I thought the results were interesting. Not so much for what people are worried about, but that it reflects how dependent we are on electricity.

The subject of electricity also reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend about electrical engineering versus mechanical engineering. He has been in electrical all his life, recently retiring from EPRI (you don’t get more electrical than that). Though partial to electrical engineering, he was of the opinion that we will be in dire need of mechanical engineers in the future. Because so many kids are going into the computer and other electronics fields, there will be a lack of trained mechanical engineers and we could be in real trouble. MEs will be like gold. There will still be a need to engineer the physical parts of machines. So parents, don’t necessarily steer your children into electrical engineering. For those who like to take apart machines instead of programming them, there is a rosy future too.

1. Public Agencies – such as police, fire, emergency response and transportation workers allowing them to connect in the field to vital resources and information.
   
2. Visitors – augmenting economic development in the area by providing visitors and business travelers access to such things as maps, restaurants and other local attractions.
   
3. Local Businesses – especially those that employ a workforce of mobile workers such as service and repair people and the construction industry.
   
4. Residents – for mobile workers, residents who want to connect while on the go, low income residents and their support agencies and to fill gaps where access is not available
   

For the past 100 hundred years, “office work” has been performed either in an individual closed room or a large, single open area. The Boss or upper level management sat in the closed room, the office, usually with the door shut. Everyone sat elsewhere.

For the first 50 or so of these years, everyone else, the others, were open bull pens. There is a wonderful picture on the National Building Museum’ s web site that illustrates this perfectly. The Sears Roebuck Chicago Headquarters photo, circa 1913, shows one large room with rows upon rows of typists. All are seated behind the same kind of desk, with the same type writer, facing the same direction, performing the same job. Not a modern office work as we think of it today, rather the factory-like production of piece work created on a typewriter. This “office” is structured for single-tasking, in one location, with one environment and one set of support equipment in a
vertically hierarchical organization.

Since the 1970’s, this other work is done in open office systems, now infamously dubbed Dilbertville – rows upon rows of same size cubicles. Originally designed as an improvement over the open pit, the rampant proliferation of the cube has nothing to do with altruism. Now considered a workplace evolution of the open bull pen, the change that took place was not so much in the office structure, but in the work performed within the panel walls. Leaving repetitive, single-tasking behind, work has become multi-tasked, varied and different, changing on a daily, even hourly basis.

As we begin the next century, the work and the workplace are changing again. Enabled by technology, the transition out of the Industrial Age to the Space/Knowledge/information/internet Age (the era to be named by future generations) is complete. No longer constrained by the four walls of an office, cubicle or office building, work occurs wherever and whenever, across the boundaries of space and time.

Thus has emerged a new worker – one who can work anywhere, plug in anytime. This person revels in infinite variety, is motivated by the change of scenery and is more productive surrounded by an ever-shifting sea of activity. Who are these workers? They can be seen
sitting in your local coffee house, the town square or an airport lounge with cell phone to ear and PDA in hand.

Unfortunately, these workers can not be found in today’s office building. Maybe companies can be forgiven for not providing a workplace for this worker, having only recently been discovered
sitting in coffee shops with a laptop and a latte. Like a newly found species of bird, corporate anthropologists are mystified by what exists in these environments that draws such workers there in droves.

Equally unfortunate is the phenomena of lack of perception on the part of the worker. In other words, most have no idea what species of worker bird they are, blindly migrating from one company to another or from cube to cube. Haphazardly assigned work space based on job
title rather than personal productivity, they have been forced to adapt and accept their environment, never given the opportunity to discover their personal work mode or know in which office conditions they best thrive.

Do you want to know which type of worker you truly are? Or whether you became that by way of purposeful intent or unlucky happenstance? I have a process for discovery.

Think you know your species. Please fill out my ‘Work Mode’ survey. I am tracking migratory patterns.

The New Work Places – Challenge:
Use 10% Recycled Material in your New Work Place

I know that the rest of the world thinks of Northern Californians as “tree huggers” – bleeding hearts when it comes to preserving the environment. It’s true. The reason is we live amidst such
beauty that we have a special understanding of the need to take care and preserve it. An integral partner of preservation is recycling – reuse of already harvested and processed natural
elements – wood, ore and fossil fuels, in order to reduce the consumption of limited resources or keep them from the landfill.

In our area there is another method of recycling that can help in a big way – the reuse of construction materials. A company in East Palo Alto, Whole House Building Supply and Salvage, makes this possible for the average person. In our area, because the price of land is often worth as much or more than the house on it, people are buying property just for the land, then tearing down the house. Whole House partners with the home owner or contractor and holds a sale the weekend prior to demolition.

