Wandering the World…

One of my friends, Kyle Matthews, recently pointed me in the direction of one of Seth Godin’s blog entries where he talked about Thinking Bigger.

I have just been in Florida for the last 4 days, where I saw how powerful this principle is. My brother, Gerald Rogers, had an idea about two months ago to put together a multi-speaker event, which he invited me to, but I had no idea what to expect. Well, in that short period of time he lined up some of the most powerful speakers (people like Tony Robbins‘ son Jairek, the business guru an NY times best selling author Chet Holmes, Than Merrill and other TV personalities, former sports stars and incredibly successful entrepreneurs), over a thousand people signed up to come, and for the hundreds of people who actually attended - it is quite possible everyone left with their lives dramatically changed for the better (including me)!

Gerald Rogers with Than Merrill

Testimonial Video (after just the first day)

Gerald had really never done anything like this before! But perhaps being driven by a passion to make other people’s lives better invites the universe to conspired with you — as it did with helping Gerald succeed in creating a world-class event! In addition to the speakers, I was impressed so much by the quality of the other friends I met there too. It seemed impossible to walk out of the experience we just had without being inspired and recognizing how this might indeed be one of the best times ever in the history of the world - and being motivated to take advantage of opportunities which are present and to really make a difference.

When I think about my brother, there are few people in my life that can make me laugh as hard or feel as loved as he does. Now there are few people who have done as much to inspire me to believe more in myself and think bigger. And it makes me so happy to see how Gerald is now thinking bigger in a way that allows hundreds (and no doubt thousands) more to benefit from the gifts and talents that God gave him.

Important Questions:

• What if I told you that in two months from now you could help do something that would forever improve the lives of hundreds of people (both those you know and love as well as those you have never met)? Would you believe me that you could - and then have the courage to make it happen?
• How much more could you do to make this world a better place, if only you had the courage to think bigger, focus, and follow through?
• What are the strengths and talents that God has given you, so that you can make this world a better place?
• What is it that is holding you back from doing that — and what could help you to eliminate the fear or mediocrity in your life so that you could increase your belief in yourself and your ability to think bigger?

I am back in Finland again.
(Have I ever mention how much I like this place? - If you have never been to Finland before, you need to reconsider your life goals)
Part of why I like the University of Joensuu is because of their strong international programs, and in particular their connection to Africa.

I recently accepted a position as the coordinator of the EDULINK ICT4D Consortium of African and European Higher Education Institutions.
Last year we wrote a grant proposal to the EDULINK funding call (a part of the European Union’s efforts to support and develop ties with the developing world), a couple of months ago we heard news that they accepted it, and this last week I sent out an official confirmation of the EU funding to each of the partner institutions.

The current partner institutions include:

• the University of Joensuu, Finland;

• Tumaini University/Iringa University College, Tanzania;
• the University of Southern Denmark, Odense;
• UNESCO Centre for ICT4D at Royal Holloway, University of London;
• the University of Education, Winneba, Ghana;
• Eduardo Mondlane University, Mozambique;
• Maseno University, Kenya;
• C. A. Diop University, Senegal

And with the following two associates:

• the Association of African Universities (AAU)

• and Entertainment Robotics, a private company that develops ICT4D.

The specific objective of this project: To strengthen each of the partner institutions potential for effectively producing and utilizing ICT for development; specifically improving academic curriculum and research capacity through (1) workshops, (2) student and faculty exchanges, and (3) online contributions to a virtual hub (for collaboration, resources, and open sharing of results).

I am excited about the position because it allows me to be flexible in where I live (as I can do most of the work online), and the project is focused on an area that I feel passionate about. I feel we can make a difference, even though progress usually turns out more slow than we would hope (it is more like sitting and watching a tree grow than it is like watching a train pass).

As you can see from my previous blog entries, instead of western countries simply offering aid to the developing world (and often unintentionally making things worse than before) - I’m a strong believer that it is MUCH better if it is a two-way flow of ideas and communication, synergistically coming up with solutions together that no one partner could on their own, helping with the “development” of the European partners as much as with the African ones.

