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The emergence of the internet has given people the opportunity to become as visible as they want to be. Visibility means people can spill their guts and reveal themselves in so many new ways. We can post our opinions on blogs, update our ‘status’ as often as we want on Facebook, Tweet about things we like or dislike and put up our photo’s for people to rate. Why do we do this? And is it good or bad?

I would say that this desire to be seen online mimics our need to be seen offline. Why do most human beings want to become celebrities? It’s simple, for love and for power. All of us need and want love and many of us want power (to varying degrees). Take for example sites like hotornot.com and soyouthinkyourecool.com which allow you to put up your picture and something about yourself for others to rate. This way strangers can weigh in on whether you’re pretty or cool, but why do we care what strangers say? They don’t know us or impact our lives in any way. Perhaps that’s the key. Since they don’t know us they’re not like our family or friends who have a biased opinion. However while these ratings may be more truthful, they’re totally superficial. This is where the fine line between wanting love and vanity emerges. Seeking social approval from friends and colleagues is natural and healthy (to a certain degree). Seeking approval from strangers over the internet is like a call for help.

In fact in our quest for social approval what seems worse than a good or bad rating, is no rating at all. Having your blog, profile or photos ignored is like being banished into the desert or sitting by yourself in the corner of the classroom. The instances where it’s worse to be poorly rated than ignored is in those unfortunate cases where bullying and ostracism have occurred. In general however we want to maximize the number of comments, ratings and friends we have on Facebook (even if we barely know these ‘friends’). Building our ratings and friends simply to have them is a façade that shows we are important and loved. This again is a call for help.

Of course there are legitimate benefits to social media. The ability to connect with people, share ideas, promote our businesses and so on via social media is great. What is not so great is our society’s obsession with rating and being rated. The internet is a powerful tool and many people in the world are now on it. Therefore we should expect every corner of human thought and behavior to manifest itself there. However we should take care to spend our time and direct our thoughts to positive ideals and not worry about how we’re viewed by people we will never meet.

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They say if you give a man a fish you’ve fed him for a day, but if you teach him how to fish then you’ve fed him forever. So why don’t we apply this logic in the classroom? In other words why don’t we teach students (of all ages) how to start a business of their own instead of relying on paychecks from an employer? I have a few theories on this;

1. Business is something you learn on your own - The conventional wisdom is that you learn ‘the ropes’ of business as an apprentice and then branch out to start your own business. While this is a valid path I think this applies to a small number of entrepreneurs these days. Most people spend many years in a corporation hating their job and not imagining that there may be a better way (as I did). Typically the people who make this leap have been forced to since they were laid off or had to leave before they had a nervous breakdown.

2. Schools aren’t prepared to teach entrepreneurship - School curricular don’t have the means to teach this because there hasn’t been enough demand historically. Furthermore teachers typically don’t have any entrepreneurial experience to draw on so they would need to bring in outside speakers for help. This isn’t a bad thing however it would take a real push to convince the school board.

3. This is what business school is for, isn’t it? – Typically people think that business is a complex topic that should be left for business school. However while business school is useful for those who want to specialize in finance, marketing etc. it’s not for everyone. This doesn’t mean that the broader audience shouldn’t learn business skills. The student interested in cooking may want to open a restaurant someday or the student interested in math may open an engineering consultancy or web development company.

Giving students an exposure to business means teaching them how to develop products, market them, manage inventory, deal with customers and finances. Certainly the complexity of these topics will increase as students progress through the years. As we don’t teach elementary students calculus, we wouldn’t teach younger children about corporate finance or tax optimization. However there are many important lessons that they can learn which will benefit them greatly in the future. The payoff to the student would be a sense of empowerment to be able to start and successfully manage their own businesses. The benefit to us (as a society) would be a stronger economy with less unemployment since small business is the engine of job and economic growth.

Andrew Hargadon has written a great piece entitled ‘7 Ways to Make Students more Entrepreneurial‘ which discusses how we can enhance our educational system to integrate entrepreneurship.

