About Nigel Cameron

Writer, conference chair, former think tank director “Asking Tomorrow’s Questions” Speaking managed by ATG│Chartwell US: ellis@americantalentgroup.com, Global: alexh@chartwellpartners.co.uk Nigel Cameron has extensive experience as a keynote speaker and in facilitating high-level conversations focused on the future – crossing disciplinary lines and bringing together participants with diverse opinions and backgrounds. His emphasis is on reframing issues, welcoming outlier opinions, and pressing for a positive sum outcome that recognizes differences and engages them. A citizen of the United States and the UK, he has worked on both sides of the Atlantic and travels widely. He recently chaired GITEX 2015 in Dubai and will be chair of the Future Technology 2016. In one year he addressed conferences on all five continents, including the biennial innovation festival hosted by Australian finance giant AMP in Sydney, and Nanomedicine 2010 Beijing. He was the sole US-based plenary speaker at “the world’s leading conference on content marketing,” the 2011 Content Summit. Other recent engagements include the UN-affiliated Rio+ 20 Planet under Pressure event (London), and the opening keynote at the European Identity and Cloud Conference (Munich, Germany). His unusually wide experience includes serving on U.S delegations to the UN General Assembly and UNESCO; three periods as an executive-in-residence at UBS Wolfsberg (Switzerland); testimony on technology policy and values issues before the U.S House and Senate, the European Parliament, the European Commission’s advisory Group on Ethics, the German Bundestag, and the UK Parliament; and co-chairing a nonpartisan panel that advised the UK Conservative Party on emerging technologies and health policy. In the early 2000s, he was an invited non-federal participant in the Department of State-led Project Horizon, 3-year scenario-based strategic planning process. He has appeared on network media in several countries, including in the U.S. ABC Nightline and PBS Frontline; and in the UK the BBC flagship shows Newsnight and Breakfast with Frost. With a strong academic background together with an M.B.A. he has developed projects focusing integrative approaches to new technologies both in the academic/business context (at the Illinois Institute of Technology) and in the policy community (Center for Policy on Emerging Technologies in Washington, DC). He hosted a succession of annual policy conferences on nanotechnology at the National Press Club, which led to the publication of Nanoscale: Issues and Perspectives for the Nano Century (Wiley). Among Washington events in 2011 he hosted a series of roundtables on impacts of new technologies (risk, intellectual property, change), co-sponsored by the Intel-led Task Force on American Innovation; and was invited to moderate panels on the security implications of the “Arab spring” for weapons (WMD) control. He regularly hosts teleconferences with thought leaders such as Wired Magazine founder Kevin Kelly, former Lockheed-Martin chairman Norman Augustine, CEA president Gary Shapiro, innovation leader Vivek Wadhwa and White House technology policy lead Tom Kalil. Other teleconferences have focused emerging issues in cybersecurity, and the future of on internet governance with Ambassador Philip Verveer and others. In Silicon Valley he hosted a breakfast for the venture community to discuss his provocative commentary on the innovation gap between the west coast and Washington, How to Bridge the Continental Divide. Other recent commentaries that have generated thoughtful interest in Washington and further afield: on NASA, and Washington’s core problem thinking about the future. He has written a monthly column for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on the latest issues in corporate social responsibility and his op-eds include several for the San Francisco Chronicle on emerging issues in technology and policy. In 2015-16 he is Fulbright Visiting Research Professor in Science and Society in the University of Ottawa, Canada.

The Future and Us and Kurzweil

Posted on July 19, 2012 by Nigel Cameron

Ray Kurzweil at Stanford Singularity Summit. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Ray Kurzweil is one of around a dozen figures who mark out the space between present and future – and us and technologies. He is an optimist as to speed of progress and its generally beneficent character, up to and including his “singularity.” Here he is noting, in general rather helpfully, that the future is easier to predict than some may think, in areas where exponential digital change is driving events (if you like, on Gordon Moore‘s moors.)

Of course the fun really starts when technologies bump into each other (convergence), when their disruptive impact is so great it’s just not clear what’s going to happen next, when people (yay, people!) decide to make decisions that shape what comes next, and so on.