We need to get rid of the idea that Africa is a poor person that we need to pity and help! In my opinion, such an attitude is patronizing and simply fosters dependency. Africa is truly rich, and they have all they need and more!
In a sense they might benefit from association with Western countries, but in that same sense Western countries need Africa just as much or more. It seems much more healthy and helpful to have relationships and attitudes that encourage a two-way synergistic sharing and implementation of ideas and resources (where the end result is better than either party could come up with by themselves).
Hopefully the fruits of this consortium experience will be ICT4D innovations, curriculum, and research that meet real needs and contribute to improving the quality of lives and the human potential of all involved.

Questions:
Along those lines, my questions for you in this blog entry are ones that we asked at the TEDC conference participants in August:

• What do you think are the unique strengths of Africa and its people?

• In your opinion, what is it that Africa and Africans can share with others, to help “develop” even Western countries, and make the world a better place?
• (I ask these questions about Africa, because that is where a lot of the EDULINK project partners come from, but you can answer them with regards to any another “developing” area too.)

Several months ago, before I knew I was going to be directing the Edulink project, I proposed an idea to Andy Gibbons, the chair of the Instructional Psychology and Technology department at BYU, to offer a course on the use and application of web analytics for designing and improving online learning environments, and he loved the idea.

I had been teaching a course on Web Analytics in the Marriott School of Management (mainly taken by students in information systems, marketing, business), but I think this might be the first time any university has offered a course specifically about its application in online education (although I doubt it will be long before others catch on). [If you want to get an idea for what is happening, here is a link to our class space.]

What are my expectations from the course? That everyone in the seminar:
(1) has hands on experience with the application of it with a real case,
(2) has an opportunity to contribute to an academic publication on the topic, and
(3) that our experience together produces knowledge and insights that are greater than any one of us could have come up with on our own.

My experience so far indicates that using web analytics to make and test recommendations for a simple online shopping experience (with metrics like CPC and ROI, measured in $) is a little more straight forward than deciding what set of data to monitor in order to improve online learning environments. But lets face it, with most e-learning there is a lot of room for improvement! -It is pretty easy to see how there must be some beneficial ways that web analytics can help to monitor activity and create insights for recommending and testing data-driven improvements. The initial question of importance is to determine the right KPIs (Key Performance Indicators).

Each of the participants in the seminar have already generated some ideas that I think will prove fruitful (click on their name to see their first brain storm of ideas):
Aaron Johnson
Cahlan Sharp
Joseph South
Julia Carlson
Mary McEwen or here too
Michelle Baron
Mike Thompson
SaraJoy Pond
Stephen Ashton

A combination of a summary of the class’s ideas along with my own thoughts over the last couple years of thinking about it will be forthcoming…

Questions for now:
For anyone who might be reading this blog entry -
- If you were designing and/or teaching online classes, for example, (as opposed to teaching one face-to-face and being able to see student’s reaction and adjust the experience in the moment) – what kind of things do you think would want to look at to help you make adjustments for the needs and experience of those you were teaching?
- Ideally what kind of things do you think you would want to be able to measure and monitor in order to give you insights into what is going well and/or what could be improved – (and for whom)?

I did something this last week that I immediately regretted and continue to feel bad about – wanting to help but honestly feeling as if the situation was worse after my arrival than before.
I’m asking for your thoughts in what I could have done differently.
Thinking about it, I have started to see the experience as an analogy for how aid/development is generally given and received in Africa.

The situation:
I was in a little village about an hour and a half outside Kampala, checking on some options of places that I can bring the participants of the upcoming TEDC conference. A friend of a friend was kind enough to offer me a ride back to Kampala, and so as a thank you I wanted to buy something to share with him.

Funny enough, we drove past the “American Super Market” (which was run by people from India) so in addition to taking a picture, I went inside to look for something to share. I got some peanut m&ms, and just outside the store gave some to this friend, a girl he was talking to, and then just to be nice also to the guard sitting outside the front door.

