Book: Rework

I just finished reading Rework by the 37 Signals team (Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson), a Christmas gift from my youngest son.  If you are not familiar with 37signals and their work I recommend checking them out.

The book provides an outline of the 37signals philosophy including tips and opinion.  It is aimed at small businesses, however, I think everyone from small business to large business to government organizations should read this book and think about how it might be applied to their work.

They don't say this explicitly but what the book is really about is rethinking some of the dogma of business-as-usual.  I have often thought that any organization that has an "innovation" branch is already in trouble.  If you read this book you'll find out why.  An innovative culture isn't something you can install, or force directly.  Innovative cultures happen by consistently rewarding innovation.  Sharing cultures happen by consistently rewarding sharing.  Organizations that consistently treat employees as untrustworthy, end up with a culture of fear and lack of trust.

For examples of how to do it right in a government context, I think the Province of BC is on the right track with their new B.C. Government Social Media Guidelines and their public statement of Open Data as Defining Principle No. 1 of their Citizens @ the Centre: B.C. Government 2.0 strategy. The very fact that these documents exist sends a signal to employees of a relatively large organization that they are trusted and empowered to engage citizens and empower citizens to create value from open government data.  This kind of positive reinforcement will go a long way to creating a culture of learning and trust as people come up to speed with the new tools of social media and open data.  Kudos to the folks that made this happen and the executives that supported them.  I look forward to seeing what they do next.

Creating an environment where innovation happens, where sharing is rewarded, where great work is recognized and where trust is leveraged is the hallmark of an organization that gets it.  37signals definitely gets it.  Rework is an easy and worthwhile read.  If you're interested in innovation in the workplace, I recommend you read it.

Book: I.O.U.

As part of my current effort to become more informed about the state of the country, economy and markets I recently finished reading I.O.U. by John Lanchester.  While Life Inc. described the nature of the corporation and the devastating effects it is having on humanity across the board, I.O.U. focuses specifically on the global financial crisis precipitated mostly by Wall Street and enabled by many others.

It's very comprehensible delve into the antics of modern banking and a "wake up call" to anyone who thinks the banks are 1) taking care of your money, or 2) care about your portfolio.  Your deposits are leverage for the real money, lending.

I highly recommend this book and though I think there are other ways to get this material this one is particularly good at showing how bizarre the financial world has become.

Book: Life Inc.

I have recently become more and more interested in the state of our world on a macro level and on a recent trip to Vancouver I picked up a few books on the subject in an attempt to become more informed.  Call me naive but thus far in life I have just basically taken some things for granted: we live in a free market society, anyone can prosper if they are willing to work hard, real estate is a pretty safe long term investment, the government acts in the best interests of the people, etc...

I just finished reading one of the three books I picked up titled Life Inc. by Douglas Rushkoff.   Life Inc. is a book describing the effect of corporations and the power they have over us and our governments and the effect they are having on humanity.  If you've seen the movies "The Corporation" or "The Century of the Self" you have some idea of the material but this book takes it to a whole new level.  A highly recommended read I warn you, it's not the easiest material to consume.  Not that it's poorly written, or that it's alarmist, it isn't.  It's extremely well written and thoroughly researched and it's easy to read in a few days.

What's hard is grasping how insidious and yet subtle our current monetary system and the corporate system is.  Corporations are like a different life form, and they are competing with us for resources, and in the last 400 or so years, they have been winning.

It's not all bad news.  Douglas reminds us that we still have ultimate power, for now at least, and there are some very concrete things we can do.  It's just whether or not we have the will.  He states that the situation is entirely temporary.  We will either do what's needed to arrest corporatism, or... it will arrest us.