Eddie Goes Down a Tweet at UCISA 2012

The Universities and Colleges Information Systems Association represents the IT services of all the major universities in the UK – no mean feat in this day and age, when electronic resources and communication are playing an increasingly bigger part in the lives of students and lecturers. Nevertheless, UCISA manages to stay on the cutting edge of technology, ensuring that computers are an aid to education, not a barrier.

The UCISA Annual Management Conference was held this year in Celtic Manor in Newport, Wales. Prof Eddie Obeng was invited to give the closing keynote speech, in a panel chaired by Kathy McCabe, UCISA Secretary. The subject of Eddie's talk was Surviving and Thriving in a World of Challenge. He told the delegates that change was coming faster, and with less precedent, and that this was not the time for “business as usual” if they wanted to succeed.

Judging by the tweets coming from the event (hashtag #ucisa12), Eddie's speech was well received:

@mcockshoot: Eddie Obeng very entertaining final speaker at #ucisa12

@RIsaacsdi: Professor Eddie Obeng Surviving and thriving in a new would of challenge. This guy is good #ucisa12 @sdi_institute

@Davie_T: #ucisa12 has met its match no on can tweet at the speed of Mr Obeng's speech lol

@daviewhall: Eddie Obeng. One world only. WOW #ucisa12

New trends in a rising tide – solving the challenge of corporate learning in ambiguous and uncertain times

This article was written by Prof Eddie Obeng for Training Journal, and posted on his personal blog.

In a recent article in Training Journal, Peter Honey argued articulately that classroom learning should not be written off yet and still has a lot to contribute. His focus was on the softer side of classroom learning arguing that they are ‘ring-fenced spaces with learning the explicit purpose’ and that ‘It is far easier for classrooms to be learning-friendly than everyday workplaces’. He points out that ‘They allow people to meet together to share experiences and indulge in reciprocal learning. They are cheerful, off-the-record places with relaxed laughter.’

In spite of this, e-learning continues its steady growth – estimated to reach a value of £45 billion by 2014 with growth rates of around 30% in Eastern Countries. In this rising tide the focus of e-learning continues to be cost and convenience rather than quality, although recent trends towards using interactive (serious) games and ice breakers,¹ the continued effort to merge classroom and online sessions mean that increasingly studies of the quality of the learning suggest less and less of a gap.² In particular, corporate e-learning continues to grow in an economy where the business cases can be made for change.

The pace of global change continues to increase at the same time as there is an increased need to deliver results and new outcomes even faster. New Processes put in place quickly become obsolete and must rely on the inventiveness and goodwill, cemented by relationships between colleagues, to provide the glue and sticking plaster which ensures continued delivery of the organisation’s goals and products. Customer demands for service and quality continue to rise not as fast as the average player in the market but at the speed of the fastest. Through collaboration, merger or acquisition, even small scale enterprises and local government institutions are drawn into having to think and work at a global scale, crossing cultures, and time-zones.

The use of the classroom described by Peter Honey above would be an ideal way of forging the new cross cultural relationships. The use of traditional e-learning as a way to re-equip and re-skill at the speed required. But both have within them constraints which prevent them providing the solution to the demands of the 21^st century. The figure below highlights the challenge:

E-learning ends up relegated to the bottom half of the set of cubes whilst the classroom is stuck in the front half. Even newer e-learning approaches remain stuck in broadcast mode and because at the end of the webinar there is ‘nothing to see’ the lack of persistence keeps them as events rather than as captures of knowledge for life long application.

In the corporate environment there is an increasing demand that the learning is not only learned but put into practice. This simple need means that three new areas will begin to quickly rise to absorb the old worlds of e-learning and classroom learning.

The first is the use of Augmented Learning. My favourite example of this concept is the way in which certain Duracell batteries can tell you whether they still hold a charge or not. Augmented learning is a way in which to attach answers to the questions which arise from real life objects. An accountant looking at a balance sheet should instantly have access to the set of questions he should ask and calculations to carry out. In fact the accountant need not learn anything at all! In areas where conventions are strong, and the process is repetitive this type of learning will steadily come to dominate. It is easily updatable for all users at the same time and does not require re-training or a human change management process.

The second area is Mobile Learning. My favourite example of this is happened a few months ago when after I had completed a IRL conference presentation I was surrounded by people waiting to ask questions and noticed that one person was ‘Googling’ me on his phone and reading the background article while queueing up. Mobile learning will enable the learning to cross the boundary from the classroom/webinar into the workplace.