Before I knew it, a dirty little pair of hands attached to a cute little dirty orphan popped out in front of me in a motion of wanting some too.

My first thought was compassion, “Of course I want to do something nice for this little guy, when I have been given so much and he has been given so little, due to no fault of his own.” Just as I went to pour a couple in his hands, I was jostled as another pair of slightly bigger dirty hands pushed the other ones out of the way in order to try and catch the candy. Then another pair of dirty hands attached to a cute little dirty orphan joined them, and another, and another, until in what seemed like a matter of seconds, I was surrounded by hands and orphans. A lot of them had left their places sitting on the street near the building and now surrounded me. (someone told me nearly one in four children in Uganda is an orphan, mainly due to AIDS – although most of them get taken into live with extended family, these ones looked like they lived on the street)

I quickly counted heads (15-20) and how many candies were left in the bag (about 11) – not enough to go around.

I looked over to my companion for some advice or help; he just shook his head at me (like “stupid mzungo”) and walked quickly across the street to the car to start it because he was in a rush to get back to Kampala.

I obviously looked confused and at this point the kids were kind of pushing each other for spots at the front so that they didn’t get left out.

My first thought was to simply do nothing and keep the candies to myself so that it would be “fair” (or at least equally unfair for each of them) – but that thought made me feel selfish and guilty.

I was trying to think quickly but my friend was already in the car and it seemed like more and more anxious kids kept coming over and surrounding me.

So I just light tossed the bag towards them while I broke free of the crowd and hurried across the street to get in the nice, comfortable, clean car.

I looked back just once to see what happened, and instead of the candies being spread as equally and fairly as possible among all the orphans, they had fought and struggled over them until one or two of the bigger kids won all of them and the rest got none.

By then we had driven away.

Maybe you can see now why this situation keeps bothering me.

My question for you:
What could/should I have done differently?

Feel free to give simple answers or ones in which you creatively think out of the box. And don’t be afraid to hurt my feelings either, I’m asking for your honest thoughts.

After I get some answers to these questions, I’ll share a bit about how it seems like an analogy for current aid/development situations in Africa in general. But for now, I’m just interested in how you think I could have done things different with this particular incident?

Everywhere I go, I am surprised how much people all over the world know about the U.S.
• When I was in Russia a couple weeks ago, a young man came up to me and asked me if I was from the US. Then he began to ask me all kinds of questions about the housing market and sub-prime loan crisis. He wanted to know when I thought the market was going to recover, and what the relationship was going to be between the stock market and the upcoming elections.
• When I was in France, a woman who was originally from Scotland but now living in Norway taught me some interesting things I didn’t know about the current US presidential political candidates.
• When I was in China, a few people talked to me about wanting to move to the U.S., one man describing to me the uniqueness of some of the freedoms we have.
• When I was in Finland, I heard a black man from Tanzania defend the current situation in America to a white woman from South Africa who was speaking against certain parts of it.

I know other countries are talked about (e.g. French president’s new wife, Spain wining the Euro 2008, Russia’s and Putin, Zimbabwe’s election scandal…) but the situation in the US seems to command so much of the discussion of ordinary people around the world. To be honest, sometimes the discussion has made me feel somewhat awkward to be from the US, and at other times it has made me feel some degree of pride – but always it makes me think what a big responsibility it is to be the focal point of so much discussion.

I heard the CNN news host Glenn Beck talk at the Freedom Festival on the BYU campus about how much America craves for a leader, but how the greatness of America was never found in Washington DC or any of its politicians.
He talked about how in America we all now have been bombarded with talk and recognition of all of the problems and all of the dangers we face – and now the whole world knows all our problems. We often talk so much about the problems we currently face, that we totally miss the blessings and opportunities that we so easily take for grant it. So what is it that contributes to the ways in which America is great?

