Sean Genovese

Crazy? You Bet I Am!

2010-01-12T00:00:00.000-08:00

I started working in aerospace purely by chance. I am not an aerospace "legacy" living up to the family tradition. I was never overly excited about planes, satellites, or defense. I was simply a college graduate with student loans, no health insurance, and a strong desire to not be in school anymore. An opportunity presented itself for which I was qualified, the benefits were good, the location was perfect, and I took it. It just happened to be in aerospace.

I started work on March 5, 2004 with the excitement of the unknown and the thrill of a real paycheck. After a few weeks of experiencing big corporate aerospace life, I looked around at some of those "legacies" and swore that I wouldn't stay longer than five years. People laughed at me. I shrugged off their scoffs and renewed my pledge, vowing in the meantime to take advantage of that paycheck and all the other benefits the company had to offer.

After six short years of engineering school, I made no secret of the fact that I had absolutely no intentions of pursuing any kind of advanced degree. Student loans, student housing, arrogant professors--I was one college student who was none too eager to move on to the next stage of life. As I settled into big aerospace, however, I discovered one of those company benefits included fully subsidized continuing education. I was already prepared to put in five years, so it seemed like a waste not to pursue such an opportunity. I started a file folder labeled "Grad School" and began collecting information about schools, application requirements, and the GMAT.

On March 5, 2009, I received a certificate from my employer. It reads, "in appreciation of 5 years of valued service". Crap. Not only did I not have a Master's degree back in March, I wasn't even enrolled in school. I started to think about the past five years. They were hardly wasted, I invested big parts of my life in some big experiences that one could argue were at least comparable to graduate school, if not more valuable. I used each experience to grow but I also used each experience as an excuse to put that grad school folder back in the filing cabinet. Lingering in the back of my mind was the knowledge that I had this opportunity--an opportunity that few people have--that I had not taken advantage of. Staring at that certificate, I did not want to find myself five years later having the same conversation with myself. I dusted off that grad school folder and started studying for the GMAT.

Ironically, it was just a few weeks later that I found out about Alyssa. This was just the sort of detour that was going to have me staring at a "10 years of valued service" certificate, shaking my head and muttering "I could be a doctor by now". Jen and I discussed whether this was the best time for me to be going back to school. I would be working full time with two children under two at home. This was the best time for me to be going anywhere. I took out the file folder, sent in my application, and in December I received official word that I was accepted into the Management of Technology program at the University of Texas, San Antonio.

Why Management of Technology? Well, I think I did a good job of answering that question in my admissions essay, which you are welcome to read.

My Graduate School Admissions Essay

2010-01-11T23:07:00.000-08:00

My father is a professional musician. To this day, one of my favorite things to do is watch him play. I don't know how many of his gigs I've been to over the years, but it's easily in the hundreds. As much as I love the experience of live music performances, I am drawn to identify myself less as a member of the audience, and more with the creators of the music. True musicians can meet each other for the first time on a stage and make music like they've been playing together for years. The pure innovation and creativity that goes into a live performance is energizing, and I've always thought it would be a thrill to be able to pick up an instrument and just start jamming. I never learned to play a musical instrument, but I did inherit a passion for the creativity and innovation I see on stage.

I love technology, I always have. As a kid I was a tinkerer, a passion I inherited from my grandfather. He is a product of the Great Depression and a father of six, so tinkering was his way of giving things a second life and figuring out what made them tick at the same time. I used the same approach with my first computer and it became my muscle car. I bought it in high school and, before long, nearly every component inside had been removed, upgraded, or replaced. Our family was always on a tight budget, so I had to manage my upgrades carefully with money I earned from providing rudimentary computer services to neighbors and family members. My passion for tinkering and technology was clear, but it would be six years of college, a change of major, two internships and a lot of part time jobs before I would match that passion to the right instrument: Industrial Engineering.