The third is Enterprise Led Learning. My favorite example is the use of 3D internet (fully-functional, immersive environments). For example, on QUBE, the ‘classroom’ (where avatars interact, work in syndicates, brainstorm with post-its, specialists give short talks, etc.) is just across the virtual hall from the Team/ Project room where the global execution team, from several countries, keep their PowerPoints, Excel spreadsheets and plans and all meet for an hour twice a week (although the individuals come and go frequently since such environments offer ‘persistence’- everything stays where you left it.). The classroom agenda is set by the needs of the Enterprise but there is no functional distinction between learning and application. In addition the demand to develop people across the globe is met without disruption. The learning and the activity all share the same purpose of delivering the goals. This type of learning best solves the challenges at the top/executive levels of the organisation, in the innovative and creative centres and the areas of complex change and project execution. What is common to these three environments are that the people face challenges of high uncertainty and ambiguity, full of unknown-unknowns.

So strangely although the tide of e-learning is still in full flood, by acknowledging the softer, relational and emotional advantages of classrooms to cross cultural boundaries and build relationships three new solutions emerge. One which removes the need for learning, another which provides it when & where you need it, and a third which merges learning and working seamlessly using learning simply as another resource in the delivery of challenging enterprise goals.

---

1 The Corporate Learning Factbook 2011 Karen O’Leonard.^↩
2 Class Differences - Online Education in the United States, 2010 I. Elaine Allen, Jeff Seaman, Ph.D.^↩

UPDATE: Eddie Obeng's TED Talk Now Live!

We previously mentioned on the New World Times blog that Prof Eddie Obeng's presentation from TEDGlobal 2012 would be available to watch on TED.com some time in October. Well, we are proud to announce that the video is now live. Click here to watch the talk.

Once you've watched the video, why not join us for a special (virtual) event to discuss it? Whether you agree or disagree with the presentation, you can meet Eddie Obeng and others to share your opinions and discover more about the New World and the rules it operates on. The event will take place between 12.30pm and 2pm UK time on Wednesday 24 October in the New World Cafe on Pentacle QUBE (visit http://QUBE.cc to find out how to get to QUBE). To register, contact Josh Cheesman (Josh_Cheesman@PentacleTheVBS.com; +44 [0] 1494 678555] who will provide you with an entry pass.

"Thinking rationally? Think again" – Eddie Obeng's Presentation from TEDGlobal 2012

Chris Anderson, Bruno Guissani and the team at TED.com have allowed an enormously diverse group of people to share ideas packaged into short, bite-size chunks – using the Pentacle new world Rule “Chunk it or Junk it!”. Over the years, speakers from Bill Clinton to Ken Robinson and Richard Dawkins have participated in TED conferences. TEDGlobal 2012 was no exception and included Pentacle’s Eddie Obeng sandwiched between Ruby Wax and Macy Gray at one end and Don Tapscott and Antony Gormley at the other.

There was obviously a good reason for Eddie to give his talk, although the title, Thinking Rationally? Think Again makes his motivation for participating intriguing. Insisting that “The real 21^st century is not so obvious to us, so instead we spend our time responding and reacting to a world we know and understand but which no longer exists”, he guides us through a 12-minute whirlwind of turning well-regarded beliefs, orthodoxy and ideas upside down.

The video, out in October, can be watched at TED.com, or if you prefer reading blogs the TED Blog summarises it beautifully.

Say “cheese”! Or “queijo”! Or “formaggio”! - March's Inspiration Monthly Event

A crowd of people are stood listening intently. Some of them nod in agreement. Some are even jumping up and down in excitement. They shift around and jostle with each to get a better view of the whiteboard the presenter, Prof Eddie Obeng, is pointing at – despite being thousands of miles apart.

This is Inspiration Monthly, a regular event hosted by Pentacle on QUBE. Users anywhere in the world can log on to QUBE and participate fully with others as if they were actually there through their personal avatar (we call them Qubots). This month participants from the UK, Ireland, France, Italy and Brazil got together to chat and learn.

The theme this month was innovation in a risk averse culture. Try this question that Eddie asked in the session: would you rather toss a coin and get £1 million for heads and £0.5 million for tails, or toss a coin and get £20 million for heads and nothing for tails? Your answer? Well, if you chose the first one then it shows that you're risk averse; if you picked the second option then you're risk loving. Eddie then talked about the two reasons we fear taking risks, and everyone present discussed how they could overcome these fears.