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Have you ever worried about writing or presenting a speech? All of us, from the novice to the very experienced, get somewhat anxious about public speaking. Using examples from some of the most successful public orators as well as his own lengthy experience, James C. Humes has put together a book which provides a lot of useful advice to improve one’s speeches and onstage personality.

In his book, ‘Speak like Churchill and Stand like Lincoln’ Humes provides 21 ways to power-up your presentations. Each of these ways is presented clearly and concisely. I would love to discuss all 21, but for the sake of time I have chosen the nine which stood out the most for me.

1. Power Pause – Napoleon apparently was a master of pausing for effect. Before starting a speech to his troops he would sometimes pause for 60 seconds. This wait would build people’s anticipation and focuses the audience towards you.
2. Power Opener – Your first words will set the tone for the speech. They will also give your audience an idea of how closely they will pay attention to what you have to say. Try to open with a substantial idea, quote or statistic – something that will convey your message and people will remember.
3. Power Point – This isn’t referring to a certain Microsoft program but with providing the audience with a clear message. You should relay this message in a cogent and straightforward way. Eisenhower once said that ‘you ought to be able to put your bottom-line message on the inside of a matchbook before you ever start at your typewriter’.
4. Power Quote – Using quotes in your speech is a great way to add authority to your message. Just be sure that you’re using the quote appropriately and can cite the source.
5. Power Statistics – Benjamin Disraeli is quoted as saying ‘There are lies, damned lies and then there are statistics’. Using statistics can add authority and legitimacy to your point.
6. Power Reading – This is something I see even from CEOs of large corporations; they read a speech from notes and look down the whole time. Never read a speech to an audience while looking down, it disconnects you from them.
7. Power line – A power line is a memorable phrase which conveys your message in a sentence or two. Think for example of Roosevelt’s power point ‘We have nothing to fear but fear itself’, it’s clear and memorable.
8. Power Question – Questions are a way to get your audience involved and thinking about your message. If you want your audience to get motivated by your speech, then present them with questions. A good example of this is JFK’s ‘Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country’ (although this isn’t technically a question, you get the idea).
9. Power Closer – How you end a speech will strongly affect how your audience feels about what you said and will be what they remember after you’re done. You should end your speech with a powerful statement or story. Even a bad speech can be saved with a great ending.

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In life we tend to study only successful people, companies, governments and so on. Even when we study the lives of these “successes” we tend to gloss over their mistakes, indiscretions and failures. Take for example, Abraham Lincoln who is considered one of America’s greatest presidents. He had a number of failures on his road to the White House (listed here ). He lost numerous political races and even had a nervous breakdown at one point.

So what’s the point? Perhaps we can learn just as much or more from a person’s successes as from their failures. All of us have faced and will face again, both success and failure in school, work or life.  Therefore we need to accept that both will be a part of our lives. Furthermore we need to learn how to take our mistakes and turn them into successes. Take for example Donald Trump, he’s a multi-millionaire who has been enormously successful in business. However, he wasn’t always a success. When the real estate market tanked in the early 90’s, his fortune evaporated and he was left owing over $900 million dollars to banks. He once remarked that he drove past a homeless man one day and said ‘that man is $900 million dollars richer than me!’. He didn’t let his failure become associated with who he was. Instead he kept working and learned from past mistakes. This is something we should all aspire to. This is why I recommend that after every group project that the group gets together and fills out a lessons learned document. This serves to document your successes and mistakes and understand why they occurred.

Finally, this post was motivated by a great speech by J.K. Rowling who was the graduation speaker at Harvard in 2008. Her speech discusses the power of going your own way in life and what failure has to teach us. She certainly would know what both failure and success feel like. She wrote Harry Potter while almost homeless and broke. It is now a billion dollar industry. Please check out her speech;

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When I was in school I never considered my group assignments as ‘projects’. Instead I looked at them as the same type of work I had done before, but now shared with other people. In fact I never really knew what project management was until after I graduated from business school.

