Alexandra Levit's Water Cooler Wisdom

Why Finance Pros Are Turning to Automation

Are financial experts afraid of automation? Not exactly. If you talk to many of them, you’ll hear that technology has actually changed their jobs for the better and has positively impacted how they work in their organization by eliminating manual processes, increasing accuracy and efficiency, and facilitating valuable customer interactions.

I rounded up some of the best thoughts on automation from big timers in the industry. Here’s what they had to say.

“Automation will change how we insure property, loan money, invest money, deliver technology, write research reports, and what professionals in financial services do every day. Every week in the news we read about a new application for artificial intelligence, machine learning, neural networks, or robots — whether it is self-driving cars, AI assistants, predictive models, robots building (or printing) hardware, or how to invest our money. Put these all in the category of automation — and that is what will impact finance the most in the next decade.” David Reilly, CTO of Bank of America, as told to Tina Wadhwa, Business Insider.

“Open digital technologies will continue to support finance transformation. Transformation is accelerating in terms of companies and people needing investment decisions, as well as the development and implementation of new business models. This will require increased automation and simplification to drive process efficiencies, increased analytics to provide high-speed business insight to drive better business decision-making, and, finally, better collaboration so business connects in a much more seamless way.”  Richard McLean, regional CFO, Asia-Pacific and Japan, SAP, as shared on the SAP blog.

“We developed a chatbot named Eno, an automated program that can communicate with the bank’s customers via text message to give them information on their accounts and help them make credit card payments from their smartphone. The gender-neutral virtual assistant uses artificial intelligence to respond to natural language text messages from users about their money. For example, customers might ask Eno to show them their recent account balances or pay off a credit card bill.” Ken Dodelin, vice president of digital product development, Capital One, as told to Anne Irrera, Reuters.

For more insights from finance professionals, check out the full post on the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

IDEO's New Ideas for Building Innovation

Global design firm IDEO is known for its innovation. In fact, many clients approach the firm specifically because they want to learn its secrets. In a research initiative meant to get at the heart at what makes innovative companies tick, IDEO studied its 26-year archive of projects that focused on clients’ internal team dynamics, as well as external sources focused on innovation (including Fast Company‘s annual Most Innovative Companies lists).

One major theme emerging from the research? Many business leaders, including those in IT, hold back permission to innovate. Scared off by potential security breaches through the cloud and employees going rogue with unauthorized software solutions, IT often serves as a bottleneck in the implementation of cutting edge technology. But, as the data clearly showed, the workers closest to the organization’s most pressing business challenges are the ones who play the most critical roles in leveraging innovation to solve them.

At FastCoDesign, Katharine Schwab reported the main recommendations gleaned from IDEO’s data. Let’s highlight those, along with some ideas for encouraging IT to greenlight your initiatives.

Keep lots of options open

The IDEO research indicated that when teams iterate on five or more different solutions, they are 50 percent more likely to launch successfully. This is contrary to the traditional viewpoint that you should pilot and invest heavily in only one idea at a time. Staying flexible as to where the project might go also allows you to iterate alongside IT and accept that team’s suggestions for how to best move forward.

Challenge existing processes

IDEO found that when the majority of team members said that they felt comfortable challenging the status quo and acting with autonomy, the chances of a failed launch decreased by nearly 17 percent. Talk to your IT group about how you can experiment in a safe way that doesn’t result in any unnecessary risks to the organization or its technology infrastructure. Share best practices and seek IT’s partnership in the realm of process improvement.

For the rest of the findings, head over to the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

How to Manage Disruptive Organizational Events

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez, a world-renowned thought leader on Project Management and Strategy Implementation, recently penned an article for CIO around PM fundamentals for mergers and acquisitions.

As he wrote: “Last year, some 40,000 companies changed ownership, for a total deal value of some $5 trillion, according to Thomson Reuters. That means people are managing 40,000 massive transformation projects – but how well are they executing them? And have they been planned using the best practices of the professional field known as project management?”

In the article, Nieto-Rodriguez cited 10 steps for leveraging PM to assist with mergers and acquisitions. These included identifying a unique problem or opportunity, examining alternatives and being selective about projects to take on, understanding the puzzle of how all of your projects fit together, defining a specific timeline, securing high levels of sponsorship, obtaining necessary resources, anticipating drag and overconfidence, imagining plausible kill scenarios, selling to internal stakeholders, and tracking metrics.