Ironically, it was the mastery of another instrument that would ultimately lead me to Industrial Engineering. In 1999 I interned with a biomedical company performing "Y2K" testing in hospitals nationwide. The opportunity to travel the country was so exciting for me that I decided to write about it and share the experience with family and friends via email while "on the road". I discovered a talent for telling stories in a way that kept readers engaged and entertained. The following year, I orchestrated the "Year 2000 Road Trip Extravaganza", a 6,000 mile cross-country road trip that took me and a college buddy through 25 states in 24 days. Our goal was to hit the road with all the mobile technology we could get our hands on and document the experience "from the road" using that technology. The trip provided me a perfect stage to share my passions and connect with people. For an Industrial Engineer, being able to connect with people is like a musician knowing how to read music.

My professional work as an Industrial Engineer has been mostly with The Boeing Company and predominantly dealt with the maintenance, modification, and upgrade of military aircraft. In my nearly six years with the company, I have traveled to numerous sites domestically and abroad, in each place gaining perspective on how people work while supporting their journey to improve processes through "lean" manufacturing. The specific programs and geographic locations change, but my fundamental job remains the same: work with people and their processes to systematically reduce waste.

Lately I’ve been giving a lot of thought to technology and innovation. While many of the end products & services produced by The Boeing Company are truly on the cutting edge of science, technology, and industry, much of the technology involved in creating and supporting those products and services is not. When it comes to placing new technology in the hands of employees, large organizations--especially those dealing with sensitive information--tend to be sluggish to respond and overly protective. I believe that technology should be treated as a tool, not a threat. I believe it is an investment in a means to an end, not just another overhead cost. I believe there is tremendous opportunity for companies of all sizes to manage technology more effectively.

Once again I find myself in the audience. I know my passions and I want to jump on stage, grab the right instrument, and start to play. The Management of Technology degree seems to me the next “right instrument”. Learning how to stimulate technological innovation and creativity in an organization will transform me from the guy in the audience tapping his leg to the guy that can jump on stage and jam with the band. After years of sitting in the audience, I am ready to jam.

Who's Talkin' 'Bout My Generation

2009-11-20T05:51:00.001-08:00

A few months ago I wrote about an industry conference I attended in Anaheim, California. One of the presentations was given by Dr. Marlene Law Graham, a senior manager at The Boeing Company in Long Beach, California. Dr. Graham's presentation, “Leveraging the Power of Cross-Generational Teams”, focused on four commonly accepted workplace generations, how their respective views toward “work” differ, and how to effectively deal with those differences to resolve conflict. Allow me to grossly oversimplify Dr. Graham’s presentation.

Traditionalists and baby boomers (born roughly between 1925 and 1960) tend to view work as an end in and of itself. They equate productivity with attendance and long hours and believe in “paying your dues”. Generation X and the so-called millennial generation (roughly born between 1961 and 2000) tend to equate productivity with results. They view work as merely a means to an end and are interested in getting the job done so they can move on with the rest of life. Obviously the divisions are not hard and fast, but when the two older and two younger generational definitions are paired, as I've done here, I think the demarcation is very evident. To illustrate, let's consider two companies as if they were generational members. I'll pick the companies.

The Boeing Company was born in 1916. It has survived the Great Depression, two world wars, the Civil Rights Movement, and 9/11. To say the company is seasoned is a dramatic understatement. Its generational attitude is certainly traditionalist; conformity to the rules and long hours are accepted as the norm. The value of something as benign as text messaging might be questioned in this environment (and a colleague recently wrote about how it was).

By contrast, Google was born in 1998, unquestionably making it a millennial child. As such the company’s culture tends to be more results-oriented. A visit to the Googleplex, Google's corporate headquarters, reveals a more relaxed, open attitude towards creativity and innovation. People bring their pets to work, ride Segway scooters up and down the halls, and use conference room projectors to watch the latest DVD movie releases. In a recent interview with CNET, Google CEO Eric Schmidt responded to a question about new technologies the company is developing by expressing their attitude as follows:

“Let’s not pre-judge what these things are best used for. Let’s build great technology…and our end users will ultimately judge”.