Alex Higgins from Red Bee Media said that he found QUBE “really interesting”, and Leonardo Teixeira from Cata Vento said it was a “great learning environment”. One participant even said it was “almost impossible to describe. Experience is everything.”

At the end there was just time to take a virtual group photo of everyone present, which you can see above. The only tricky part was deciding what language to say “cheese” in.

If you want to take part in the next Inspiration Monthly event, which will be held on QUBE on Thursday 19 April, go to http://pentacle.co.uk/inspirationmonthlyregistration.htm

Atkins Goes Around the World in Foggy Times

WS Atkins is certainly no stranger to delivering on the international stage – this year millions of people around the world will watch Olympic events in venues designed by the engineering consultancy. But nevertheless they're working on further developing themselves as a truly global company, one who can carry out projects crossing global boundaries without breaking into a sweat.

Prof Eddie Obeng contributed to a one-week programme (Orchestrating Exceptional Performance) for 13 project managers from the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, India, Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Eddie discussed how to run programmes even as the world changes around them – he compared it to trying to run on a treadmill that's constantly speeding up. The programme and project managers explored how to overcome their fears of, and discovered the joy of, uncertainty. In particular they liked the idea of “foggy change”: not giving up even when the next step is unclear. Hopefully Atkins will span the globe in spite of the fog of change.

Helping B&Q to be More Helpful

Picture: Renjith Krishnan

In a tough, challenging world, we could all do with a little help. And just as there's always a bit more DIY you can do around the house, B&Q, who already serve 3 million people every week, are going to do more to give us that help. They've decided that they want to be “the most helpful home improvement retailer in the UK”, improving the friendliness and utility of their staff.

The NEC in Birmingham was the venue for Prof Eddie Obeng, introduced by Martyn Phillips, CEO of B&Q, to select helpful champions in a drive to improve service. Eddie showed the participants how to engage more people, and therefore be more helpful. It was a rollercoaster event, covering the IDQB^TM method of communication (Issue, Data, Question, Build) and Stepping Forward to Lead – which ended in everyone stepping forward to dance.

It just goes to show: when helpful people need help becoming more helpful, they turn to Pentacle.

Bringing Project Managers Out of Their Shell

Shell's project managers have a lot to deal with. Not just in the scale of the major projects, but also in the abundance of incertitude that they face. Nowadays not only do they have to tackle huge tasks like developing oil fields in difficult places and the alchemy of turning gas into liquids, they must also cope with the uncertainty and ambiguity of geopolitics and local issues. The excellent Shell Project Academy in Rijswijk, the Netherlands, invited Prof Eddie Obeng to join the Managing Complex Projects course. The course, run in collaboration with Cranfield and accredited by the Association for Project Management (of which Eddie is a Fellow), is designed to transform highly competent and very experienced project managers into leaders of complex foggy programmes of multiple competing stakeholders set in a world of confusion

Eddie introduced them to the World After Midnight, and took them on a journey to make complexity more simple by engaging shareholders early and being suspicious of certainty and painting by numbers. They explored how to not only feel comfortable being ‘lost in the Fog’ but to be suspicious if it all looks too straight forward. For the participants who have a track record of delivering in certainty, this should help them come out of their Shell.

"The only culture we have is on a Petri dish..."

Remember the 1970s? Leyland, the home of British vehicle manufacturing, became an international by-word for failed organisational culture. Unwilling (or unable) to change the way it did things led to the demise of a once great industry.

More recently we have heard about a “culture of institutionalised racism” within the London Metropolitan Police Force, or a “culture without accountability” in some areas of banking.

Culture seems to have a significant impact on the future well-being of organisations. 

Why?

Just consider how teams are managed within these organisations, how decisions are made and how reporting lines work. Teams tend to be rigid, reporting lines are based on a pyramidal hierarchy; red tape is the order of the day and the leader knows best.

Let us call these characteristics - the Old World.

So what is the problem?

Have you noticed how the world business environment has changed? Do the things we used to do have the same impact? Do these ways of working help or hinder us?

What has happened is that all of us have been slowly and steadily moving from a world in which we could learn faster than the world was changing, into a world which changes much quicker than we can learn. This NewWorld^TM leaves us with less and less chance to predict or even imagine our future. In these circumstances, culture plays a determining factor - it is the handmaiden in the process of inventing the organisation’s future - because existing processes become redundant.

