In reflecting on all of their comments and the discussion themes that emerged – I think there were three key themes that I found particularly interesting  that came out across all the speaker and panelists.

1) Leadership requires instilling a deep & distinct set of purpose and clarity of objectives.  This is more important than ever with next generation of leaders and employee who want to align their efforts to a higher purpose.  Those leaders who can align communicate with extreme clarity about the objectives, and link those objectives to a greater, meaningful mission for the company and it’s stakeholders will be best able to drive higher levels of motivation and performance.

2)  Optimism is the greatest act of rebellion.   More so that ever today given the gloom and doom that has is prevailing across countries, markets and institutions, those leaders who reject the status quo, and reject the difficulty of the situation by providing an optimistic path forward will be the most successful.   Our teammates, colleagues, employees and partners naturally gravitate to the leaders who provide an optimistic path forward out of the doom and gloom.  Many of the speakers point to cases in business, politics, science, and other industries where breakthroughs were achieved.  One of the speakers used this “Optimism is the greatest act of rebellion” phrase – but I cannot remember who – so forgive me for not attributing it properly!

3) Authoritarian models of leadership are a thing of the past.  Tomorrow’s leaders have to be more collaborative and be the very best be at influencing others to drive action and consensus.  This requires deep, fundamental listening to stakeholders and constituents, the ability to find common ground to move solutions forward, and the servant leadership model that asserts leaders are simply stewards of resources and have a profound responsibility to stakeholders to achieve the right outcomes with humility and respect.

It was a real privilege to be at such a gathering of leaders.   You can see many of their comments in video format at this site – be sure to check it out

I’ve written in previous entries about we at IBM strongly advocate for colleges, universities and other learning institutions have to focus on developing students with t-shaped skills.  The focus across so many markets on STEM skills complements this notion – we need stronger skills in science, technology, engineering and mathmatics – and they need to be complemented by industry knowledge, or strong commnuication skills, or IT/computer science skills.  As part of our focus on helping colleges adapt their curriculum we’ve even provided $500K in teacher grants to for innovation and development of courses  focused on solving some of the world’s most difficult challenges.

As students head back to the classroom, there is a natural discussion at many schools about the use of tablets and e-readers in the classroom.   In my own hometown or Raleigh, North Carolina one local school is making headlines by deploying e-readers, and many other schools around the world are taking similar approaches.  And as one would expect, tablets such as the iPad are also making their way into the classroom given their ease of use and wide range of multimedia capabilities.   Some advocates dream of replacing textbooks with e-readers, and others hope for homework on iPads to replace book reports and projects.

However, while technology in the classroom can certainly have it benefits – the jury is still out on their effectiveness at enhancing learning.  As Nicholas Carr points out in one his postings  – the largest study to date on the concept of e-readers replacing textbooks showed that “…the findings suggest that e-readers may be deeply flawed as replacements for traditional textbooks. Students find the devices cumbersome to use, ill-suited to their study routines, and generally underwhelming. Paper textbooks, it seems, may not be quite as obsolete as they appear.”

During the past academic year, a University of Notre Dame pilot of iPads in the classroom showed that student enjoyed the flexibility of using the tablet for more interactive learning.  Pilots at other schools showed similar results.  At the elemenary levels of education iPads are being used a whole variety of ways, but as Mark Bauerlein points out in his recent review of this subject – the science of how one reads and retains information is very different when consuming from a book vs a tablet or e-reader.

So how should schools cope with the demands for greater technology – and especially the use of e-readers or ipads  — in the classroom?

Our experience at IBM points to five key principles that should be followed to avoid the technology for technologies sake trap –

1)  Learning plans and content have to drive the use of technology, not vice versa.  Content and lesson planning are still the hallmarks of great teaching and always will be.  Technology is just another delivery vehicle that can be used to engage and excite students.   The key is the thoughtful integration of the technology with the pedagogy.

2) Schools and administrators must plan carefully for how it will be provided first to faculty and staff and how their professional development will be supported long-term.   It is critical to provide our educators with the time and training it will take to get comfortable with any new technology and provide them the training and resources on how best to integrate it into the classroom.

3) Schools must think carefully about how the technology will be deployed & maintained.   This can span everything from network planning for bandwidth requirements, to ongoing support resources for the classrooms, to the security and privacy issues that might arise from having student data on highly portable devices.

4) Success of technology projects needs to be carefully assessed with learning instruments.  As I pointed out just above – the jury is still out on the actual learning impact of the latest devices.  Measuring the effectiveness of the improved learning outcomes is critical.