This sentiment is echoed in Google’s policy of 20% time, where engineers can spend one day a week working on a project of their choosing. It doesn’t matter if it looks like work or not, Google’s focus is on the result, and as long as the results keep coming, the process is largely left up to the employee.

Late in 2006, Businessweek ran a story about the aggressive transformation of Best Buy’s corporate headquarters to a Results Oriented Work Eenvironment (ROWE). The concept is that “people are free to work wherever they want, whenever they want, as long as they get their work done.” Three years later, Cali and Jody, the program’s founders, have spun ROWE off into its own subsidiary, bringing the philosophy to the world via their book, private consulting, and a blog. Recently they wrote about a company considering the addition of instant messaging because their younger generation workers are accustomed to it.

“What started out as a tool used by younger workers is being adopted by older workers. That’s what we like to hear: using technology to change the culture of a workplace so that people can have more power and freedom to do their jobs when and where they want.”

Changing the culture of a workplace is where many companies fall short—especially those of the “traditionalist” variety. Companies like the one Cali and Jody wrote about might think they can step into the digital age by simply adding a social networking tool to their workplace. But social networking tools cannot simply be deployed and expected to instantly integrate generational cultures within a company. I've written before about innovation, and the mistake companies often make by simply pulling innovative tools off the shelf without understanding or addressing the cultural and generational transformation necessary to achieve the desired results.

The more traditional generation tends to view technology as a threat rather than an opportunity. A change to how work is done is a change to how life is defined, and since work is not just a means to an end but more an end unto itself, this can be upsetting. Technology thus becomes an obstacle rather than a tool. But today's generation has figured out that just because you’re at work doesn’t mean you have to be working--and vice versa. They use technology to blur the traditional definition of "the office" and studies have shown they are typically more--not less--productive while doing it. It's somewhat of a paradox that the generation that values separation of work and play the most has most intertwined the two.

The ability to always be connected is not inherently good or bad, it's how that connection is managed and balanced with the rest of life that matters. In Wealth of Networks, Yochai Benkler writes,

“The overarching point is that social production is reshaping the market conditions under which businesses operate. Consumers are changing into users…reshaping the relationships necessary for business success..."

Regardless of whatever title I may have (Industrial Engineer, Lean Practitioner, Father, Writer, etc.) I am a change agent, it's just what I do. As such I must not only be aware of generational differences and the new relationships of a technologically connected business world, I must embrace those differences and offer effective ways to unify the talents and strengths of each generation. Sometimes that might mean text messaging the boss from Starbucks while checking Facebook. What's wrong with that?

My Bank of America Story

2009-09-11T19:22:00.000-07:00

I recently had some interaction with Bank Of America that got my blood pressure up. Due to an admitted error on my part, two transactions hit my checking account over the weekend causing my balance to dip below zero by approximately $15. This resulted in $70 in overdraft fees. The lack of funds in my account is my fault, an oversight for which I take full responsibility. However, to charge me $70 for such an error seemed a bit egregious and I took issue with it.

This is not the first time I've taken issue with Bank Of America policies or their application of them, and that's why this situation really got my blood boiling. There's more to this story than just a knucklehead (that's me) with too many accounts that forgot to transfer money to the right one. This is about customer service, and it's something that I, as a consumer, take pretty seriously. So let me fill you in.

My very first checking account was opened in 1996 with Bank Of America (BofA) in California. For thirteen years I've had that same account, and I still do (for now). When I moved to Texas, I quickly discovered that BofA in California does not play well with the rest of the country. I could still use my ATM card to make purchases and withdraw money, but deposits now required a visit inside the branch to see a teller. Most of my life is paperless now, but since my wife and I are still fortunate to have birthdays, we do occasionally have a need to deposit checks. To make our lives more convenient, we opened a new checking account at BofA in the great state of Texas.

Let's pause for a moment, because I'd like to start keeping score. Every time I am inconvenienced by BofA, they will lose a point. When they provide positive customer service, they will gain a point. Here's the first example. While it might appear they did a noble thing by making life more convenient for us so we don't have to go inside the bank every time we make a deposit, the whole reason it became necessary was because they were no longer providing a service we once had. That's minus one for the bank.