I’ve written before about various aspects of all this (not least the rapid aging of companies that are out there on Moore’s moors – segue to Facebook‘s valuation, and so on). It’s handy to be reminded of the impact of the digital factor. Perhaps we can devise an impact factor that could be attached to companies, business models, and industries. Those close to pure digital will flourish rapidly and collapse/be superseded very fast. The search/social phalanx is slowly being followed by biotechnology as digitization and the management of huge data sets moves along (and, oh yes, typewriters and sliderules . . .). Random industries such as travel agency and cameras (sorry, Kodak) were hit hard and early. Publishing has taken longer and is going through an anguished process that will not soon be resolved. Education, especially higher education, has resisted with a fortitude and insouciance that would have been hard to resist.

So yes, some things are easier to predict. Some much less so. Some will always surprise. And then there’s the human factor.

Ray Kurzweil on Predicting the Future #WIFNY | Working Knowledge ®.

Ray Kurzweil on the Singularity and Bringing Back the Dead (singularityweblog.com)
(via 10 Questions for Futurist Ray Kurzweil – Video -… (futureof.biz)
Ray Kurzweil on Predicting the Future #WIFNY (customerthink.com)

Facebook user satisfaction plummets- MSN Money

Aside

Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook

Mark Zuckerber (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Nuff said.

But if I may add: The cause is attributed to three factors: Privacy issues; the constantly changing interface; and what HuffPo describes as “in-your-face advertising.”

Which takes me back to a theme I keep harping on: Our leading “social” company is among the least engaged on its own behalf in social media; despite being uniquely well-placed, it has chosen to disconnect itself from its user/customers and take continual decisions without consultation.

The context here is fascinating, since it is not simply that Facebook, “the social network,” does less well than G+ and Twitter; as a whole social companies score far worse than traditional (and traditionally unpopular) companies such as airlines and utilities.

Hard to make this up. And truly remarkable that these companies seem to be among the least able to grasp the impact on business/consumer relationships of the technologies they have mastered.

It’s also dire news for Facebook investors.

Facebook user satisfaction plummets- MSN Money.

[News] Facebook User Satisfaction Plummets, Google+ Shines, Says Survey (pcworld.in)

Social Media is NOT necessary for the C-Suite . . .?

Posted on July 18, 2012 by Nigel Cameron

English: Infographic on how Social Media are being used, and how everything is changed by them. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

After all the recent talk around the unbelievably low numbers for executive participation in social media – including that of hardly any CIOs, which should be a hanging offence if not one for drawing and quartering first – we now have an effort to defend the C Suite and pooh-pooh the concerns of those of us who have been suggesting that the Fortune XXX are well on their way to losing their fortunes.

Jeff Esposito makes the best of a thoroughly bad case, and I invite you to read it (link below).

Quick points in rejoinder (and see my earlier posts):

1. The issue is strategic. If in 2012 hardly a soul in the C-Suite is actively engaged in social, a (the?) major source of competitive (dis)advantage is simply being ignored – because, unlike say the dictaphone, you don’t know what you’re talking about / hiring for /strategizing about unless you have splashed around with several of these platforms over time. As I said in an earlier post, social is like saying you’re sorry; you can’t just hire someone to do it for you.

2. CEO disengagement is bizarre (these are supposed to be the smart guys). @Rupertmurdoch stands out as the only top CEO using Twitter interestingly. Only. But if the CIO, the conscience of the new info technology, is making snide remarks about people wasting their time “twittering,” it is not surprise everyone else in the suite feels they are off the hook. He (OK, almost all of them are) is doing more damage to the company than he could begin to imagine. At Moore’s Law speed, the social revolution is – chaotically – up and running. (The fact that most U.S. CIOs still report through the CFO, another body blow revealed by recent reseach, explains, sadly, a lot.)

3. Point is: This is not “about” marketing/customer service – though fielding complaints in real time is no bad thing. It’s about strategic re-invention by the alignment of corporate values, the values of employees, and those of present and prospective customers. It’s about B2B as much as B2C. It’s about letting loose a force for continuous innovation within the company – the only way, in the M’s-Law context, that this can be achieved. This is nuclear stuff. And the sooner 225 CIOs are giving their marching order (only 25 are on Twitter), the better. At least, if shareholders and boards have any interest in long-term profitability.

Jeff’s charge is partly that social media pros, whatever exactly they are, are jumping up and down about a situation which is of course of interest to them. But by and large their interests are tactical and marketing/CR focused. This issue is nuclear in its implications. There is no better thing any board member or CEO or C Anything Else could do than spend 2 weeks in social media immersion.