I realize now that group assignments can be considered small projects and that they can be completed easier by using some basic tools. In a great little book called ‘Managing Smaller Projects’, Mike Watson discusses small projects and how they require a different mindset. First of all Watson defines projects as having at least 5 characteristics; an objective, start and end dates, a temporary team and milestones and tasks. A small project is one where there are a lot of constraints on time and resources.

Almost all group assignments in school are just small projects since they have both time and size constraints. These constraints force them to be usually a few weeks to months in duration and in groups of 5 or less. Therefore students typically have to get organized and start working quickly if they intend to meet their deadlines.

So what should a group do to ensure that they are working quickly but effectively? Well Watson says that small projects sometimes get derailed because the team wastes time searching for solutions or getting into too much detail for the scope of the project. To help solve this problem groups should write a project outline and have their professor or teacher review at some early point. The project outline is a document which details; the objectives of the project, the way your group will accomplish the objectives, goals, communication plan and finally your milestones. This may sound like a lot, but it really doesn’t have to be. I’ll break down these things one by one.

1. Objectives – You need to clarify what your purpose is and make sure everyone in the group is aware of it. Watson says that objectives should be S.M.A.R.T. which means Stated clearly, Measurable, Agreed upon, Realistic and Time sensitive.
2. Proposed project – What exactly will your project be about? As it becomes clearer, be sure to write down all the details as a group.
3. Communication plan – If you agree on how and when you will communicate, you’re more likely to actually do it. Make sure everyone has each other’s contact details. Using a site like EnterTheGroup.com to keep track of your work and communication can help.
4. Milestones & tasks – Once you decide what your project will look like you then need to think about milestones and tasks. A milestone is a point where your project has completed a certain number of tasks. Groups should create milestones so that there is metaphorical path from beginning to end. For small projects there will only be a few milestones each consisting of a couple of tasks.

Ultimately a group project should follow the same steps as a large project. However the difference is that small projects shouldn’t get bogged down in details. They should write an outline, keep track of tasks and milestones and definitely meet on and offline, but these formalities should be brief and to the point.

Once these steps are mastered, you’ll notice that the formality isn’t a time waster, but instead a time saver. Your projects will definitely come out better if you write and stick to an outline.

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I don’t know about you, but I am the type of person that likes to get things quickly and not spend a lot of time debating or arguing. Case in point, whenever I go shopping I tend to buy things quickly with the goal of getting out of the store as soon as possible. This usually results in my forgetting to purchase a few items or my buying something which is overpriced or doesn’t fit right.

I have realized, the hard way, that whenever I spend a few moments and make a list of things I need to buy my shopping experience is greatly enhanced. When I use a checklist I tend to find what I need faster and almost never have to go back to the grocery store to buy things I had forgotten to earlier. The idea is that writing down what you need to do actually helps you to do it. This concept can be applied to a group project.

The act of writing down something seems to enhance its importance at the same time as helping us remember what to do. Daniel Boorman of Boeing Airplanes has written about the importance of checklists in the operation of commercial Boeing aircraft. According to Boorman, ‘In five years of service …the tool [checklists] has consistently found to prevent errors’[i]. Furthermore, noted surgeon and author Atul Gawande has written an article (which is a must read) that has morphed into a book (called ‘The Checklist Manifesto‘) that really addresses the need for simple checklists in complex places like an intensive care unit. Gawande discusses situations where hospital staffs have been able to treat severely injured people in ICUs, where time and process are extremely important, by using checklists. The checklist in this case is a way of ensuring that all the necessary steps have been followed and that the correct process is being implemented.