Are you thinking of evolving your business into the New World^TM? Why don’t you ask yourself whether your organisation follows Pentacle’s 12 New Rules for the NewWorld^TM?

• Is your solution integrative? Say AND, not OR.
• Does your solution recognise the need to tailor actions to meet different populations/needs? FAIR = DIFFERENT
• Is your solution capable of self-governance? Change DEPENDENCE to INTERDEPENDENCE
• Is your solution designed to ensure focus on delivering to your goal of making money (delivering benefit to society)? Do NOTHING of NO USE.
• Is your solution designed around the people who have to deliver it and live with the results? STAKEHOLDERS RULE OK!
• To what extent have you made or scoped your solution to the possible rather than the ‘nice to have’ impossible. Make Time FIT.
• Have you reduced the scope to de-risk your solution appropriately? CHUNK it or JUNK it.
• Have you ensured that your solution appropriately uses new technologies? All constraints into TOUCH SPACE.
• Have you ensured that your solution appropriately uses new knowledge? Unlearn EVERYTHING.
• Have you taken into Account the overall impact of change on your ability to deliver results? Don't Change ANYTHING.
• Is your solution self-sustaining? LOOP it UP.
• Have you developed a solution with powerful results, which relies on an approach, which is not popularly adopted? Go VIRTUAL.

What do you think?   Lets talk. Visit us at PentacletheVBS.com

When Soft Bits Become Harder

Insights from a moving case …

We were recently asked to step in and support a project that had become quite “emotional”. A large multinational was moving & regrouping several ‘locations’ (do you notice that they didn’t use the term “teams”?) into a brand new building.  The HR team in charge of the project named it “Zeus” and referred to it as “a transformation project”.

At first glance, all seemed OK: the new building was… stunning!  The proposed canteen was… gorgeous!    The plan (you know the type of document full of little boxes, arrows, and what they call “dependencies”?) was… crystal clear!  People, 12 months before the actual move, already had their own space allocated … Quite a good start n’est ce pas?

So what was the problem?  Despite demonstrating the politically correct “positive attitude”, the key stakeholders - the staff - were clearly not supporting the project, or even worse, were preparing secret plans to leave the company before being ‘kindly invited’ to move to ‘a better place’.  

I immediately asked a naïve question: “Why did you call this project Zeus?” The reply was abrupt: “We needed a name. This one sounded smart.” It soon became clear that we were talking about a plan, not about people.  In other words, all hard, tangible, process aspects were pretty well under control, but there was strictly no meaning behind the plan, not a single piece of emotion. The only visible sign of attention to people was to be found in a glossy communication brochure featuring mottos like “Great place to work”, “Fully green building”, “Open areas for networking”, “Let the sun shine in”, … I was speechless.  How can smart people genuinely believe that these mottos can make sense, translate into emotion, make people dream, convey a real meaning? … The meaningless name (Zeus, is apparently NOT the god of removals!) was just the symptom of a meaningless plan.

But this was just the beginning of the surprise. My second question (a bit less naïve this time) was: “What did you do to engage your staff to make this move?”.  According to them, they did a lot of things. Brochures (showing the extraordinary bright and sunny new building), leaflets (to explain the support plan that would be given to people for their home removal),  a website (to keep people aware of the latest project news), … but amazingly (to them), people remained “unengaged”. 

It took one day of hard debate to nail down my point: Communicating to inform is not the same thing as communicating to engage.  A simple corrective plan would explain WHY we do what we do, thus injecting some meaning into the project, rather than focus on  the WHAT and HOW. This combined with an opportunity for everyone to “feel, visualize, hear, imagine, story tell” their new office allowed them to contribute to its design… This was just the beginning of a 2 day journey! 

Sounds like common sense?  Yes… But when was the last time you felt enthusiastic about a reorganisation, a transformation plan, an office redesign? Have you ever seen people genuinely engaged to design their own workspace?  When did you last see ‘project scoping documents’ starting with a plan of how to engage the most important stakeholders?

Two days later, we finished this emotional journey into communicating “the meaning of  - work - life” and designing an “emotional engagement”.  

Want to know more? Let’s talk!

Should aliens receive foreign aid?

Pentacle has recently been working with the Chief Executives of some of the largest foreign aid charities in Ireland. They face real risks that change hourly and which they need to deal with as they arise.