5) Each technology project must incorporate training to ensure it is being tailored very differently for the targeted student leaner and their cognitive skills – e.g. usage by a 3rd grader is far different than by a 7th grader.   While most of the press has focused on the tremendous impact the tablets can have on elementary school environments – in fact the impact has the potential to be broad across all grades, if designed properly.

Based on the all the available data I’ve seen from pilots so far, it’s clear that e-readers and tablets can enhance the classroom and get students more engaged, but they are just another tool for teaching.  Great teachers and strong lesson plans are still the key to success for students.

In reflecting on what’s “new and different” about the cloud discussions of late – three observations come to mind -

1) The tone is much more serious and business oriented

While past events were full of hype, hoopla, hyperbole, and evangelists spouting about how cloud will change the world and change IT forever, the tone has now shifted.  Off all the presentations I saw or took part in, only one still had the mega-hype tonality.  The rest of the dialogue has finally shifted to cloud driving business results – cost savings, speed of innovation and implementation, deployment flexibility, etc.  These better business outcomes are always required for broader adoption of any technology solution, so it’s nice to see the shift finally taking place in the cloud space.  As Bill McNee of Saugatuck Technology pointed out in his keynote address – sometimes it just takes a good recession to get people focused on business outcomes again.

2) Growing recognition of IBM’s prowess in this space

Now that IBM has completed 2000+ cloud projects — and is working with 5 of the Fortune 10, and 50% of the Fortune 500 on cloud projects — clients and partners are realizing how powerful our solutions portfolio is for cloud computing.  We now have all of our major software available via the cloud, we have CPU, storage and compute functions rentable in the cloud, and we have a whole range of design, test, and implementation services for public and private cloud deployments.

3) Growing recognition of the importance of open standards and interoperability.

Given the growth of both public clouds and private clouds – there is now tremendous demand for a set of standards and interoperability.  IBM was pleased to be help the OMG Group launch the Cloud Standards Customer Council that now has over 150 members and meets again next week to continue the important work of building out a set of open standards.  You’ll see the members range from large telcos and Fortune 50 clients to small service providers and even universities.  The group already has some important use use cases and requirements for open cloud computing being drafted – so be sure to join (its free to join) and contribute to this important work for our industry.

What are your thoughts?  Are you seeing similar trends and themes?

“A well-rounded education gave graduates more tools with which to solve problems, broader perspectives through which to see opportunities and a deeper capacity to build a more humane society.”

You might want to check it out….

Usually my answer goes like this “You should study what you are most interested in and along the way ensure you try to minor or get experience in some area that will be a good means to find a job. “

At IBM we’ve been talking for two years now about the need to develop “T-shaped” students – students who are deep in an area of expertise, but also have broad skills in a range of areas.  A good example would be someone deep in engineering who has also taken some computer science and business courses, or someone deep in energy science who has some experience in public policy and IT networking.   Why?  Because the most challenging problems we face in building a Smarter Planet require solutions that are focused at the intersection of these fields -

• SmartGrid deployments require the intersection of energy skills, IT skills, public policy around pricing and privacy, etc.

• Smarter Healthcare requires a mix of analytics, business management, healthcare policy, and deep usage of technology to integrate medical records across systems and providers.

• Smarter Cities projects bring together leaders in transportation, civic affairs, healthcare, safety and security, energy and even smarter water and waste management.  Each of these areas require experts to deploy new ways of integrating these systems to improve the quality of life in places like Rio, Sao Paolo, Mexico City, Shanghai and even New York City.

IBM has been looking across many of our Smarter Planet projects all around the globe, and one of the distinguishing factors that sets the most successful projects apart from others is the degree of creative leadership that is in place on the project.  That’s right – creative leadership might be the trump factor.

Why?   I think it’ s because these projects require a strong vision of “what’s truly possible” in the face of so many obstacles.  Getting a network of city agencies, along with public and private leaders and stakeholders, to work together without being limited by the long list of obstacles and constraints takes strong creative leadership.

And how best to find this type of creative leadership?  New research that was published by Tony Golsby-Smith in Harvard Business Review says that companies and institutions should hire students from the Humanities.

As a graduate of Saint Anselm College – a liberal arts school known for it’s great work in the Humanities – I couldn’t agree more!

Be sure to check out the article – it outlines four of the key reasons that humanities graduates are great at solving very complex problems.

1) Rely on your expertise and experience – each of you as mentors were selected based on your expertise and experience, so leverage that as the key areas that you coach the entrepreneurs on – and stick to those areas you know best.