In a follow-up interview, I asked Nieto-Rodriguez how to best leverage PM in the event of other disruptive events that might occur in an organization. Here are some of his ideas:

Layoffs

Manage a round of layoffs as a project and appoint an expert project leader to execute it. In most cases, the rationale for the layoffs is clear and the PM should communicate it to the impacted stakeholders. The inception and planning of the project might take some time, as all of the details must be carefully defined. As opposed to traditional projects, the implementation part (or the layoff announcement) should be as short as possible. Your project plan should include support for both the employees leaving as well as the ones staying.

Reorganizations

Reorganizations are transversal by nature and impact several or even all of the departments within an organization. The project approach and its emphasis on clear objectives, tasks, and deadlines will bring focus to the proposed changes. Here again, the rationale has to be clearly articulated, including the benefits for employees. Avoid being in “constant reorganization mode,” which creates change fatigue when the organization is not able to recoup sustainable benefits from the new model introduced. Reorganization projects need time, sometimes a few years, to make changes stick and deliver the promised benefits.

For the rest of Antonio's advice, head over to the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

Are Your Apps Ready for Primetime?

In a recent webinar with Inside Solutions and SilkRoad, I talked about the growth of mobile apps in the HR space, and specifically, citizen development.

Over the past five years, many organizations have moved their HR systems into cloud platforms and are looking for add-on tools that allow them to access and integrate – or build their own – mobile apps. We discussed the benefits that apps bring to HR operations and how you can get started on an app dev program of your own without having to rely exclusively on IT.

In the Q&A period, one attendee asked about the factors to consider when testing new mobile apps. This is a terrific question, as the actual development of an application is only the first step. While it’s tempting to immediately release your new app to the world, it should first undergo significant testing so you can ensure it works as intended and is meeting user needs. Here are some points to keep in mind as you prepare your creation for prime time.

Select the Type of Testing Device

Mobile apps can be tested a variety of ways. There are device emulators, which are often the fastest and most inexpensive means of testing basic functionality and features. But physical devices are better for understanding how an application will perform in real-world situations. In considering the type of device, consider that you’ll want to test on all OS versions and on screens of varying sizes and resolutions. Memory and connectivity requirements also come into play.

Select the Testing Environment

Generally speaking, cloud-based environments allow for most testing activities and have the benefit of providing on-demand access to a wide range of mobile devices. Network simulation tools allow you to test your app with different network speeds and bandwidths. It’s important to remember that at least some tests should occur in actual network environments so that you know exactly what will happen when users engage.

For more, head on over to the SilkRoad blog.

Agility Means Different Things to Different People

According to Forrester analyst Craig Le Clair, business agility is the quality that allows an enterprise to embrace market and operational changes as a matter of routine. This is the attribute that enables companies to thrive amidst uncertainty. Unfortunately, most companies have apparently not accepted this broad view. When Forrester reviewed the elements of agility with its CIO and CMO clients, the firm found that while the issue of agile performance was critical, CIOs and CMOs did not agree on what it meant in practice.

To clear up some of the confusion, over the last several years, Le Clair has refined his 10 dimensions of agility and divided them into three major categories: market (channel integration, market responsiveness), organization (knowledge dissemination, digital psychology, and change management, and process (business intelligence, infrastructure elasticity, process architecture, and sourcing and supply chain). Let’s look at each dimension a bit more closely.

Market

• Channel Integration: Information sharing and cross-channel experiences
• Market Responsiveness: Customer knowledge and rapid access to resources

Organization

• Knowledge Dissemination: Broader sharing, flatter organizations
• Digital Psychology: Trend awareness and digital skillsets
• Change Management: Embracing change and embedded change management

Process

• Business Intelligence: Information management and distributed analytics
• Infrastructure Elasticity: Cloud awareness and embrace of cloud options
• Process Architecture: Process skills and core systems independence
• Software Innovation: Real-time experience and incremental development
• Sourcing and Supply Chain: Agile sourcing process and supply chain flexing skills

For more of Le Clair's ideas, head over to the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

Making a Good Decision with Limited Information

Leaders do not always have the luxury of time when making a critical business decision, yet research shows that quick decisions are often remarkably solid despite time pressures. Here are six strategies for coming to the best conclusion in a non-ideal situation.

Strategy 1: Define Your Result

Consider why you must make a prompt decision now. What is the most pressing problem, and what do you need to have happen as a result of the decision? If everything worked out the way you hope, what would be the outcome? Don’t get too caught up in a detailed list of pros and cons, because inevitably, some listed won’t be as important as others. Recognize that every option will likely have a downside as there is rarely a 100 percent perfect decision. You simply have to do the best you can with the data you have available at the time.

