Relationship Capital. The Barista Principle -Starbucks and the Rise of Relational Capital is an interesting article on the importance of relationships. Write Ranjay Gulati, Sarah Huffman, and Gary Neilson in Strategy+Business: Winning companies define and deploy relationships in a consistent, specific, multifaceted manner. Although some companies will dub any concluded business deal [E M E R G I C . o r g]

You have to register to get the full article but this is absolutely on track. Companies that support the 4 main partners (employees, suppliers, shareholders and customers) will be most successful. Those that neglect one or more will not be successful.  5:58:47 PM    

Biotech scare stories engineer the truth. Seattle Times Jul 30 2002 1:30PM ET [Moreover - moreover...]

WHile I am probably on the same side of the issue as the writter of the editorial, I hate it when either side portrays the other as idiots. There are some concerns and we do not know enough to satisfy all of them. The argument must be placed into a risk-benefit argument. Mass smallpox vaccinations WILL kill several hundred Americans if carried out. They sshould only be used if the benefit (saving millions) is worth the risk. GM modified foods have some tremendous benefits but there are risks involved (i.e. such as diversity of crop plants). Many of these foods have been engineered to be of maximum benefit for the company and not for the customer (i.e. engineered plants that generate no seed, so that the farmerust go back year after year to get more seed.). Plants engineered to be a better foodstuff (added amino acids to make it complete) probably have benefits that outweigh risks. Plants resistant to herbicides (that the agribusibess just happenes to sell0 may have very different risk-benefit calculations.  5:53:59 PM    

STOCKWATCH Biogen up; brokers play down failed trials for Crohn's disease drug. Ananova Jul 30 2002 12:44PM ET [Moreover - moreover...]

Biogen bowel disorder drug fails clinical test. iWon Jul 30 2002 10:44AM ET [Moreover - moreover...]

This is one of the potential competitors for Enbrel. It will be abandoned but there are others coming down the pike.  5:37:13 PM    

Military R&D will encompass biology. UPI Jul 31 2002 1:24AM ET [Moreover - moreover...]

I love reading 'news' articles that are more science fiction. DARPA has been working on augmentation of humans for some time but it is a long way from hairs on gecko feet to soldiers with Spiderman wall climbing abilities. Again, days without sleep may sound nice but since we ae only just getting any kind of handle on why we need sleep to begin with, what sorts of problems are to be encountered. These sort of articles remind me of Popular Science or Popular Mechanics. How many wonderful things discussed in a December 1968 issue actually come to be?  5:35:11 PM    

An Executive Guide to Knowledge Management.

If you followed me these past months, you probably noticed that I already wrote about Knowledge Management (KM). You can read for instance Knowledge Management: Building a Better Battleship or Idea management may help validate knowledge management.

Today, we are looking to a complete guide about KM. It starts by -- yet -- another definition.

Unfortunately, there's no universal definition of KM, just as there's no agreement as to what constitutes knowledge in the first place. For this reason, it's best to think of KM in the broadest context. Succinctly put, KM is the process through which organizations generate value from their intellectual and knowledge-based assets. Most often, generating value from such assets involves sharing them among employees, departments and even with other companies in an effort to devise best practices. It's important to note that the definition says nothing about technology; while KM is often facilitated by IT, technology by itself is not KM.

Here are some questions answered by Darwin Magazine:

What constitutes intellectual or knowledge-based assets?

What benefits can companies expect from KM?

What are the challenges of KM?

Who should lead KM efforts?

What technologies can support KM?

This guide also describes some case studies from the Maryland Institute College of Art or the Ford Motor Company. It includes a list of Top Links, with the CIO Knowledge Management Research Center leading the pack -- which is hardly surprising considering that Darwin Magazine and CIO Magazine are sister publications.Finally, there are ten advises for getting people to adopt these KM tools and use them in an effective way.

The best recommendation -- in my experience -- is the first one: Start small. But the other ones are worth reading, like Let the users rule.

Source: Darwin Magazine, July 19, 2002
 

[Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends]

Something I will have to check out. Sounds very similar to what I have been talking about. Every little bit of evidence helps.  5:17:59 PM    

Courtney Love's Manifesto

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Forgery Bill Could Criminalize Copying

Excellent points about the unforeseen effects of legislation. The big corporations will always abuse legislation in the courts, even if they know they will lose eventually. After all, they only thing they can lose is money while they can win a lot. It is a path that many lawyer-driven companies look forward to - abusing porrly written legislation.  12:07:13 AM    

Darwin Executive Guides - Knowledge Management

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