2) Ask good questions – rather than telling them what to do or making statements.  Too often mentors want to tell an entrepreneur how to position their solution, or how to adjust their business model.  Instead by asking effective questions mentors can get the entrepreneur to think in new ways, to explore new options that might lead to a richer set of ideas than just the one idea or approach that might be thought of by the mentor.    This is the essence of good “coaching” and socratic teaching at it’s finest.

3) Help entrepreneurs see connections across the  elements of their business model.   As senior business leaders and mentors, you are all experienced in seeing connections across various business models – e.g. understanding how certain pricing models will impact route to market and sales models, which might impact a customer acquisition vs.  retention strategy and have impact on marketing and solution delivery.  But often times entrepreneurs are not as experienced at seeing the inter-relationships of these business model elements and don’t see the interdependencies – or they assume items are inter-dependent when they don’t have to be.   As mentors helping them see these connections is a critical area  we can add real value.

4) Help them learn to anticipate.   Given our collective experience in working with startups – we all know that the ability to anticipate changes in the marketplace and being able to evolve the initial idea is the key to success.  Ask good questions about how the solution might evolve based on client feedback, how the business might be able to pivot based on either existing or new entrant competitor moves, or based on changes in technology or value capture strategies.   Anticipating well is a key to survival.

5) Help them refine their value proposition and communications.  The single area we most often see significant same-day improvement in during a Smartcamp is helping the startup improve the clarity of their customer value proposition.  Often times the most impactful area we can help them is in clarifying the customer problem they are actually trying to solve, and crisping up their statement of value and 30-second elevator pitch to prospective clients.    By helping them refine the positioning of the solution and the messaging of their unique value and selling proposition, we can really strengthen the startup’s chance of getting those first key clients.

I hope you find these tips helpful as we all work to coach and mentor these exciting startup companies!

• Adiro Systems Private Ltd — builds sensor-based enterprise mobility solutions including automatic identification and data collection for manufacturing industry.
• ConnectM – creates machine to machine technology for domain specific analytics and business intelligence for Telecom, Utilities, and Transportation industries
• Indrion Technologies India Pvt Ltd – an intelligent automation provider based on embedded sensor and actuator network technology.
• Infobotique Services (P) Limited – creates solutions for compliance and risk management for Oil and Natural Gas industry.
• Quantama Mobile Solutions Pvt. Ltd – allows you to find places of interest, promotions and events nearby.

The five finalists presented their plans and after much discussion and dialogue with the mentors and judges, ConnectM was chosen as the winner for its Smarter Energy Concept.

ConnectM will now compete in the SmartCamp World Finals with winners of SmartCamps from other countries, for the honor of IBM Global Entrepreneur of the Year 2011!

I’d like to especially thank our distinguished group of judges and mentors who spent the full day with our five finalists.  We appreciate your willingness to be a part of the event and help mentor these five companies as they strive to create solutions to build a Smarter Planet!

·	Darren Bibby, Vice President, IDC
·	Venkat Raju, Country Head & MD, ACI WorldWide
·	Ravindranath.P, Executive Director, TiE
·	Shalini Pillay, Partner, Performance & Technology, KPMG
·	Dr. Ponani Gopalakrishnan, VP, India Software Labs, IBM
·	Madhusudan Atre, President, Applied Materials India P Ltd
·	Samir Kumar, Managing Director, Inventus Advisory Services
·	Laura Parkin, CEO & Co-founder, NEN
·	Prof. Sekhar Babu, Chairperson, Amirta Institute of Management
·	Jeby Cherian, Director, Strategy, IBM India South Asia
·	Prof. Sadagopan, Director, IIIT Bangalore
·	Uma Reddy, CEO, HiTech Magnetics
·	Rahul Chowdhri , VP, Helion Advisors P Ltd
·	Ashish Sinha, Founder Pluggedin
·	Capt. V.Sivakumar, Associate Director - IT, Metlife India
·	Vish Narayan, IBM Distinguished Engineer & CTO, IBM Industry Solutions
·	Ajay Hattangdi, Managing Director, Silicon Valley Bank India Finance
·	Ramasubramaian, CMD, BioPure
·	Priya Chetty Rajagopal, VP & Client Partner, Stanton Chase International
·	RamPrasad Moudgalya, Telecom/Wireless Intrapreneur
·	Ankur Gulati, Analyst, DFJ
·	Mauricio Sucasas, Director, IBM ISV & DR, Growth Market Units
·	Mohan Kumar, Executive Director, Norwest Venture Partners
·	Girish Venkatachaliah, Director, Information Management and BA, IBM
·	V. Ravichandar, Chairman, Feedback Consulting
·	Vidhya Shrivatsava, Head- South, India Angel Network

Sudhir Sethi, Founder, Chairman & Managing Director, IDG Ventures, along with Ajay Hattangdi, Managing Director, Silicon Valley Bank India Finance and I were on the panel of judges for the IBM SmartCamp Contest held in Bangalore on 27th of April 2011.