There has been a lot of new technologies and innovations which have come from America:
• Light bulb
• Car
• Television
• Movies
• Telephone
• Assembly line
• Artificial heart
• Safety pins
• Computer
• Water tower
• Popsicle
• Polio vaccine
• Cotton candy
• Blue jeans
• Scones

But this is not really what he thought makes America great.

Where is the greatness?

From his message, at least part of greatness of America is captured in two phrases:
1. “We the People” – the first three words on the Declaration of Independence – in large print. This is the belief that government does not solve our problems, but we solve them by serving our families and communities. Glenn Beck said: “We can solve any problem. Not in Washington, but right here. The answer never comes from Washington, it never has… The answer comes like a beacon in these three words – ‘We the People’”
2. “In God we Trust” – this phrase should bring humility, not arrogance. It is the belief that if we humble ourselves and trust in God, He can guide us into an uncertain and difficult future to do things that will benefit ourselves and those we care about (both in and out of the country).

George Washington, the first president, was a good example of this – not looking for power of government position, not interested in being a politician, but simply in doing his duty to serve for the sake of freedom. Glenn Beck pointed out that when George Washington was making his stance at Valley Forge during the war of independence, he was just a short way from the government capitol (which at that time was Philadelphia). During the cold winters, his wife was the one who made shirts and pants for the soldiers. “The government and congress did not do much to help them then. The situation has not changed that much today.”

____
As a strange side note, one of the news stories in the U.S. this year is that the fireworks displays tonight might not be as spectacular this year because it was more difficult to get fireworks from China due to the recent earthquake.

So even in talking about the positive aspects of American society, I can not get beyond the reality of how interconnected the world is now-a-days.

Since we are so interconnected, I’m curious – from an international perspective what do you think have been some of the positive and negative impacts America has made on the world?

I would sometime like to do a study on games people play in different cultures and countries.
Going to St. Petersburg this last weekend, we joked about a ‘Russian game’ called the “Everybody get down!”-game - and how this man on the bus didn’t learn how to play it very well…
(sometime ask me more about it for a funny story)

But as I have been thinking a lot about games lately - and have started inventing one or two games that deal with intercultural communication and collaboration - I wonder these questions about the games people play around the world:
- Who is involved (adults and children, people of what ages, and what relation)?
- Are the games based on cooperation or competition?
- Are they team based or individual?
- Are they thinking/skill based or games of chance/luck?
- If it is a game you can “win” what do you win?
- Are they played indoor or outdoor?
- Are the games just for diversions or what deeper things do you learn from playing them? etc…

Here are my questions for you:
- Do you know any games you (or others) played as a kid that people from other areas of the world might consider unique?
- What are your favorite games to play and why do you like them?

I was just emailed a link to the keynote presentations from the conference in Oxford: “Confronting the Challenge of Technology for Development: Experiences from the BRICS” and I realized I should post a copy of my abstract and some follow-up thoughts from my presentation (which was about the diffusion of innovation in developing countries through microfranchising).

(For a basic introduction to microfranchising, you can go here or here)

Follow-up thoughts:

• Microfranchising is an powerful, intuitive concept that will most likely spread exponentially in a similar way to microcredit.
• It addresses both social and economic problems in a novel and effective way.
• There are unsuccessful microfranchises (one of which I learned about at the conference), and I need to do more exploration as to what factors were involved.
• The innovations needed for developing countries are not just product innovations, but also innovations in system and process (as the ones which are implemented from developed countries often fail) - and microfranchising is a great example of that.
• Microfranchising is a useful concept for developed countries as well, and for govt and education as well as business.
• I want the journal we choose to publish our article in to be free and online, in order to reach the most people of the key target audience.