The Old World way of  dealing with these risks is to gather them all up, assign an arbitrary description based on likelihood and severity (High, Medium and Low) and then put them in a risk register. If you are really lucky the auditors will come around annually and check that you have done it right ;-)

Does it really make sense to write a list of what might happen and then put it on a shelf where nobody reads it? Is this approach even relevant when lives are at risk?

In the New World, where change happens at the speed of light, you need a different approach. Luckily, we don't need to learn how to do it because we have all been part of a government sponsored programme to teach us about risk... using Science Fiction movies.

Don't believe me? Think back to watching those movies …

You know the story, the ugly, green, drooling, slimy monster arrives on Earth; the natural reaction would of course be to run away, but no, the hapless hero immediately wants to investigate further. At the first sign of aggression from the alien, our hero tries to blast it with his laser gun. If that doesn't work (and it usually doesn't), then they usually try and capture it whereupon they stick it in a "secure facility" and put some unhinged scientist with wild hair and pebble-thick glasses in charge. When that all goes pear-shaped (and it usually does), then there is usually a"Plan B" which seems to involve a thermo-nuclear device.

Familiar?

Well risk management is just the same. First you have to Identify the risk, then you should FIX IT NOW!TM No messing around putting it into a risk register. If that isn't possible, you should contain it (while monitoring the whole time). And just in case, you should have a Plan B.

How do you manage your risks? Still putting them in a risk register? Are you surprised when the alien turns around and bites you?

Staying Digital all the Way

An overheard 'phone call:


"OK, so let me get this right - you need me in Hong Kong on Wednesday for a three hour client meeting and then I need to be in New York on Friday to meet with the design team and then the following Monday I need to be in Shanghai to talk to the manufacturer to get the production process agreed? Wow. Is there any other way to get this done? That's a lot of travel for not a lot of face-to-face time. Are you sure? Right then. I'm on my way."

In the New World, where everything and everybody are interconnected, does it make sense to have this conversation?


How could this trip be 'chopped down' reduced or even made obsolete by using just two of Eddie Obeng's New Rules for the New World?

• ALL CONSTRAINTS INTO 'MEATSPACE' -- can we look at what needs to be done and figure out the problems that really requires a physical presence versus the rest that can be done at a distance?
• Go Virtual! -- Lets concentrate on the effect of what we do, not the form.

So lets replay the phone call with the New Rules in mind:


"OK, we have the video call set up by the Hong Kong client on Wednesday -- I'm assuming we'll be using the high-quality boardroom system? Fine. Listen, I think I will go to New York on Friday because I haven't met the design team yet, it will be our first time working together, I want to set-up a project team culture of working hard and having fun and the easiest way will be for us to spend a long day together with a lot of laughs and perhaps a couple of beers (which I can't do in cyberspace). Whilst I'm there, we'll also set up a collaborative workspace on QUBE  and reproduce their working environment on the three dimensional internet (3Di) so that afterwards although we will not meet again it will always feel as if we are in the same 'space'.  We will  establish regular team 'drumbeats'.  For the Shanghai manufacturer, how about we take the results of the client and design team meetings, do a shared screen session, say by glance, with Shanghai and place the conclusions in a shared folder, say by dropbox?  Then the plant can detail the production process and give us an idea of timelines and update the  folder so that we maintain a 'single version of the truth'.  And don't have to waste our lives emailing and chasing each other.  We can catch up with them in the next week or so via QUBE. I think we should set it up so that the Manufacturer owns the travel budget so that each time I have to go to see them their profits are reduced.  This should encourage better long distance collaboration and prevent any misunderstandings or serious issues arising. Does that sound like a plan? Great!" 


We need to establish good relations with people we don't know - that is basic stakeholder management. Some of us have the skills to do this virtually but for most of us we are still at the same stage that people were in using telephones half a century ago, and don't know how to connect emotionally without the face-to-face element. Make sure that you can work effectively at a distance.   Learn now. 

Plan to meet face-to-face when only when you want to boost the emotional temperature or an extremely interrelated and complex set of problems to explore. 

Staying digital - all the way! There is no better alternative.

Stakeholder Engagement - Place your bets... Now!

You are on the horns of a dilemma – you are at the start of a tricky project and are trying to work out what you need to do and how the hell you are going to achieve it. First impressions count and its important to make a strong start and inspire confidence in all connected with the project. This project could make or break you!

