When the robots realize what they don't know

Warning in advance to the good folks that check out the blog here, I sense another 'robot' kick coming on.

So bail out now if indeed the tales from the robotics frontier are not really your thing.

Today's dispatch from the robot wars - Robots Learning Better Ways to Ask Clueless Humans for Help, is from the IEEE site. Scientists and robotics researchers at MIT, (it is always MIT it seems), have taken the 'clueless' robot that traditionally can do only what is specifically programmed to do, and enhanced it with the ability to interpret where and when it needs assistance to carry out an assigned task, and then to communicate that need for help to an equally clueless human counterpart.

In the research conducted at MIT, scientists have taught the robots to ask for help to complete the assembly of a piece of furniture. They can make requests for assistance like 'Please flip the white table top over' and 'Please hand the blue robot the black table leg'. check out the embedded video below to see how this process and technology work (email and RSS subscribers will need to click through)

If you watched the video all the way through (you deserve a medal for that), you might have caught the most interesting line of all - that this kind of robot technology would eventually allow humans to supervise larger and larger groups of robot workers.

Robots are great at completing the majority of most simple tasks, but eventually there are one or two steps in whatever you want a robot to do where it's much more likely to fail. Giving robots the ability to recognize these failure points and then intelligently ask for assistance could open up many more tasks to at least partial automation, and it's likely to have the most impact in variable, unstructured environments.

You know, like the kinds of environments and types of jobs that we keep thinking are going to be safe from the eventual robot uprising.

Have a great week!

The next evolution of corporate social media management

Just might be something like Beatrix - a new 'advanced virtual social media assistant' that can assist organizations, (or individual 'thought leaders' as well I suppose) in their quests to become 'social media rockstars.'

How does it work?

Unlike more well-known social media management and scheduling tools like Buffer or HootSuite, both of which allow an organization to schedule and plan social media activity, Beatrix not only helps wth the scheduling of social media updates, it actually helps find and select the actual content as well.

Let's say a local pizza shop wants to buff up its social media presence. The organization can then give Beatrix a few keywords to focus on - like 'pizza', 'wine', or 'sandwiches', and the Beatrix algorithm finds interesting content from around the web and sets it up to be shared on the company's social accounts.

Here is what Beatrix says in her own words...

The algorithm creates instant content plans for you. Stuck for things to say on social media? Beatrix will plan out your week. No time to post? Beatrix will post for you at times you specify. Beatrix does everything a social media intern does.

Just like a real assistant, Beatrix emails you a new content plan every week. If you like it, Beatrix will post that content throughout the next week. Or tell Beatrix what's wrong and she'll create a new plan. Beatrix gets smarter the more you use her. And she never misses a deadline

A 'smart' social media assistant that takes your input, seeks, finds, schedules, and shares interesting content related to your business, and keeps you abreast of the ongoing content plan? An automated service that not only decides for you when to post to social networks, but what to post in the first place?

That sounds pretty awesome to me.  Of course maybe it is because I spend ridiculous amounts of time looking for good content to share, (and blog about).

Sure, someone out there is likely to respond with a comment like - 'That's not what effective social media is all about. Companies need to be authentic or personable or real, or some such.'

Maybe.  Or maybe most of us just really want our fans and followers to think we are on top of our industry, and are sharing relevant and interesting content about what they are interested in. 

And if that is the case, then why wouldn't an algortihm be just as effective at that task as a social media intern who is counting the days before he or she can head back to school.

Have a great week!

More evidence that texting is the best way to connect with talent

A few months ago I had a piece on the blog titled 'The most engaging method of communication you're not using' about the increased growth and the massive engagement levels driven with text communications.

I used the below chart from Business Insider to back up much of my take on how if you really want to engage with people - employees, candidates, prospects - whomever - that getting permission to communicate via text was the way to go.

 

A practically equal number of texts sent and received across all age cohorts indicate incredible engagement and interaction in the medium. When people receive a text, they generally reply. And the sheer volumes of messages being sent by members of the 18-34 year old age range both indicate that more and more texting (or similar short, disposable communications tools), will need to become a tool in your toolbox if you want and need to effectively connect with people.

Want a more practical and real-world, (ok a sports world) example of how this change in communication methods is playing out with top talent?

Last week American soccer star Clint Dempsey transferred from Tottenham, the English Premiere League club he had been playing for, to the Seattle Sounders of the US-based Major League Soccer. This was pretty big news for US soccer fans, as well as relatively important news for world soccer in general.

Dempsey is not only a club-level star, he is probably the US National Team's best all-around player, had seen success in a top-flight European league, and is still relatively close to his prime playing years. And with the World Cup only one year away, for a player of Dempsey's ability and national team importance to move to Major League Soccer and away from the English Premier League was a big story.

But back to the point of this post and how texting plays into this.

Check two excerpts from a recent SI.com interview with Dempsey, as he describes the process of changing clubs, his role on the US National team, and some of the communications that took place between him and club and country leaders over that time.

SI.com: Did you have a heart-to-heart at one point with Tottenham manager André Villas-Boas?

Dempsey: I didn't. I really just had a heart-to-heart with my family, talked to my wife, to my mom and dad, to my brothers and my sister. And had a few sleepless nights just going over that decision and wanting to make sure I was making it for the right reasons, and that I felt good about it. You have to get that gut feeling that you're doing the right thing. It was good for me to be back with Tottenham in preseason and be around it to make that decision instead of being removed from it on vacation in the summer. I was able to be there, be in training and really think about it.