Running Score: -1

This arrangement worked out just fine for awhile. For the most part we let the California BofA account just sit while we used the new Texas account. There was one instance I can remember when I decided to buy a song on iTunes for $.99 and forgot that the billing was still tied to my California BofA account. After taxes, the account became a few cents negative and I was assessed a $35 overdraft fee. Realizing the absurdity, they promptly returned the fee, but they lose another point for the fact that I was inconvenienced and had to call them to resolve the silly issue.

Running Score: -2

After our daughter was born, people started to give us money on her behalf. My wife, ever the doting mommy, thought it prudent to open a savings account for our little princess. She walked into the bank one day and set it all up, proudly announcing to me that it was all free. We mostly ignored the account until several months later, when we noticed the savings account was overdrawn. For several months, BofA had been charging us a hefty maintenance fee of about $15 on the account because the balance was below a threshold we were never told about. Eventually the account went negative and the overdraft fees started piling up. So did my anger.

Let's assess the damage: Minus one for lying to us in the branch. Minus one for even having a policy that includes charging for a savings account (that's just silly). Minus one for not contacting us directly when the account went negative.

Running Score: -5

My wife and I fought over who was going to make the call. She won. After a heated discussion with the customer angering agent, we ended up with the overdraft fees reversed. They kept all the other money they robbed from my daughter. The account was immediately closed. The entire transaction was brutal, and my wife had to fight to even get the overdraft fees back, so the bank earns no points here for that "gesture", and they lose another point for keeping the other fees.

Running Score: -6

When I found out they had essentially drained what little money had been in our daughter's account, I was furious. Bank of America had just purchased Countrywide who happened to be our home mortgage lender. I had been thinking about refinancing our home loan and after the savings account debacle, I was ready to march into the branch the next day, close my remaining accounts and threaten to take my mortgage to another company regardless of the rate.

Let me be clear about why I was upset. I believe a company can and should charge whatever they want for their services. At issue here is the fact that we were not sufficiently informed about those charges and when we, in good faith, brought this to their attention, we were essentially accused of lying. Why else would a company, when faced with the loss of business, refuse to budge in an arbitrary disagreement with a customer?

I suspect companies that operate this way assume that most consumers are probably not vindictive to the point they are willing to endure the costs and hardship associated with taking their business elsewhere. In truth, this is what ultimately happened to me with the savings account debacle. I was overcome by more important life events and let the issue drop. But I did not forget.

Yesterday that bad taste in my mouth came back when I got hit with those overdraft fees from our big $15 weekend on the town. Adding insult to injury, if I still had a savings account the money could have instantly been transferred to cover the deficit, thus saving me an unnecessary headache. Minus one.

Running Score: -7

This story gets worse before it gets better. When I noticed on Wednesday that my pending transactions were going to put me in the red, I immediately transferred $100 into the account. That should have put the account around a positive $85. Thursday, I logged in to verify my transfer. The balance: $10. My running total never showed the account going negative, but it did show two $35 overdraft fees. How could I incur overdraft fees if the account never balanced out officially to zero? I called the customer angering number and made the inquiry.

My mother always told me you catch more bees with honey, so whenever I am involved in a customer service confrontation I try to start out as calm and polite as possible. I did that here...at first.

The customer angering agent on the phone told me that regardless of the "pending" status, my "available balance history" showed two transactions against an account with insufficient funds, thus the two $35 overdraft fees. One of the transactions was literally three dollars and fifty cents.

"Thirty-five dollars for a three dollar charge that hadn't even been processed yet?" I asked incredulously.

She replied: "Yeah, it's a lot, isn't it?"

Of all the things she could have said to me in response, that was the wrong choice. Minus one for being unprofessional. Her apparent lack of awareness at how unprofessional the response was left me wondering why I was still doing business with this company. The bees took cover as my pleasant honey-like demeanor immediately took on the pungent odor of vinegar. With steam coming out of my ears, I told the customer angering agent that my relationship with the bank did not have much of a future. She then had the audacity to ask me if there was anything else she could help me with. I guess she was hanging her hat on raising my blood pressure.