To extend the point, Gawande discusses the work of Peter Pronovost who has successfully implemented the use of checklists in hospitals around the world. Pronovost’s work has shown that checklists have reduced the incidence of preventable complications such as infection. By following a simple checklist, doctors and nurses discovered that they were routinely skipping steps in accepted medical practices. The reason wasn’t necessarily because they were poorly trained or lazy, but simply that in the confusion of the moment that they forgot. Furthermore, as was the case at Sinai-Grace hospital in Michigan, the necessary supplies such as certain soaps and gowns weren’t usually available. Hence this was an issue of ensuring that the right steps were documented and could be followed.

From this work I think we can dispel a couple of myths about the use of checklists which are that  they’re only for the chronically forgetful or stupid. As we’ve seen, even doctors, nurses and pilots can skip crucial steps so we can rule out forgetfulness and stupidity. Rather I would suggest that checklists act as both reminders and enforcers. They remind us of the sometimes mundane and they enforce a systematic approach.

Working in group projects also requires a systematic approach in which following certain steps can greatly help your group. At EnterTheGroup.com (a free site for managing group projects) we supply users with a checklist which breaks down a project into 4 phases. The first phase is called ‘Pre-Project’ and asks questions concerning how you will organize your group, if everyone knows the objective of the project and if misunderstandings are being taken care. These are all important steps to think about before you start working on your project. The next phase of the project is called ‘Project Proposal’. This is where your group will start to organize specifically how it wants to tackle the project. It involves making sure you have had an initial meeting, written up a project outline, chosen a project coordinator and so on. The third phase is called ‘Work breakdown’ and it involves making sure that everyone in the group is communicating about their tasks and milestones. The final phase is called ‘Project Wrap-up’ where the project is near completion and everyone should make sure that all the assigned tasks have been completed, the project has been reviewed and a lessons learned document has been filled out.

Following a process when it comes to working on projects is essential and the checklist is one powerful way of ensuring that everything gets done.

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Here’s an interesting result from a scientific study – self-control (or lack of it) is infectious! In other words, these studies found that when we affiliate ourselves with people who have a lot (or little) self-control it affects our life decisions.

Maybe this isn’t so shocking after all since we know that group think is very powerful and people tend to conform to the average of the groups to which they belong. This type of conformity can be both a psychological and physiological phenomenon. We see it all the way from the joining of cults to the synchronizations of women’s ovulation cycles.

This idea of conformity exists in the working world as well. Anyone who has worked in a large corporation can attest to the fact that peer (or boss) pressure has significant influence. Finally and the main reason why I posted the link below, is that when it comes to students working together on group projects, conformity can take hold. Groups must encourage dialogue and constructive criticism through open communication. Of course you may reach a point where you want conformity. This will likely be after a lot of thinking and discussion has already occurred.

Here is a link to the research study: http://entertheblog.com/wX

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Part1 of A Review of Technology and Education

This article is part I of my multi-part investigation into the extent that technology is becoming a part of the educational process. As I am building a website which is designed for students to collaborate and manage their group projects online, I thought it important to investigate the extent that people are turning to the web for learning.

I’ve never taken an online course (they weren’t so popular back in the stone-age days when I was in university) and I was curious just how large the market for distance learning has become. I was somewhat shocked to learn how they have grown into an incredibly important part of the university course load. There are a few other important bits of information that I have learned as well, but first let’s define what distance learning is exactly. Distance learning is any type of educational program where the students and teachers are not in the same physical location. According to Wikipedia, the first university to offer a distance learning program was the University of London in 1858. These days most Universities offer some type of distance learning. The name that typically comes to my mind when I think online education is the University of Phoenix. They have grown into a behemoth and offer many different reputable degrees and programs.