Strategy 2: Look Both Short and Long-Term

Envision how your decision will play out immediately, and how it will play out down the road. Understand your organization’s short and long-term goals and evaluate your decision in relation to both of those. Suzy Welch’s 10-10-10 method is one way to employ this strategy: think about the implications of your decision 10 minutes from now, 10 months from now, and 10 years from now!

Strategy 3: Reduce Your Risk with a Trial

If you are uncertain about the best path forward, can you test the impact of a particular decision on a small scale? For instance, can you implement a new process in a single department, or company-wide for only one month? Trials give you an out if a decision isn’t working, and also provide opportunities to modify your approach based on feedback.

Strategy 4: Talk to People Who Have Been There

Seek out those (either inside or outside your company) who have been in a similar situation and probe them about their learnings. You might also ask the opinions of those who will be directly affected by the decision, and those who are truly impartial. The more perspectives you can get, the better informed your decision will be. However, in order to protect yourself from analysis paralysis, don’t leave your inquiry open-ended. Instead, commit to a concrete decision after collecting points of view for a specified period of time.

For more strategies, head over to the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

From Small Potatoes to Big Ones: The Question of Expansion

The decision to expand your business from a small, mom-and-pop operation to a larger organization is a milestone many business owners want to achieve.

But expansion can be scary—not to mention risky—and it's important to approach it with a significant amount of forethought and strategy. In this roundtable interview, I spoke to three business owners—Bryan Bedera, CEO of PR firm Amplify Relations in Reno; Richard Kershaw, CEO of web design firm Quality Nonsense in London; and Jean-Michel Lebeau, CEO of software development firm Cortex in New York City—about how they came to the conclusion that it was the right move for them, and the steps they took to help ensure they were successful.

What led to your decision to expand your business?

Bryan Bedera: We were too reliant on a small number of clients and thought expansion would provide long-term stability for the business. It's much easier to get good deals when three or four clients aren't providing the bulk of your revenue.

Richard Kershaw: Like many entrepreneurs, I wondered if we could take everything we'd learned, clone it and double our revenue.

Jean-Michel Lebeau: We look at growth as a strategic tool, not a way to survive or hide imperfections and problems through speed. We decided to grow and expand to the U.S. market because our goal is to generate as much impact as possible through technology, and to do so, we need to work with people who are looking to create this kind of impact. Top companies are all around the world, and if we're to attain our objectives, we need the right structure to support those clients and help them with their technological challenges.

What did your initial expansion entail? Did you expand your business again later on?

Lebeau: The first four years were very hectic, to say the least. We rented our first office when we had two people and had to move several times as we kept adding staff. We doubled in sales and headcount every year or so, so we tried to predict our needs in terms of human resources and real estate two to three years ahead and did our best to remain agile.

Kershaw: We spent nine years focused almost exclusively on one project. We made the decision two years ago to launch new websites, leveraging our existing team and processes. That turned out to be the wrong strategy, and we are about to expand again with a different approach.

Bedera: Our expansions have included more office space, a 30 percent increase in staffing to further fill out roles, bringing services we had previously subcontracted in house and a larger investment in marketing.

For more where this came from, visit the full interview on the AMEX Open Forum.

How 21st Century Leaders Develop Their Teams

Business owners who wish to increase their growth trajectory should be mindful of succession issues and make solid plans to ensure that the next generation of leaders is ready to take over. Manager training is a critical part of the mix, but should your business engage in formal or informal training, and what type of mentorship should you encourage?

I spoke with three business owners about their strategies for getting their organizations' leaders up to speed: Josh Harcus, co-founder and chairman at sales agency Hüify in Wilmington, South Carolina; Joey Kercher, founder and CEO of Air Fresh Marketing in Denver; and Nina Ojeda, founder and CEO of beauty aggregator PRÊTE in Los Angeles.

What's your definition of a leader in your organization? Is leader synonymous with manager?

Josh Harcus: A leader is an individual who has a lasting impact on those around them. A good leader will have a positive impact, and a bad leader will have a negative one.

Being a manager does not necessarily imply the qualities of leadership. The title of manager gives one the opportunity to lead, but a good manager must make the choice to sacrifice for those underneath them.

 

Joey Kercher: A leader in my organization is someone who takes initiative to make our company better and doesn't rely on others for motivation.

For me, the definition of leader is not synonymous with manager, though they are intertwined in many ways. Managers focus primarily on tasks, time and keeping projects on track. Although a leader has to have managerial abilities, leaders also need to focus on interpersonal relationships. Leaders often have to act as the face of the company as well.