Minus one for pissing me off.

Running Score: -9

After I hung up I replayed the conversation in my head and I started to boil. The overdraft started a fire that, admittedly, I contributed to by playing with matches. But now "customer service" had just fanned the flames. I started to reflect on the savings account debacle. Fool me once, shame on me; fool me twice and it's time to find a new bank. I decided I would be making a stop at the branch on my way home and I posted my intention on Twitter.

I pause here briefly to explain something about Twitter that you may not be aware of. Many companies, in an effort to leverage social networking to their advantage, have started using Twitter as a customer service tool. They run searches of Twitter posts looking for their company name and when they find people like me (read: irate customers) they reach out to try and mitigate the issue "proactively". This morning, I noticed I have a new follower, David Knapp, alias BofA_help. Putting the bank on the board, plus one for not having their heads completely where the sun doesn't shine. David, pay attention, this next part is for you.

Running Score: -8

By the time I reached the bank I was seething. I had about four paragraphs of rage ready to go in my head. I didn't even care about the money anymore, this was about thirteen years of patronage being disregarded over a very insignificant amount of money considering my various mortgage, checking, and credit accounts with the BofA machine. They own most of my house but they feel the need to stick it to me for a $15 oversight? Those were the thoughts going through my head when I walked into the branch.

I was immediately greeted by two women asking how they could help me. One of them led me to her office and I managed to get through the first paragraph and a half with most of the bees still buzzing about. Paragraph three is where the message was going to get sour, but I never got to it. This customer service experience was positive, which will earn the bank another point and here's why:

She offered solutions to help prevent the situation in the future.
She recognized the absurdity of the situation and refunded the fees.
She was gracious, thanked me for coming in, and didn't act like my business was a burden.

I left fairly calm, with my money back in my account, and feeling like the bank and I were at least on speaking terms again. We'll see if we end up being friends (that refinance thing is still pending, with the potential of becoming another debacle). Hopefully there is a lesson here for David and the BofA customer service team. They've ended this inning down by seven, and frankly it should be more.

Running Score: -7

Everything that occurred was at the convenience of the bank, not the customer. At the top of my bank statement reads the message:

"Customer since 1996. Bank of America appreciates your business and we enjoy serving you."

I find this ironic because, in the situations I've described, the bank did nothing to serve me. I had to call them. I had to drive to the branch. After thirteen years, why don't they know me better? Why don't they remember that time when a $.99 iTunes download caused a similar overdraft incident? Can't they see that between then and now the only thing that's happened is I've made every payment to every creditor including them on time? Or do they know all that and just don't care? Are they assuming I won't expend the effort to change banks?

Here's a hint: I expended the effort to drive to the branch with the intention of closing my account. In the past two years I've ditched my telephone and television provider, mostly for poor customer service. Don't test me.

Banking technology has come a long way over the years. The twenty-first century allows us to transfer money anywhere in the world over the web, deposit checks without an envelope, and use a cell phone to check an account balance. Customer service however is still in the dark ages. It's time to step it up guys. If you're reading about a problem on Twitter, you're already too late.

What is RSS?

2009-08-22T08:41:00.000-07:00

I'm glad you asked, because RSS, or "Really Simple Syndication", is helping me deliver content to you better, whether it's a story about my latest trip at The Road Scholars or my new musings on technology on the Sean Genovese Blog. Until recently, if you wanted to find out if there was anything new to read on one of my blogs, you had to either visit the site on the web and look, or sign up for The Road Scholars mailing list and wait for my email. Now you can bring new content that you want to read directly to you via RSS. This is great news if you

Don't like to have your inbox flooded with email
Change email addresses frequently
Can't access certain sites or email clients at work
Don't want to be bothered checking dozens of web sites for information you care about
Love reading TRS updates as quickly as they are written

Check out this brief video for more information on how RSS works.

