A Global Entrepreneurial Spirit
by Jeff Shuman & Jan Twombly
Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK, 18 June 2003 As we write this,
we are returning from Belfast after participating in the thought provoking
48th World Conference of the International Council for Small Business,
"Advancing Entrepreneurship and Small Business." At the conference
we delivered a workshop highlighting the principles and practices
of Relationship Business. Over four days, 900 delegates from 78 countries
participated in a wide-ranging exploration of the importance of small
and medium entrepreneurial enterprises in shaping the future economy
of our global village. We are excited to share the conference's underlying
messages by introducing you to several of the people we met.
The conference explored multiple problems, plausible solutions,
and case studies to address the overarching question, "How to best
encourage the growth of small and medium enterprises as a catalyst
for regional and national economic growth?" One answer everyone
agreed upon was that a sound business education is an important
component in engaging in successful entrepreneurial activity. Clearly,
educational institutions better produce. Leaders in business and
government alike - including the U.S. and U.K., as well as Slovenia,
Greece, Iceland, South Africa, Uganda, New Zealand, and many others
- are relying on entrepreneurial thinking and practices to expedite
the next stage in the transformation of their economies from agrarian
and industrial-based, to more knowledge, and relationship- based
businesses.
Every country on the planet is positioned somewhere on this transformation
continuum. In fact, South Africa - where next year's conference
is being held - is counting on an emerging culture of entrepreneurship
to help it continue building its democratic society.
Full
Story
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"Your goal is to create mutually beneficial value exchanges
with customer segments that offer the greatest economic profit
potential," claims Larry Selden and Geoffrey Colvin, in the
July 7 issue of Fortune. They go on to describe how winning
companies such as Dell Computer, develop superior value propositions
using an iterative process that is at the heart of relationship
business. Relationship business practitioners are everywhere.
They are executives and managers in large, global companies
and they are entrepreneurs working on the "next big thing."
They are also professionals who have opted out - or been forced
out - of corporations.
We've met many practitioners of relationship business in our
travels over the past several months. And we've seen many
emerging technologies that are being introduced to support
this creative, mutually beneficial, yet goal-oriented style
of work and leadership. So we are launching a new feature
this month, highlighting relationship business practitioners
and the relationship technologies that keep them on track
towards creating value within relationships and converting
it to financial gain. Let us know about your experiences with
relationship business - and as always, keep on dancing!
- Jeff, Jan & The Rhythm of Business Team
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Introducing
Relationship Business Practitioners and Technologies
Chris Frosk Speaks Out About Building a Relationship-Focused
Business |
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"The
great thing about these bi-directional, relationship- focused
value propositions," says Ekkosoft founding president Chris
Frosk, "Is that everyone says yes!"
With this philosophy, Chris and his team are building a Collaborative
Community that benefits "People on the Move" by providing
them with contextually specific information that helps them
engage in outdoor activities more safely, cost-effectively,
and more enjoyably. The company's initial products - to be
delivered via cell phone - will be introduced over the next
three months in selected locations on the east coast of the
United States. "The U.S. Atlantic Coast is our testing grounds
because it is our home," says Chris. "But part of our mission
is to bring about a global wireless application developers'
network that builds locally relevant products. After all,
if you are developing for wireless, shouldn't you work wirelessly?
And how else will you understand the specific issues your
customers face in adopting technologies that are simultaneously
location agnostic and location specific?"
Full
Story
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| A
Picture is Worth a Thousand Words |
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One
of the techniques we've always found helpful in our work is
to draw the picture of the business an entrepreneur is building,
or the network of stakeholders a relationship manager is working
with. So naturally we were very excited to make the acquaintance
of Verna Allee, author of The Future of Knowledge and learn
about her web-based software that draws a picture of the value
flows between and among participants in a community.
This relationship technology gives users a cost- effective
tool that can be used to both analyze and plan the value propositions
that are the fuel for generating the financial results both
parties to the relationship seek. And it can be used to highlight
where new value can be created. The tool also points out competing
and conflicting interests that aren't being satisfied, thus
representing a potential threat to achieving the desired goals.