Nina Ojeda: Leadership doesn't come with a title, it's a choice. A leader is someone who always puts their team first, company second and themselves last. Leaders can be managers, but not all managers are leaders.

How do you develop leaders or engage in manager training? Is your approach more formal or informal, classroom-based or experiential?

Kercher: We develop rising leaders by first hiring the best people. We look for those who have expertise and intelligence as well as the capacity for growth. My company is small, so we do not have a formal method for manager training. Currently, we operate as a flat organization, in which each team member has the flexibility to make their own decisions. Failing is okay as long as we can track our mistakes and learn from them.

Harcus: My colleague David is a terrific example of my company's approach to leadership development. Since David's team focuses primarily on sales development, David wanted each of his team members to grow in their abilities to build rapport and think on their feet. So he had everybody do open mic, stand-up comedy at an improvisation club in San Francisco. It was awesome to see each team member thrive under the pressure of trying something terrifying, and conquering it. Along with stand-up, David has conducted many formal manager training sessions that are essential to his team's development.

For the rest of the interview, head over to the AMEX Open Forum.

Why You Don't Need to Save the World

I once knew a guy named Brian. Brian was a recent college graduate and he wanted to work for an environmental nonprofit, but he couldn’t find a job. All of the organizations that interested him could only offer volunteer roles, and Brian needed to pay his rent.

Brian received a job offer in pharmaceutical sales. At first, he was resentful – Big Pharma wasn’t what he signed up for when he went to college. But after thinking it over, he decided to take the job and make the best of it. 

Brian used the huge company as his personal training ground. He talked to people in every department to learn about different functions of the business. He mastered the process of how new drugs were invented, approved, manufactured, and sold, and learned essential transferable skills including finance, marketing, IT, customer relations, and of course, sales.

Brian quickly became one of the top-ranked salespeople in his division and was promoted to manager. At this point, he was more marketable to the nonprofits, so I asked if he’d leave Big Pharma. “Why would I do that?” he said. “I want to do work that matters, and I’ve found a way to do that here.”

Sound good so far? Check out how you can do the same at my new Mashable column.

Business Owners: To Build or Not to Build?

There are two primary ways to procure skills that don't exist in your organization. The first, building expertise, refers to training current employees in the new areas. The second, acquiring expertise, involves either hiring new employees or partners or merging with another organization so that the requisite skills are instantly available. 

I talked to three business owners—Robby Berthume, CEO of advertising agency Bull and Beard in Winston-Salem, North Carolina; Kayla Wagner Faires, CEO of digital marketing firm Revel Interactive in Denver; and Rahul Varshneya, CEO of mobile application developer Arkenea in Carrollton, Texas—who made the decision to train existing staff, hire new people with certain expertise or acquire another company.

How did you decide you needed to expand your business?

Rahul Varshneya: A service business is a people business. People buy from other people based on trust. Once you have a set of people that trust you, it's easier to upsell and cross sell and [that] opens up other channels of monetization. Our passion to add more value for our customers now and for a lifetime leads us to expand what we have to offer.

Kayla Wagner Faires: We take cues from our clients regarding what is most valuable to them and expand accordingly.

Robby Berthume: First of all, we determine if the expansion is aligned with our brand, business model and growth strategy. If it meets that initial criteria, we validate [if] the market wants it, validate if the market is willing to pay for it and validate that it won't negatively impact other areas of our business or lead to opportunity cost.

Beyond this, we launch new products, services and competences using a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) style approach. Too many entrepreneurs and business owners lose their focus by going all-in too quickly. Tread carefully until you know you have a winning addition.

What has been your process so far for adding products, services or competencies to your existing offerings?

Berthume: I frankly don't pay much attention to competition, nor do I let my clients dictate whether or not I expand on my offerings. That client need could be an anomaly, and the competition generally follows a herd mentality.

I don't want to imitate, I want to innovate. I'm generally wary of spreading our brand and service offering too broadly and adding products or services too quickly.

Wagner Faires: We take a strategic approach with a few lenses as we consider adding services. Does it fit within our company's values? Can we provide the service at an exemplary level to our customers versus the competition? Is there a definite customer need for it? If we can say yes to all three, we consider bringing the service on, usually with a trial run first.

Varshneya: We continuously look to add products and services to our existing offering. The process is pretty simple and straightforward. We brainstorm internally and then survey our existing and potential clients on every product or service they have bought or intend to buy that complements our offering.

For the rest of the interview, head over to the AMEX Open Forum.