If you are a Road Scholars fan, here's how RSS can work for you. There are currently three blogs I publish:

There is actually a fourth one called TRS News. This is what gets published at the main Road Scholars homepage and what you see if you are subscribed to the TRS mailing list. Whenever I post something new to one of the blogs, I simulcast a snippet on TRS News.

Each of the four blogs also has it's own RSS feed, so by using an RSS reader, you can subscribe to all of the feeds, or only the ones that interest you (so if you like everything listed above, I suggest the TRS News feed since it is the most comprehensive).

Here are the RSS feed links to the four blogs mentioned above:

If you already use RSS, none of this is news to you and all I've done here is provide you with a one stop shop for all the TRS feeds you may be interested in. If you're not using RSS, I hope you'll check it out. It's not just for The Road Scholars, you can also subscribe to your favorite sports scores, weather reports, news headlines...anything that has a feed!

My Tivolution: Three Sheets (on FLN)

2009-08-04T16:56:00.001-07:00

If you aren't a fan of Zane Lamprey, you should be. His show, Three Sheets, originally was produced and aired on Mojo, an all HD television network that is now defunct. After a hiatus that lasted way too long, Zane has resurfaced with Three Sheets on the Fine Living Network. The show follows Lamprey around the world exploring different drinking customs. As he says in the intro:

Every night, in every city around the world, it happens. People pour into local watering holes to well, drink. It's my mission...to traverse the globe getting to know these different people and their drinking customs; bellying up to the bar and with any luck, making some new friends.

Check out this video from CNN, by a less than enthusiastic reporter, to get a feel for Zane's flavor.

It's a good show.

Atlantis Makes Refuelling Stop in San Antonio

2009-06-02T16:18:00.000-07:00

Those of you following my tweets today know that I saw space shuttle Atlantis take off from Lackland Air Force Base after a two hour refuelling stop on its ferry flight back to Kennedy Space Center.

My boss captured some awesome photos of the departure.

We call this the "money shot".

For more photos and information about Atlantis and its last mission, check out Damaris' "How I Am Becoming An Astronaut" blog.

Innovation In The News: Advice For Natali DelConte

2009-06-01T19:31:00.000-07:00

I recently read a blog by Natali DelConte, a senior editor for CNET, about the role technology plays in the news. Natali is working on a new format for a general news webcast and she is struggling--overwhelmed was actually the word she used--with how to make a news broadcast interactive without bombarding the viewer with gratuitous uses of technology that amount to little more than gimmicks. Discussing the differences of "old media" versus "new media", she poses the following question:

"Has the information evolved just because I can live stream myself blow drying my hair? Is social media a gimmick that gives the viewer the illusion of interaction with the news?"

Her concerns are well-founded; we've certainly seen plenty of gimmicks in television news lately, perhaps most notably during last year's election coverage. Saturday Night Live had a field day with anchors and their dreadful attempts to incorporate some cool new tech--interactive touch screen technology--into broadcasts.

For the most part, the anchors skillfully demonstrated how out-of-their-league they were with the new technology, thus the technology was reduced to little more than a gimmick. It wasn't the technology that failed them though, it was their sacrifice of the process for a result. Rather than focus on how technology could enhance the delivery and timeliness of good information to draw in ratings, they tried to bring in the ratings with flash and glitz. This was technology for technology's sake and it completely bypassed an important and often lost step in the process of improvement: innovation.

As an Industrial Engineer and a lean practitioner, my biggest challenge is how to effect not just change, but innovative change. In business, change usually means better quality, lower cost, and improved schedule performance. Organizations are always falling into the trap of focusing on lowering cost and improving schedule and quality and they fall short and can't figure out why. They skip the innovation, ignore the process, and instead focus on the desired result. Here's an example.