Anything in the house is available for purchase. Prices are usually way below what it would cost to buy new. Everything from kitchen cabinetry and appliances, doors, the door jambs and hardware, plumbing fixtures and lighting, to wood floors and baseboards are available. You can even purchase the wall studs if you have the inclination. Bring your tools and a vehicle to haul in. Payment is cash or check.

Don’t find what you want? Get on their email list to be notified of the next sale. Or visit their warehouse with additional building materials that have been donated or salvaged from area homes and businesses. They always have a selection of hardwood flooring, used bricks and more.  There is nothing like the feeling you get from knowing you may have saved a tree. House recycling – it’s good and its fun.

Whole House Building Supply and Salvage
1955 Pulgas Road  East Palo Alto, CA  94303
Warehouse 650-328-8731    Donations 650-322-3090
www.driftwoodsalvage.com

December is usually a slow new business month. Work often turns into the big crunch to meet year-end deadlines and quotas. It’s also about socializing – catching up with everyone you missed talking to during the year – or treating yourself to a business
holiday present by attending the myriad of organizational parties and special conferences.

I did the latter the other day and went to a great one-day conference called Leadership and Innovation in the Emerging Creativity Economy, presented jointly by the SBODN (South Bay Organizational Development Network) and IP Society (Intellectual
Property Society). The conference was held at PARC, Palo Alto Research Center, founded by Xerox Corporation in 1970 to define the “Office of the Future” and, since 2002, an independent subsidiary corporation. It was well worth the price of admission, if just to be up on their hill with a panoramic view of the southern San Francisco Bay Area, on a sunny and gorgeous brisk December day.

Kudos goes to Rossella Derickson and Krista Henley of SBODN and Pat Reilly of IP Society on a successful endeavor. Ideas and concepts that resonated with me include three of the speakers:  Prasad Kaipa – The Kaipa Group, Michele Jackman – Jackman
Enterprises and Adventures and Matt May, Director – Aevitas Learning Management.

Kaipa – Igniting the Genius Within: Innovation and Leadership in Action
Kaipa, who has spent many years interviewing Nobel Laureates about creativity, believes “creativity is at the root of innovation.” That “creativity is what makes innovation … innovation is at the root of transformation” and “transformation begins with people and out of the box ideas, entrepreneurship and intra-entrepreneurship.” Also, “risk taking and fear can not exist together.” I couldn’t agree with him more.

Never before have I heard my ideas about creativity confirmed more succinctly. I believe that people know very little about creativity and the creative process. Say the word creativity and most people typically bring up references to the arts – painting, sculpting, writing, etc. Very few people understand that creativity exists in all professions and jobs and, I believe, is an absolute requirement for “knowledge work.”  

With Mr. Kaipa’s simple assertions that creativity must precede innovation and innovation cannot exist without creativity, it becomes clear why most companies fail to be truly innovative. While corporations profess the need for innovation, their social
infrastructures are set up to hinder and, often quite literally, deter creativity. Instead of the understanding that innovation is the result of the brain process of creativity, it is regarded as if derived from a light bulb icon that pops up suddenly and by happenstance. Flip the switch and voilà!

The other misconception about creativity is for a company to have a creative “environment” all it has to do is manipulate the physical setting. Much like the concept of let’s just put everyone together in an open group area and they will instantly collaborative doesn’t work, neither will just moving wall and desks generate an
innovation.  If the psychological atmosphere for creativity already exists, then the physical workplace will assist or enhance the process. First, the creative processes of experimentation, trial and error and success and failure must be fostered by enthusiasm, support, facilitation, encouragement and trust. Traits not found in most corporate structures.

More great Kaipa-isms – “Loyalty is not important – it’s competence.” “Fear is the greatest deterrent to innovation.” And the concept of “unlearning.”

The SBODN has tapes available to purchase for each session or the entire conference. The day was filled with insights, but minimally, I’d get these three. Otherwise you will miss some great sayings in Michele Jackman’s Innovation, Creativity & Change:
Overcoming Predictable Levels of Disharmony, such as “Is your box your coffin?”  “Get it right, get it done and get along.”  “ A break through is not innovation.” “Vegetarian businesses meat less, get more done.”  She had everyone rolling in the aisles with laughter.

Also don’t miss – Matt May’s The Elegant Solution: Toyota’s Engine of Innovation, how Toyota not only comes up with but also implements 1 million ideas a year. It’s all about turning ideas into practice, "big leaps through small steps" and overcoming
temptations such as “batting for fences”, getting "too clever" and solving problems "frivolously", and his list of ten steps to making innovation happen.

Enjoy!