Here is the abstract…
The Diffusion of Innovations in Emerging Economies through Microfranchising

P. Clint Rogers, Ph.D.
Jason Fairbourne (Director, MicroFranchise Development Initiative),
Robert C. Wolcott, Ph.D. (Founder & Director, Kellogg Innovation Network; MBA & EMBA Faculty, Innovation & Entrepreneurship)

Abstract:
Emerging markets present a host of challenges for the traditional structures and operations of multinational businesses. Everything from different consumer needs and marketing obstacles to product distribution challenges and human resource management issues (Srinivas, 2002). These challenges provide opportunities for innovation not only in product development, but also in organizational structure and management (Brown, 2004). In this article we present an innovative business management model called microfranchising which has successfully facilitated the introduction and scalable distribution of innovations in emerging economies. The impetus behind the origination of the idea was to provide sound business opportunities and services to the world’s poor by introducing scaled-down business concepts found in successful franchise organizations. The key principle is replication– replicating success to scale through three enabling characteristics: (a) organic nature, (b) modularity, and (c) micro-scalability.
In this paper we discuss how microfranchising can solve many of the problems of traditional approaches to introducing innovations in emerging economies, and we describe as case studies two microfranchise organizations offering ICT (Information and Communication Technology) services in emerging economies: Drishtee and One Roof. At the core, Microfranchising addresses four primary challenges found in emerging economies: (1) the lack of jobs in many communities, (2) the lack of business skills among the poor needed to grow a successful business, (3) the lack of goods and services available to the poor (e.g. lack of efficient technologies), and (4) the lack of MNC’s understanding or ability to operate successfully in this vastly different context. We also illustrate how the concepts involved apply to a broader context of business and government.

Keywords: Knowledge Transfer and Innovation in MNCs/MNEs, Corporate Governance in Emerging Markets, Entrepreneurship in Emerging Markets, Marketing in Emerging Markets, Sustainable Development, Technology Transfer, Microfranchises

Attending a conference at Oxford last week (“Confronting the Challenge of Technology for Development: Experiences from the BRICS”), I heard several of the speakers refer to Finland as an example of one of the most successful countries in terms of development and productivity growth over the last couple decades (one speaker even referring to it as one “Superstar model”). Being back in Finland again, I have asked myself why has Finland been so successful (when so many other countries struggle and fail to do what Finland has done)?

[FYI - There are all kinds of quotients and formulas out there to measure the “productivity” of a country, and people are constantly debating about what should be included in them. Usually included are a combination of things like GNP, import/export ratio, capital accumulation, growth per capita, patent applications made, publications, Research and Development ROI, etc…]

So why can you give money to Finland, and they very effectively turn it into productivity and growth, when you could give it to other countries and not have nearly the same result?

Here are some of the ideas I have thought of or heard from others (You should vote for one of them or suggest your own). Why Finland has been so productive and successful:

1. Because Finland has such a low corruption rate (one of the lowest in the world), the money doesn’t get embezzled by government leaders, and people work together better because they can trust each other more.
2. Finland is very homogeneous - this also helps with getting people to work together and trust each other.
3. Finland is very egalitarian (perhaps due to the Lutheran influence?)- and so this helps to mediate some of the glory seeking and conflict. [e.g. I heard from one man that all government officials at a certain level are required to take a business economics course in which they get assigned a role that is not their own, then use real data and numbers from Finland’s economy to make decisions and policy recommendations. This helps them see that they need to work as a team, and appreciate the insights they learn from those with another expertise.]
4. Finland is used to pulling together to face very difficult challenges and great odds. [e.g. when China started becoming more of a threat economically, they flew over some of their top people who came back with a much different approach.] This is like the “sisu” mentality - which comes from things like enduring months of freezing cold weather with virtually no sunlight, living in the woods for years without talking to another person, or sharing a boarder with a country that likes to keep you on your guard.
5. There is a hypothesis that a country’s productivity level and growth is directly proportional to the amount of Karelian pasties they consume?
6. Perhaps by requiring men to wear speedos at all public pools - this bring a special camaraderie, creating a better environment for working together? Kind of symbolic of stripping issues down to the meat and bones and avoiding anything extra.
7. The fact that Finns don’t engage in much small talk (e.g. ignoring each other rather than saying “hi” to each other as they pass each other) maybe saves time for them to be more focused and productive?
8. Perhaps it is because people around the world serendipitously thought “Nokia” was a Japanese company - and so invested in it heavily?