Consider the attempt by so many corporations in America to replicate the success of the Toyota Production System. In the mid 1900's, Taiichi Ohno developed the Toyota Production System as a disciplined way of improving manufacturing processes through the systematic elimination of waste. Companies all over the world, including our own now defunct American car companies, benchmarked Toyota in an effort to replicate their success. They failed. Why? Because rather than change behavior and truly innovate, they went after the result, not the process. They went to Toyota factories and saw moving assembly lines and kitted parts and they duplicated what they saw as if pulling the techniques off the shelf at a supermarket. What they failed to see is the theory behind the practice. The process of eliminating waste, a pinnacle of the Toyota Production System, was sacrificed for the desired result, a buzzing production line. Nevermind that cost, quality, and schedule were not improved. What better illustration than today's bankruptcy announcement by GM. Last time I checked, Toyota is still in business.

Innovation, on the other hand, is an investment in the process, not the result. Nobody wants a shiny car that won't perform well on the road or requires a ton of maintenance. Likewise, nobody wants information delivered in a fancy "new media" way if it's stale or irrelevant. Sometimes it's necessary to ignore the result you want and simply focus on the process. That's when true innovation takes place. Americans don't "buy American" for the sake of buying American. They buy American because they want American to by synonymous with "better". They want to be proud of something that says "American". When you focus on the result--buying American--and you ignore the process--make it better--innovation is lost and you simply have a shiny car that doesn't run well and nobody wants. But I really am not writing this to beat up on the car companies--they just happened to provide a very timely, very effective example.

Let's try another one, something a bit more personal. I recently attended an industry conference in California. Consider the desired result if you are a conference organizer: engaged attendees. What good is a conference if nobody attends or those that attend don't pay attention? As an organizer, you can either focus on the result or the process.

Here's the result-oriented approach:

You tell your keynote speakers you want an engaged audience.
You equate participation with engagement and you ask the speakers to incorporate questions and answers into their presentation.
The speakers focus on periodically cold-calling questions to various attendees to stimulate "participation".
The attendees are bored with the presentation (since no emphasis was placed on the quality of the content), fearful of being put on the spot, and maybe even a little resentful for being talked down to as if they were back in school.

Here's what the organizers at this particular conference actually did (a process-oriented approach):

They told the keynote speakers they were incorporating an audience response system into their presentations.
Each attendee was given a credit card-sized RF "clicker" they could use to provide instant feedback to specific questions. Results were fed directly into the speaker's presentation slides.
Rather than focusing on the audience, the speakers focused on the content of their presentations and the audience feedback they would solicit about the presentation.
The result? Measurably engaged conference attendees willingly participating in every keynote presentation. Gratuitous use of technology or innovation?

So here's my advice for Natali, and anyone else who wants to effect change in whatever it is they do:

Don't fear gimmicks; innovation is inherently risky and gratuitous technology, or any number of other tools or "gimmicks", can help if used properly. As Henry Petroski says in The Evolution of Useful Things, "Our expectations for a technology rise with its advancement". It can't advance if you don't use it.
Innovation isn't always successful--at first. As a change agent, you don't always know where you are going when you start the journey. Don't be afraid to take a risk on something that might not pan out. A negative result is still a result--and a good one--provided you stay focused on the process. The desired result more often than not will naturally follow.
GM and Chrysler have demonstrated to the world that pouring money at a problem doesn't work if you're not willing to try something different. Don't be afraid of change, innovation demands it.

Personally, I hope Natali incorporates every bit of new technology into the show that she can get her hands on. Twitter, You Tube, Microsoft Surface--who cares if it seems gratuitous and trite (besides, if anyone can make blow drying hair exciting, she can) as long as she's still delivering good information people want. If she does, a year from now other shows will be scrambling to incorporate {insert the great result here} and scratching their heads trying to figure out why they didn't think of it.

Chances are they were too busy focusing on the result and totally forgot about the fundamental purpose of any good news organization: the process of delivering information.

Obama Man by Greg Morton (Bob & Tom TV)

2009-05-31T08:51:00.000-07:00

My Tivolution: Cash Cab

2009-05-23T10:45:00.000-07:00

If you haven't already, set your favorite DVR (or tune in live if you absolutely must) to the Discovery Channel game show Cash Cab. Hosted by comedian Ben Bailey, the show takes place inside a New York City taxi cab. There are a couple of reasons I love the show.

