More Than Tech

Blockchain is one of the hottest topics in technology today. There is a lot of poorly informed hype surrounding blockchain but there is a great deal of promise also. I recently read an article on a pilot blockchain project undertaken by a major company, one which has been responsible for some wonderful technology. The article claimed that blockchain was enabling a swathe of new capabilities, but every single capability described was simply nothing new - been around for years, in fact I designed a system over 20 years ago that had all of the capabilities of this supposedly groundbreaking blockchain. It seems that the only reason blockchain was involved in this project was to ensure that it got funding and publicity! This type of hype could easily drive us to dismiss the technology altogether, but I think that would be wrong. This is an interesting technology that we should understand, if only to spot the hype. Its still a young technology and I think it will take years for it to mat

I took up martial arts when I was 19 and had some early success in competitions, but I put none of my success down to natural ability, it was a function of determination, willingness to learn and the fact that I was fortunate enough to have some wonderful teachers and role models. One of my best friends competed in the Seoul Olympics and he infected me with his endless determination, positivity and humility. Perseverance Fixes Everything! Martial arts require the practitioner to learn new movements and techniques, some of which are complex and in even un-natural. The idea of getting your foot above your head isn’t something most people think about let alone practice! These techniques are mastered through repetition and perseverance. If you work hard and keep at it, you will improve. It’s such a cliché but its at the core of my belief system. There is nothing that cannot be improved with hard work and perseverance. My favorite technique in TaeKwonDo competitions was my trust

If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs...Rudyard Kipling Most people do not perform well under pressure but I believe its a skill that can be learned and developed. In the 80's and 90's I was a competitive full contact martial artist. I learned about pressure by getting in the ring with other highly trained martial artists who were completely focused on hurting me and trying to knock me out! I was fascinated to see how some competitors performed better under pressure and others crumbled. I wanted to learn how I could get the best out of myself at the most important time, something I always admired in others. All of my sporting heroes were always capable of digging deep and finding something inside themselves when they most needed it. We can all learn to perform under pressure. How Pressure Affects Our Brains The cerebral cortex is the area of the brain responsible for the higher functions such as reasoning and logic but an evolutionary older pa

E-Procurement solutions have been widely available for almost 20 years now and we have seen them develop significantly A Little History In the late 90’s the indirect purchasing model was not supported by systems. Typically, there would be contracts and preferred suppliers, but it was very difficult to prevent maverick spend and non-compliance with policy. It was the early days of the internet and one of the early internet (or intranet) scenarios was to use a simplified browser-based interface to create purchase requisitions by selecting items from a more user-friendly list of items, which quickly became catalogues. The objective was to digitize the old paper based requisitioning system and drive compliance through an interface that the infrequent user could easily navigate. The interface was intended to require little training and to have a reduced set of functionalities to support very basic purchasing. Quickly after this, we saw the emergence of true e-procurement solut

My first job was as a developer, I was involved in the development of a mainframe purchasing system, which I later helped to replace with a package. That was my first exposure to a buy rather than build decision and since then I’ve seen both scenarios, although in the vast majority of cases buy beats build hands down. Of course, if there isn’t a package in the market that does what you need, then building your own system makes sense. Also, if your company has some secret sauce that is truly unique and special, then there is an argument to build. Whilst I was at a previous company, we developed our own WMS because we didn’t see anything commercially available that could easily be enhanced to contain our proprietary intellectual property, but that company is one of the largest distributors in the world, with some intelligent systems and some unique ways of doing things. For everything except the WMS, we used packages - I think that says something. Even with the capability and expert

If you’ve read the EI books then I’m probably preaching to the choir. If you haven’t, then I’d like to recommend that you do! Many tech people are much better at problem solving and working with numbers than working with people. Business Applications - All about People People implement systems! Rightly, we put a great deal of emphasis on the technology but we really must guard against neglecting the people. The most significant factor in implementing business systems, is how well you engage with the business owners and deeply understand their needs and issues. Its important to have a structured and rigorous methodology but more important are the way the people operate. How well do they listen and understand. How good are the people ate listening and digging deeply to get to the requirements. How good are they at recognizing and challenging legacy thinking? (thinking constrained by the legacy system and the "way we have always done it"). How good are the implementation