate within three years of the time they start.

Damning, isn’t it? [Read more…]

Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: business, college, commentary, education, on-the-web, qualifications, rant-alert, reaction, social media, sociology, statistics, teaching, the-web, university

A Social Media Policy for Awesome Knowledge Workers

May 11, 2011 by Ian 6 Comments

Awesome Bat-shirt - istolethetv | FlickrIf you are a knowledge worker – whether a marketer, a programmer, a blogger, any other form of writer, a critic, a human resources professional, support personnel for a company, or even a cook – you have one purpose inextricably tied to all your public activities, on and off the web.

You are here to be awesome on your clients behalf.

Your better understanding of social media, traditional media, and the communicative web will help you be awesome. It’s really not that hard; You Cannot Suck. How you achieve this is where it gets complex – but it’s not complicated out of intention, it’s usually complicated because of lack of savvy and situational awareness.

Doing better work, in any position, requires that we recognize just how in-public our lives are, and get used to living that way – or making adjustments in our behavior to allow only what should be public to be public.

Awesomeness includes, but is not limited to:

  • Making positive comments on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, blogs and other social areas about your employer, your clients, and yourself.
  • Adding perspective where it can be helpful, through status updates, blog posts, and links to other helpful perspectives.
  • Helping people by providing information
  • Helping people by passing along useful tools
  • Making connections between people in your network, and others who can help
  • Not always being the most important person in the room
  • Allowing others to do what they do best
  • Recognizing awesomeness when you find it

… And just all around being a good, helpful person.

Awesome Street, USA - Moonlightbulb | FlickrAwesomeness expressly forbids, for everyone:

  • Grumpiness
  • Stoicism
  • Self-deprecation
  • Self-abasement
  • Anger
  • Fear
  • Expressed angst
  • Passive aggression

… and all other forms of public nastiness you wouldn’t want to see on a first date (or a fiftieth).

If you are a knowledge worker tasked with communicating, you must acknowledge that;

  • … living in public is not for everyone.
  • … your best work can still be misinterpreted.
  • … your employers deserve your best at all times.
  • … your employers need to provide you with clarity of purpose and message.
  • … only you can set your own limits (awesomeness requires that they are not beyond your grasp).
  • … you must set goals which are achievable by your own level of awesomeness (which will, and should, grow over time).
  • … you should avoid promises on behalf of others without prior confirmation or consultation.

If you are an employer of knowledge workers, be aware:

  • Not everyone is capable of living in public.
  • Those not willing or capable of living in public will do better work when they are allowed their privacy.
  • Media savvy workers do better work – providing training is a good idea.
  • It’s bad form to make promises on behalf of others without prior confirmation or consultation.
  • People will make mistakes. To deal with mistakes, first educate, then punish, then eliminate – in that order.
  • Not all mistakes you perceive will be received as such by the public, or even the clients on behalf of whom your employees are being awesome.
  • Not all successes you perceive will be received as such by the public, or even by the clients on behalf of whom your employees are being awesome.

Social Media is constantly evolving.

As such, by the time this policy is published, it’ll already be outdated. So, a challenge. Write your own personal social media awesomeness policy. Keep it people-focused. Think about the human costs of your holistic publicity. Let your people – whether clients, employees, or employers – shine with awesomeness in the way that’s best for them to do so.

What would you add?

(Obligatory note; this is not a lawyer-approved document. It’s intended to make you think. Did it achieve its goal?)

Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: awesomeness, business, clients, employees, employers, policy, privacy, social media, social media fatigue

What Microsoft is Buying with Skype

May 10, 2011 by Ian Leave a Comment

Microsoft bought Skype this morning.

I expect the deal has been in the works for some time, but I think it’s a good move; market potential for new versions of Windows and Office is dropping due to saturation and consumer comfort with ever-better versions of both (I’ll be hard pressed to move off of Windows 7, and Office 2007 has done very well for me compared to previous versions). XBox is going strong, sure – but it’s not where Microsoft’s core history has been.

So why does Skype make sense?

Because Microsoft isn’t just about business, it’s about business communications. They’re competing not just with Apple for mindshare and consumer’s hearts, they’re also competing with companies like RIM (BlackBerry), a plethora of productivity apps, an ecosystem of application developers, and more, to do what it initially intended; help people get the things they want to do, done.

Getting things done is important to Microsoft. See the XBox community and it’s achievement system. See Sharepoint, Outlook, and any number of other applications core to Microsoft’s service offerings. There’s a lot Ballmer and the crew can do with a communications infrastructure.

Some things Microsoft may choose to do with Skype include;

  • Adding better features to Live Messenger, and rolling the IM clients together entirely.
  • Hooking in to Windows Phone to deliver native VoIP capability
  • Bolting on to XBox live community to allow those in-game to communicate with those out of the game.

Sure, Microsoft could have done this expansion on their own, but consider the cost. Adding Skype’s existing infrastructure to Microsoft’s makes a lot of sense; even if the massive price tag is a convenience fee in part, the cost of not only building a network, but building a service and a community around that network is very large. While Microsoft might be seen as “sinking” some of their capital into Skype’s acquisition, they’re purchasing something invaluable along with the network; time. Now, no matter what MS chooses to do with the new toy they’ve bought, they’ve got the time (and, by extension the agility) do make choices and course corrections they could not have made while committing themselves to building their own, ancillary network beside (but not on top of) Skype’s existing market share.

This was a very shrewd move – and I hope it helps those of us who spend our lives communicating do a better job at that.

What else do you think Microsoft’s getting with this purchase?

Filed Under: Marketing Strategy Tagged With: acquisitions, business, communication, microsoft, purchases, skype, technology

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