First, the technology required to overcome the logistical challenges of recording a game show live in a moving vehicle fascinates me. As a former student of video production, I would jump at the opportunity to witness the show live from "behind the scenes". Some of the secrets are revealed on the show's web site here.

Second, unlike any other game show I can think of, Cash Cab contestants don't have an agenda i.e., they aren't trying to get on a game show. Statistically speaking, the show's concept seems to be a great way to get a random sampling of "the average Joe" contestant.

Finally, Cash Cab contestants are constantly impressing me with their mastery of "general knowledge". The mainstream media tends to make me think we live in a nation of dunderheads, but watching regular people answer questions about current events, history, technology, etc.--and get them right--makes me feel a little better about how smart the American people really are.

So what's next, Discovery? Money Train on the subway? Cash Car in LA? Give me a call, I'll help you find the next concept. And if you need a host, I could make myself available.

Microsoft Surface In The Classroom

2009-05-21T12:00:00.000-07:00

I've recently shared some articles about Microsoft Surface in the Check This Out section (on the right side of this blog). Inside one of them is the video below, demonstrating an application of Microsoft Surface in the classroom. The marriage between education and technology is a passion of mine, so this is pretty cool.

The Caring Diagram

2009-05-20T19:45:00.000-07:00

Someone at work was discussing something with me today and I made the comment that there was no possible way I could care any less about the topic. Actually, it was more of an announcement on my part. My boss challenged my claim, saying that mathematicians once thought zero was the lowest number possible. Then low and behold, negative numbers emerged. Therefore, he posited, there is no way that I could say with absolute certainty that I could not possibly care less.

I decided to draw the diagram below to illustrate my point more clearly.

If one were to assume a scale of caring, shown in black, where caring more follows the positive X-axis, my level of caring would be where I've noted it in blue, down near zero (but not on zero). Thus, while there exists capacity to care both more or less (especially if we assume negative caring is possible), I have taken the position--with the blue arrow--that I can not and will not care any less, despite the capacity to do so.

I hope that clears things up. And if it doesn't, I really could not care less.

Zillow Releases iPhone App

2009-05-15T12:09:00.000-07:00

I've been tracking real estate web site Zillow for a couple years now. It uses property tax information, home sales data, user input, and other real estate information to display "Zestimate" home values on a Google-style satellite map. When it first started, I looked up a few houses I knew the value of to check the site's accuracy. It was good, but not great. Over the years it's gotten better. Recently, they just introduced an iPhone app that kicks the service up an extra notch. I'm not going to abandon my cell provider just to join AT&T and get an iPhone, but still, this is pretty cool.

How Smart Is Your Dog?

2009-05-15T12:00:00.001-07:00

My neighbors snapped this shot of their dog the other day. Apparently this is what the dog does when they're not home.

Dangerous Bugs Hatching a New Role of Border Protection

2009-05-15T11:32:00.000-07:00

Check out my friend, Luca Furnare, talking to the media in Seattle about what he does every day to keep us safe from an unlikely enemy.

Click Here For the Video

Welcome

2009-05-08T10:02:00.000-07:00

Lately I've been craving a forum where I could share ideas unencumbered by a particular theme or topic. I've taken some creative liberties in the past and pushed the limits of what really ought to be at The Road Scholars blog or the Speed Bump Chronicles. I needed a place where I could post great articles about new technology or share my ideas about a topic, whether it relates to travel or not. I wanted a place where I could post my favorite RSS feeds, even if they weren't about children or trying to raise them.

This is that space. It has no limits.

This is a place where my passions will come together--writing, technology, innovation, music, entertainment, humor, travel, family, politics, religion--no limits. There's no need to sign up, and you won't receive a notification every time my online "profile" changes. Come by when you can and read what I'm sharing--and share your thoughts with me as well.

Welcome, enjoy, and please tell me what you think.