Memo to Social Media Pros – Social Media is NOT necessary for the C-suite.

The CIO Issue is about Strategy; Strategy; got that? (futureofbiz.org)
The Social Revolution: Customer Service and those who don’t get it (futureofbiz.org)
More on the #social #CIO (futureofbiz.org)

Olympics, Risk and the Craziness from G4S

Posted on July 17, 2012 by Nigel Cameron

In case you missed it, the major security firm G4S picked up a lucrative contract to provide security (or at least the bag-searching, latex glove simulacrum thereof) at the Olympics. They have monumentally blundered, and their top guy who is actually names Buckles has been admitting “humiliating mess” language in front of a committee of the UK Parliament.

OK, let’s talk about (a) risk, and (b) risk. That is, (a) where is the project plan to recruit the needed 10,000, train them, all the rest? Where is the risk assessment plan attached thereto? Where is all this boring MBA stuff that leaders do in their sleep and organizations commit to white boards and apt computer programs?

And (b), the vast damage being done this company, which has become a laughing stock, and is insisting – as seemingly its nutty contract permits – on claiming a fee of of nearly $100m for its pathetic carrying-on? No shame? No effort to recoup a scrap of repute? I forceast that Murdoch would close the News of the World, and he did. Smart guy. Damage limitation. Big symbol.

Mr Buckles?

Nick Buckles tells MPs G4S will claim its multi-million management fee despite Olympics ‘shambles’ – Telegraph.

China’s Xiaomi Declares War on Apple

Aside

As we move around inside and occasionally comment from the outside of the US technobubble, it’s handy to peak into another country that could just get serious about what we have been so good at. And we all know where that is.

This neat piece drills down deep into Xiaomi, recently valued at $4bn after its Series C; its ex-MS and Google leaders; and its plan to go head-head with you-know-who(m) initially in the vast expanse of the China market.

A sobering read. And exciting.

Already Valued at $4B, China’s Xiaomi Has Declared War on Apple | PandoDaily.

The Three Universals Coming Your Way

Posted on July 16, 2012 by Nigel Cameron

Listen up . . . .

1. A universal device. The 7 inch tablet is a step in that direction. No more schlepping multiple items around the planet. A supercomputer that will do it all.

2. A universal identifier. It may well be your Twitter handle. (It will probably not be your phone number.) So get that handle sorted out if it’s backwards or bizarre.

3. A universal privacy protocol. Easy to set up, controlling how you choose your data and identity and location and everything else to be viewed and by whom, for ever.

Not all tomorrow. Not all at the same time. But they’re coming . . . .

The Crisis of Trust in Companies and Beyond

Aside

The constant drip of admissions from J.P. Morgan Chase as the cost of the “London whale” rises and both dishonesty and folly is revealed comes in tandem with the latest round from Penn State. Former FBI Director Louis Freeh’s report unsparingly flays the leadership of that tarnished institution for a fundamental lack of concern for boys whose lives were being destroyed as individuals from janitors to the president were too interested in themselves to bother.

And in both cases, the people who knew and chose to look the other way now find that once you sow the wind, it’s the whirlwind that comes back.

Branding is not simply a game for consultants; it connects at a deep level the integrity and values of an organization with how it is viewed by the public and its customers and how it connects in turn with their values. One of the profound impacts of social media has been to begin to lay bare these and other connections in ways that go far beyond the occasional probes and revelations of press and whistle-blowers as transparency comes to be routinized rather than an exceptional experience.

At bottom therefore the issue is not about “brand” as a manipulable commodity to be burnished but integrity as a deep set of values that drive an organization by lining up its proclaimed sense of itself with how it really is and who its people are.

The issue for Penn State as for J.P.Morgan is whether what has been lost will be able to be recovered. What we already know is that this will not come soon or easy. We know how it is with the reputation of an individual. While corporations (for-profit and non) are persons only in a technical sense, their reputations are every bit as central to how the wider world sees them – and will be prepared to do business with them.

And (to pick up our much-blogged theme of social and the C-Suite) social media has only just begun to begin to open every one of our organizations and their commitments and their practices to Freeh-report style merciless scrutiny.

The Real Loss For JPMorgan Chase: Their Integrity.