That's me on the left with Murali Ramalingam, MD, ConnectM, Praveen Chandrashekhar, VP IBM Indi, Sriram Chidambaram, Head – Sales, ConnectM and Mauricio Sucasas, Director, IBM ISV & DR, Growth Market Units

To help start-up companies and IBM Business Partners more easily build their own cloud applications and infrastructures with IBM technology, today we announced:

1. New monthly rental pricing of IBM software for any ISV delivering their Software as a Service application with IBM middleware.  This allows ISVs to deliver their SaaS applications with IBM software and scale up or down the software licenses needed monthly, complementing the flexible manner these ISVs bill clients for their SaaS applications.
2. New financing programs specifically designed for IBM Business Partners building cloud computing technical environments.  With low cost to 0% financing and deferred payments up to 6 months on IBM technology and services, the company will offer qualifying partners the opportunity to avoid large up-front costs as they start their cloud businesses.

One of the coolest features of the new pricing models is that you can commit total usage across a range of 20 key products and true up at the end of each month in total.  This is one of the key areas our partners told us would really help – so we can all get out of trying to forecast usage at each product area and instead focus on driving new business.

You can get all the details at ibm.com/cloud.   Full press release here.

The new offerings come on the heels of IBM’s newly announced enterprise cloud service delivery platform, the IBM SmartCloud, announced last week!  And of course they build on the IBM Cloud Computing Specialty program for partners and the new Cloud Computing Community we announced in late February which will enable IBM to develop the IT industry’s broadest ecosystem of companies providing a wide range of cloud computing services and technologies.
And in case anyone wonders if we are embracing Cloud – just a reminder that our recent 2011 Investor meeting, we laid out the company’s 2015 roadmap on the continued transformation of IBM with focus on higher value capabilities.  Our CFO, Mark Loughridge stated that IBM projects $7 billion in Cloud  revenue by 2015.

Yup – $7 billion.

Special thanks to our IBM Business Partners TOTVS, GROUP Solutions Group, CloudOne, Availity, along with many other early  adopters of our pilot pricing program, for helping us refine the monthly software rental pricing models.

Be sure to check it out on their site and download the podcast from itunes - and let us know what you think!

What was the situation?
Despite being a seasoned leader in the fashion industry, Bernard Chaus had little knowledge of which, where and how much of its products had sold until four to five weeks into a season. By then, it was almost too late to take corrective action. Without more timely and accurate insight into sales, management struggled to react quickly and make informed decisions. As a result, the company was often forced to absorb mark-downs, forfeit prime real estate on selling floors and lose sales.

What makes it smarter?
In the fast-paced fashion industry, companies that know exactly which of their products have sold gain insight into marketplace trends and customer preferences—a true competitive advantage. Bernard Chaus not only gained real-time visibility into its sales but also saved 20 percent to 30 percent in costs related to returns, lost sales and mark-down expenses with its new business intelligence (BI) solution. Now the company has a current, accurate and comprehensive view into which products have sold by date, chain, store, size, brand, color, demographic and geography. Management can react more quickly to trends, capitalize on market opportunities and make better decisions about production and inventory, leading to improved operations and decreased costs.

By using SKYPAD, a unique Cloud Computing solution from Sky IT Group and IBM,  Bernard Chaus, Inc. has achieved the impossible – the ability to track which clothing items are selling – and which are not – at the retailer level on a day-to-day basis. This unique insight is achieved by merging information from retail outlets around the world augmented by Chaus Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) data. Chaus can quickly make predictive decisions to help customers drive sales, cut markdowns and realize cost savings.

What were the real business results?

• Dramatically improved sell-through (actual items sold), saving up to 30 percent in costs related to returns, lost sales and mark-down expenses
• Improved ability to react more quickly to sales trends, customer preferences and marketplace opportunities
• Increased efficiencies and collaboration across the sales, design, merchandising and production departments with a single, integrated view of data

See the full story here