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  This diagram was drawn by Paul Baran and his team at the Rand Corporation in the mid 1960’s.  It was used to illustrate the idea of a  communications system that would survive in the case of damage from a nuclear war.  This diagram and the resultant technology became the architecture of the internet as we know it today. There is more to the story of course but what fascinates me about this image is the number of times I have seen it in business books and articles recently.  The diagram on the left is the old centralized business organization. […]

There are three main kinds of hero myths found in cultures around the world.  The first has the hero  following something, an animal or light or wisp, and as time goes on, the hero finds themselves in an unfamiliar place.  The wisp that they were following turns into a fairy queen or some other being that then demands some action in exchange for some benefit.  The second hero’s story has the hero choosing to take on a heroic task.  The hero knows that the journey will be long and difficult.  They know that they may not win or even survive […]

I am just leaving Austin where I spent the last two days at GCUC the Global Coworking Unconference (pronounced “juicy”).  The first day consisted of a series of panels populated by 45 people from all over the world with representation ranging from researcher to corporate leader to freelancer to real estate.  The audience consisted of bearded hippies, suits and ties, tech geeks, real estate professionals, coworking space owners, with a huge range of ages 16 to 67, all gathered to discuss the coworking phenomenon, and it is a phenomenon! The first coworking space launched in San Francisco in 2005.  It […]

A couple of years ago Regus began telling the story of how they had actually launched coworking through their worldwide proliferation of executive suite options.  The coworking community rose up and loudly rejected this version of history.  In the mainstream media this played out like a clash of younger and older generations but it runs deeper than that.  Both Regus and coworking spaces rent desks by the day or month. Both can offer the same equipment, facilities, and amenities, but at its heart what great coworking spaces are actually selling is not the desk space, it is community.  This might […]

Everyone is all a buzz with the news of Yahoo’s HR head Marissa Mayer telling all of their telework employees to return to the office or find another job. The Yahoo Event, as I like to call it after all of the attention it has gotten, is quite likely primarily a management issue and not a commentary on the entire history and future of working remotely.  The pundits are all over the place with their opinions on whether this is the end of an era or a huge mistake, but sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.  In the best performing […]