Any other ideas that you can think of for why Finland has been so successful?

Just returning from Denmark (land of some of my ancestors), where I presented a paper at the Aarhus School of Business - “Knowledge 360″ conference.

Perhaps the best thing about presenting my paper “Tools and Techniques for Online Cross-Cultural Knowledge Communication” - was that people in the audience knew about research and resources regarding cross-cultural innovation that I was not yet aware of. And it is always good to make connections with people who are doing interesting things which promise some potential of future collaboration.

One of the strangest things is that one of the most prolific faculty at the business school there, Connie Kampf, used to be the friendly girl serving me and my friends Orange Julius when we were teenagers at the Eden Prairie Center shopping mall in Minnesota years and years ago! (It is easy to remember because it was located near the arcade where we could get free tokens for getting good grades on our school report cards.)

In the last couple years, since we have both received our doctorates, I randomly met her in Malta, again in Estonia, now in Denmark and will see her later next month in the south of France!

Just goes to show what a crazy, small world this is - and that you never really know the potential or future of any ordinary person you meet on the street!

*So don’t give up on me just yet, I might one day do something worthwhile. (No promises - but I’m just saying it is a possibility.)

I heard Ed Catmull, innovative president of Pixar and Disney animation studios, speak on Thursday at BYU. He spoke about a topic that I have been thinking a lot about lately - how do you create the best situation for a multidisciplinary team to work on something that has never been done before?

He started with a comment made to him by a producer: “It is not finding good people that is our problem, it is finding great ideas.” Ed Catmull argued why this statement is wrong. He gave examples of great ideas in the animation studio that did not work with a certain team, but another team took them and made them hugely successful. His point was that the most important thing is to create a team that works well together, especially when you are doing something that has never been done before.

Here are some of his ideas:

• Everyone needs to understand that they are equally valuable and important (e.g. neither the programmers, the artists, or the managers could feel like second-class citizens)
• Things will go wrong when you are the first people to do something new, don’t be afraid of making mistakes, just find ways to handle them well. “We are in the job of doing something new,” Catmull said, “Our measure is not whether we avoid different things. It’s how we respond to things when they go wrong.”
• Don’t let everything that is good mask the things that are not good - do a “postmortem” analysis, a review of each project to discuss what went well and what could be better.
• Managers are simply responsible for helping the team merge well.
• “I’ve always believed that you shape the management team around the talent rather than try to force people into a certain way of doing things.”

I also heard Brent Adams speak this semester on the same topic. He has been the driving force behind BYU’s very successful multidisciplinary computer animation program. In the past few years 1,500 animations have been submitted to the student Emmys, and BYU students have impressively won 5 out of 12 best computer animation awards and 2 of the 6 student academy awards.

He said where education has typically been an “individual sport” (with even group projects not being designed very well) -the advantage in this world will always go to those who can out-innovate and out-collaborate their competitors. Brent gave some very valuable ideas for designing multidisciplinary teams to work well in creative collaborative thinking:

• Flexibility – approaching the problem from many different directions
• Fluency – ability to generate LOTS of ideas (if you want to have a good idea, have lots of them)
• Novelty – originality, uniqueness, “I would have never thought of that”, innovation
• Definition – being good at defining the context, constraints, etc.
• Roles – design roles and responsibilities which allow people to play to their strengths.

“Successful innovation is the union of convergence and divergence processes – weaving in and out when coming to an appropriate situation.” (paraphrase)

Aside from how much I like both the Pixar and BYU animation movies, my interest in this all stems from the fact that I think some of the most innovative teams in today’s world will be both multidisciplinary and cross-cultural. I am interested in finding the best technologies and techniques to reduce the miscommunication and increase the innovative potential from having such a rich combination of experiences, expertise and perspectives.

Questions:

Does anyone have any good ideas about how to create an effective, innovative team?

Has anyone been a part of a team like that? If so - what made it work well?