Here are some interesting thoughts that I found in a research piece by the Babson Survey Research Group entitled, ‘Staying the Course: Online Education in the U.S. 2008’ by Allen and Seaman:

• Over 3.9 million U.S. students took online courses in the fall of 2007 (sorry for the outdated stats, but that’s the most recent I could find)
• Over 20% of all U.S. students were taking at least 1 online course in 2007
• The number of online students has grown from 1.6 million in 2002 to 3.9 million in 2007
• A survey across educational organizations shows that building an online presence is an important strategy to them
• Online classes seem to have penetrated equally across most subjects (except for Engineering, no reason was given for that)

According to the a research study done by the U.S. Department of Education called ‘Evaluation of Evidence-Based Practices in Online Learning’ (Center for Technology in Learning, 2009):

• ‘Students who took all or part of their class online performed better on average than those taking the same course through traditional face-to-face instruction’

While these stats are bit stale I doubt that it’s much of a leap to estimate that the number of students involved in distance learning today is much larger than the 3.9 million in 2007. Keep in mind as well that that number was just in the U.S. If we factor in the rest of the world I’m sure the figure exceeds 20 million students.

From the research I have read it seems that there is a marginal benefit of learning online versus the traditional face to face method. This benefit may increase over time as technology improves and end users (students and teachers) become more tech savvy. The real motivation for online learning appears to be two main factors; 1. Flexibility in learning when and where you want and 2. Capacity, meaning that universities are able to teach a larger number of students with online courses.

While it seems certain that online learning is here to stay (and grow), my question is to what extent are online tools being utilized in these courses? And how effective are they?

Please join me for part 2 of this series where I will explore some answers to these questions.

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Have you ever worked on a group project which seemed doomed to failure? I think most of us have been there at least once. At the point where a project gets stalled it’s extremely important to get past whatever obstacle is impeding your project because your morale will suffer and your deadline will soon approach. This article will provide some advice for removing road blocks and getting your project back on track.

To begin with it’s important to identify what types of problems groups typically run into. I would say that most road blocks fall into three broad categories;

1. 1. Arguments over management – These arguments arise from differences in working style, approach to the project or quite simply from different personalities clashing. It can be a serious problem when one (or more) strong headed person(s) want the group to do something because they think its best.

Solutions: This is a problem of communication, each side needs to come to understand and respect each other’s ability, style and ideas. Respect can only emerge when people get to know each other and there is a genuine sense of trust and commitment to the project. A good way to gain respect and trust is for everyone in the group to spend some time getting to know each other on a personal level before starting the project. Set up an informal session where people can grab a coffee together and talk. The group should try to learn how people work, what their schedules are like and more importantly what kind of people they’re going to be dealing with. The group must be upfront about ground rules such as; how much time they will commit to the project, how they will work together, when they will meet and an agreement to compromise.

1. 2. No consensus on project decisions – This problem arises when group members have very different opinions on how the project should be completed. One person thinks it should be a Power Point presentation, while another wants to do a skit and so forth. Furthermore, problems can arise when no one can seem to find ANY good ideas for the project. This can come about when the project is very difficult, the group hasn’t approached the subject properly and/or there is a lack of leadership in the group.

Solutions: In the case where there are strong opinions on which path to take, your group should examine the strengths and weaknesses of each idea and then take a vote. If the democratic method doesn’t make everyone happy then see if you can either combine ideas in some way or make compromises. In the case where no one can think of ideas, or none of the ideas that you came up with seem like winners then you need to get down to basics. First make sure the objective of the project is clear and then do some research on the topic. After that try to get the group together to do some brainstorming. Another useful tool is ‘Mind Mapping’, which is a form of visual notes. In a mind map, the group starts off writing the main subject of the project on a whiteboard and then draws nodes from it which represent related topics. The group continues to draw sub-nodes and further sub-nodes until they have ‘mapped’ all the pertinent ideas surrounding the project subject. The point is to achieve an understanding of the context of your subject and to foster creativity with regard to potential project ideas.

1. 3. A minority of the group is doing the majority of the work – A recurrent scenario in group projects is where you have some members who are very determined to succeed (and very afraid of failure) paired up with members who are willing to ‘go with the flow’. This tends to produce situations where the type ‘A’ personality is allowed to hijack the project because they want to make sure the project is done correctly and on time. While this may seem like a good compromise for both parties it can be a big road block since you may have too few people working on too big a project. Furthermore, the project will end up with the input of a small number of members. The point of a being in a group project is to learn to work with people and how to collaborate.