So what do you do? Consider the following choices… do you:

1. Go to ground with a small team of experts to work out what to do…surfacing when you have answers to the key questions that will inevitably arrive (appearing clueless is not a flattering look!)
2. Talk to people who have either something to gain or lose from the result of the project (but risk being attacked for not having the answers and having a half baked solution) 
3. Book a long vacation, some where far and remote with no phone coverage and hope by the time you return the project has been cancelled (and say to your colleagues you knew the project was doomed from the start)

Whilst considering where to place your bet... consider the following:  From our research and experience at Pentacle, we know that only 1 in 4 projects successfully deliver their anticipated benefits. These aren't great odds! This is a result of the New World, where the fast paced environment we now find ourselves in, (World after Midnight) where knowledge has a short shelf life and reliance on expert views, based on past events, are not a good indicator of what to do with our unique problems now our in the future. Option A is not looking too promising!

Option C sounds great…but how likely is this to happen?... and even if it did, you’d need to be extremely lucky with your timing... a bit like spinning the roulette wheel and placing everything on “22 Black”.

In the New World, “stakeholders rule ok”, and they are an essential part in deciding what it is we need to do and how we need to go about it. Engaging them at that start gets their buy-in and makes it easy for them to place a stake on you to succeed in the risky business of project delivery. All those that opted for Option B collect your winnings from the front of house! Early engagement (now!) goes some way to allowing project managers to avoid the lottery of successful project management delivery. 

Since we don't get a second childhood.....

What do you do when your Children's charity encounters the New World? 

The new world changes everything for everyone even if your mission in life is to ensure that children have the best childhood they can.  Children in Need, the BBC charity, just like the rest of the world is facing growing expectations from customers (donors want to know more) more challenge with a tough economic climate, multiple choices to reach their audience as media options multiply and many other challenges you would find familiar. 

David Ramsden and his team are rapidly moving into the New World  developing new philosophy for both raising and distributing the funds and doing this across the UK through a dedicated and energetic team.  The focus was on more and faster so that children across the UK would have better childhoods not in the future but now. 

To accelerate the process Professor Eddie Obeng was invited to participate in a workshop at the Leadership College in Nottingham to share consolidate and plan the future.  Eddie Spent the time he had with the group sharing some of the tools and tricks of surviving and thriving in the New World - He shared with them the WorldAfterMidnight video (from WorldAfterMidnight.com) and together they used the EDD PET (Performance Enhancement Tool) to explore creatively what to change for real to make the difference.  Eddie also shared with them a number of PETS for gaining speed through alignment, understanding the underlying barriers to change and engagement.

 

Since we don't get a second childhood... every second counts!

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Another way to travel through ambiguity

There are many ways to make a journey, by plane, by road, by car...  that works for 'touchspace' or the real hardware world.  In 'cyberspace' you can journey by browsing the web, walking around QUBE, meeting friends to play on your xbox or Wii with the right software.  In your mind you can make learning journey's through your 'wetware' brain world.

But one of the most evocative and iconic ways to make a journey is on a Harley Davidson. 

Professor Eddie Obeng was working with one of the worlds most famous brands to explore the journey of learning to lead in an an ambiguous world.  Over a roller coasted day session he led the audience of top executives around the  pitfalls and possibilities of Leading in a world of Ambiguity.  They traavelled past 'What being wrong feels like', How to enjoy and thrive in Foggy change  but missed what would have been a groundbreaking session by Steve Whatmore who as a VirutalGuest was to discuss his role in transforming Rolls Royce Motor Cars and Aston Martin.  The course began last April with a webinar from Eddie.  Using traditional webinar software Eddie revved up a tale of challenge and intrigue explaining the sources of ambiguity as well as  engaging a number of polls.  In one he asked "Did you predict the Arab spring more than a month before it began?"  The Exec leadership group answered just the same way as you just have. 

He explained how a combination of the pace and scale of change and the fact that human interaction has become so dense that a revolution in one country can spark a revolution in another country in the same way as news about a particularly funny cat on youtube spreads.  The virtual and face to face sessions were in partnership with Duke Corporate Education is part of a significant journey of development for the leadership cadre programme directed by Denis Baltzley  himself a Harley owner.

One quote heard about Eddie was - "He's a real live wire!" and that from Harley Davidson is real confirmation of Eddie's Rebel/ Rockstar of Executive Education status!  The participants zoomed past Pentacle PETs (Performance Enhancement Tools) including AliensTM, IDQB TM, GapLeapTM and SquarePegTM proving that there really is another way to travel through ambiguity.