The Dirty Secret: End Users do not use the Tools you buy for them

There is a dirty secret in the world of technology. No one wants to talk about it. Not the vendors. Not the buyers. No one.
And yet, the secret must be told. It is the elephant in the room, and someone needs to shout out and say “look, a bloody great elephant is in the room! [...]

Swamping the Row Boats – How Big Companies Do RFPs

In the last few months there has been a surge in Request for Proposals (RFP) from companies looking to implement either Idea Management systems or more fully fleshed out Innovation Management programs.
First of all, I have strong opinions on the likely success of the firms who follow the RFP approach. This is not a random [...]

I have a new software product – V4.0!!!

What is it about small software vendors. Twice in a day, whilst doing some research in the area of idea management software (link to my Google search string), I came across companies selling V4.0 versions of their software. Sounds harmless? Maybe not!
There is an old saying in software. No one buys the first three versions [...]

One of the (many) secrets of the iPod – The Advertising Blitz

I have been to five innovation conferences in the last four weeks all over the world, and every third speaker attempts to build their arguments of the need to innovate based on their confident, yet still third-party, view of the iPod’s meteoric rise to fame.
One of the aspects to the iPod story that I read [...]

Tom Malone – Innovation & Education Lecture – Harvard Business School Publishing

On Thursday this week I was extremely fortunate to be invited to a lecture by Professor Tom Malone of MIT. He presented his latest thinking on the changing nature of work, and the discussion focused on its impact on education. Work is fundamentally being changed by new technology, and this changes people’s expectations of the [...]

Briefing on IdeaBlogs – an intriguing concept

There is an interesting briefing on ideablogs that I recommend people download and read. The idea is intriguing – a quote from the paper:
“An ideablog is a social networking application used to stimulate, capture, promote and enrich ideas online via a blog-style user interface.

“Ideablogs support online communities of interest that are focused on [...]

More History of Imaginatik – "The Newtonville Attic" aka the Deep Dark Days of 2001

Imaginatik’s first offices in the US, opened in 2001, were in Newtonville, MA – a suburb, of a suburb, of Boston. View Larger MapI had called an old friend from Europe, collaboration pioneer Thierry Hubert, looking for a short term place to stay before I found more permanent digs for myself and the firm on [...]