Solutions: People who obsess with grades tend to be frightened of deadlines. Therefore to persuade them not to take on more work than others they need to be assured that their colleagues are committed to the project and are capable workers. It also helps if everyone agrees to break down the project into tasks and distributes the work evenly. If the problem persists then you need to bring it up at the next group meeting. Remind the group that EVERYONE has a stake in this project therefore everyone has to be involved.

Sometimes when we encounter the roadblocks I’ve described above it may seem that there is no way around them. Our problems are usually never as bad as we envision them at the time so we need to take a step back, remove ourselves from the situation and think about some of the solutions outlined above and things will undoubtedly improve.

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I just read an article from Forbes.com which discusses the new Center for Leadership at Dartmouth’s business school. The idea is that leadership can be taught and that an important component of leadership is knowing yourself. If you don’t know yourself, how will you know your strengths and weaknesses? Furthermore, how will you know your strengths and weaknesses in a crisis situation? While I think this is important, it raises a lot of questions in my mind.

One question is, can leadership be defined? Some people not only say yes, but that leadership can be learned as well (see ‘Can Leadership be Learned?‘ ).  In my view, truly great leaders are born with a set of special characteristics which are given the right combination of environment and circumstance to allows these skills to come to fruition. Great leaders require catalysts to propel them to greatness. Think of any great leader like Churchill, Lincoln, Napoleon or Gandhi and what comes to mind is always the enormous struggles they faced. However, this is not to say that great leaders don’t learn how to lead through experience. They have the seeds of leadership within them, but they require life experience to develop those skills.

What would have happened if Gandhi had been born in Ohio in the 1960’s? This is not to slag Ohio or the 60’s but simply my question is how would have Gandhi lived his life had he been born in a quiet place at a quiet time? Would he still have become a great leader? Perhaps yes and perhaps no, but what is likely is that he would have been some type of leader. Maybe we would have never have heard of him, but he would surely be some type of community or religious leader. The point is that

So what are these special characteristics that great leaders share? Well if you study the history of these men and women you see a few commonalities;

1. A compelling vision – They all have an idea of the type of business, country, army etc. that they want to create. Their vision is something which motivates people to follow them so that they can become a part of making the vision a reality.

2. Communication - What good is having a compelling vision if you can’t explain it to people? Great leaders speak to their followers and get them to understand what’s needed of them.

3. Steadfastness – In times of crisis people seek out stability and meaning. Leaders tend to provide people with certainty that there will be a better tomorrow and that they can trust them to guide them there. When the world is crumbling around them, leaders can remain calm and focused on what they need to do.

4. Fairness – To lead people they must believe that the world you want to create is fair. Fairness simply means that your behavior is in accord with your vision. Being a hypocrite will cause your followers to doubt your sincerity and without followers you’re not a leader.

5. Courage – Leaders don’t let fear rule them, they conquer their fears.

6. Self-knowledge – This is taking a page out of the Forbes article I referenced at the beginning of this article. A leader knows what he is all about, he knows his strengths, weaknesses, what he lives for and what he would die for.

Another question is can ANYONE develop leadership skills? I think the answer is definitely yes. All of us are leaders and followers at something at various points in our life. Leadership is like any other skill or talent; it must be worked on to develop. We develop our skills through practice and we gain opportunities to practice by stepping to new challenges.

Leadership is a skill which will definitely gain you an advantage in group projects and in the working world. If you are still wondering how you can develop your leadership skills well one simple answer is to volunteer as a project coordinator for your group project. Another way to gain practice is to volunteer for your favorite committees, clubs or charities. Try organizing meetings or events for these groups. Another thing you can do is volunteer for Big Brothers/ Big Sisters, where you would be helping a youngster out from time to time by being their ‘leader’ so to speak.

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