Seeing the threat, resources can be reallocated or value propositions
adjusted so that an unhappy stakeholder doesn't keep everyone
else from achieving their goals! The tool is easy to use,
so you can get an up-to-date picture of the value flows, every
time something in the relationships change.
We like Verna's tool so much, we're adopting it ourselves.
It makes the pictures we draw on the white board or on paper
take on a life of their own and gives the people we work with
a powerful way to develop their ability to recognize relationship-based
sources of value and convert them into financial gain.
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| Advance
Notice - Relationship Business: The Pursuit of Value Now Available |
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 The
Rhythm of Business has partnered with Chicago- based EVOKnowledge,
Inc., creator of the EvoMedia online experience, to bring the
emerging discipline of relationship business to the business
community through an evolved media platform that combines the
advantages of a book, a television program, interactive software,
and a web site into a user-controlled online learning experience.
Our partnership with EVOKnowledge has provided us with an innovative
and creative means to offer businesspeople around the globe
a chance to reap the strategic and financial benefits of utilizing
the mindset, skillset, and toolset of relationship business.
And because the EvoMedia production process combines media technologies
with proprietary cognitive methodologies, users can engage in
a manner reflective of their own learning styles, fostering
both learning and enjoyment.
"Learning how to recognize and convert relationship- based forms
of value into financial gain is vitally important for every
businessperson to succeed as our global economy becomes more
intertwined and knowledge-based," explains Jan.
According to Jeff, "Businesspeople in diverse industries
are intuitively adopting relationship business principles
and practices to overcome common business problems such as
knowing and understanding customers and their relative value.
Because everyone is a customer, it is also necessary to understand
the value of partners, suppliers, and don't forget internal
stakeholders. Relationship business is about aligning interests
so that no one sticks their foot out. Understanding relationship
business allows a businessperson to see the picture of their
business at 100,000 feet, at ground level, and every important
milestone in between."
To view a two-minute demonstration of the EvoMedia production,
Relationship Business: The Pursuit of Value visit http://www.evoknowledge.com/rhythm/start.html And please let us know what
you think of the production.
View
Demo
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| The
Gennova Group Adopts a Constitution |
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 Following
a procedure loosely modeled after the Concord, Massachusetts,
USA, town meeting - the birthplace of the American Revolution,
The Gennova Group, a professional community for the future,
has held a constitutional convention. At the conclusion of the
convention a super-majority of participants adopted a constitution
to guide its future growth and activities. The Rhythm of Business
co-founder, Jan Twombly, is one of the signatories of the constitution.
The members of Gennova Group hope to find opportunities to develop
business and learn from each other. We are brought together
by similar views about the organizational and individual transformation
required to overcome some of the economic and structural challenges
our traditional institutions now face.
Gennova Group is made up of value networks - independent,
yet interwoven teams pursuing complementary projects to achieve
specific transformation objectives. Currently there are six
value networks pursuing different aspects of business transformation.
And some members are more interested in the evolution of civic
institutions. A big piece of the value of Gennova Group membership
is the cross- pollination of ideas and practices.
Complete
Story
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| What's
Causing You to Wake Up In a Cold Sweat? |
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Take
our Relationship Business Survey
Which of these are key issues facing your company or you?
1. Increased pressure to accomplish goals despite decreased
resources
2. Inability to provide customers with a "must have" value proposition
3. Raising the funding needed to start a business or significantly
expand an existing business
4. Inability to put in place strategic relationships that achieve
objectives
Take
this 4 question survey!
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| Want
to Contribute to "Pursuing Value"? |
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 We
welcome third-party contributions to "Pursuing Value: The
Newsletter for Relationship Business." If you'd like your
article or a "Letter to Editor" to be included in
an upcoming issue, please submit it to us for consideration
with an email to info@rhythmofbusiness.com.
Do you know someone who would be interested in receiving
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Please forward using this link.
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