After I left, [Villas-Boas] sent me a really good text. He was happy with what I was doing and I was going to be part of his plans. He wished me the best. I'm grateful for him. He gave me an opportunity to see what it was like to play at a big club. So I'll always be grateful for that, just to get that experience.

Later in the interview, Dempsey discusses some upcoming US Men's National Team games and his conversations with coach Juergen Klinsmann.

SI.com: Have you had a chance to talk to Klinsmann since you made the decision to go to Seattle?

Dempsey: Just text. He said he wasn't going to bring me in for this game, but he was looking forward to making history in Costa Rica [in the World Cup qualifier on Sept. 6. The U.S. has never won in Costa Rica in nine tries] and making sure we book our tickets to Brazil [for the World Cup]. I'm excited about getting my 100th cap, and hopefully we do make history in Costa Rica.

Did you catch that?

Dempsey leaves one high-profile English Premiere League team Tottenham - and only communicates with Villas-Boas, his former manager there via text.Text me, bro.

Then as the move to Seattle impacts his fitness and availability for some upcoming National Team games and again he only communicates with US manager Klinsmann via text.

A top talent like Dempsey makes a major career move and the two most important executives involved in the process only interact with him via text message.

And no one, not Dempsey, not Dempsey's family, not the author of the SI piece, raises any objections or questions about the choice of text messaging as the communication method. No one asks, 'He only sent you a text? He didn't call? He didn't have a meeting with you?'

Look at Dempsey's quote again "After I left, [Villas-Boas] sent me a really good text."

He sent me a really good text.

And it seems like for Dempsey, 30-year old soccer star, that is just fine.

If you want to understand work, you have to understand email

I don't care how much your enlightened company pushes cutting-edge social collaboration tools, uses an internal social network like Yammer or similar, or even has set up Facebook or LinkedIn Groups for internal company communication and collaboration - you are still sending and receiving ridiculous amounts of email every week.

Don't lie like you like to - you have a problem, a bad habit that manifests itself in endless email conversation threads, tapping out five word responses on your iPhone while waiting on line at Starbucks, and conversations that often include questions like 'Did you see my email?' 

Of course she saw your email. She 'sees' every email. She's just ignoring your email.

But that aside, for a technology, communications tool, and collaboration medium that we all use so much, we understand and attempt to analyze just how we use email. Sure, we might know how many unread messages are in our Inbox, and how often we need to delete stuff since we are always surpassing some nonsensical IT-imposed storage limit, but aside from that, we don't really think about email and how we use it to get work done all that often (if ever).

An aside before I get to the point. If you work someplace where you are always going over your email storage limit then you need to consider working someplace else, or if you have any influence over this kind of thing, finding some new IT people that will make that problem go away. No one should ever run out of space for storing work-related email. That's it. And I won't argue with anyone on that point because you are wrong.

Ok, back to the post.

If you are a user for Gmail for work or even for mainly personal reasons, a new project out the MIT Media Lab can help shed some light on how you actually use Gmail. The tool called Immersion, creates a really cool visualization of your email activity, and more importantly, it helps illuminate the sub-networks and collaborative teams within. An example of the network view that Immersion creates, from my Gmail activity, is below, (and some related stats are along the right side of the post).

Click image for an even larger view

Immersion uses color coding, network connection links, and size/distance of the nodes to help understand with whom you are most frequently emailing, who else is likely included in those conversations, how often they occur, and the topics or projects that are being worked on.

On my chart, I can see pretty clear delineation between messages about HRevolution, Fistful of Talent, HR Technology, as well as personal and fun stuff as well. But the key point is that the Immersion tool offers a little bit of a window into how I am actually using email - the one technology that I am still sad to say dominates many workdays.

You probably can't leverage the Immersion tool, (yet), if you are using a corporate, MS-based email backbone. But you can put some pressure on your IT pals to find some tools and methods to help you and your organization better understand how and when and in what manner the number one collaboration technology in your organization is being used.

They have time believe me. And make sure you tell them to quit with the 'Your mailbox is over the storage size limit emails.'

Everyone ignores them.

The best line I've read all year, and trying not to deliver what's expected

A few days ago, in this piece, Marketview: Huge in Japan on the finance blog Dynamic Hedge, I read what I believe to be the best line I have read anywhere this year, and quite possibly my favorite line ever, (although the last line of Song of Myself is tough to beat).

Here it is:

The Yen carry trade is basically driving risk markets globally and will eventually destroy everything you love.

Boom.

Right in the middle of a pretty standard piece on the Yen currency fluctuations and the recent volatility in the Japanese equity markets, the author drops in that amazing line about everything you love being destroyed and now you're not reading a standard (and dreary) financial analysis piece anymore. This is something else entirely, and entirely unexpected. (I am so stealing this line).Flowers, Andy Warhol, 1964

I'm heading out the big SHRM Annual Conference next week, and presenting on Monday afternoon. While at the event, and certainly before and during my session I will be thinking about this piece from Dynamic Hedge, and that line and how it ambushed me from out of nowhere.

SHRM and the most of the other big, mainstream events succeed largely by meeting expectations I think. They are very clear about what is going to happen there, the speakers they select are if not familiar individually, are familiar in the aggregate. There are always the lawyers and consultants and advisor types speaking, and they are all kind of interchangeable. They all say (again, mostly), the same kinds of things to the same kind of audience that comes back each year. It is a kind of 'cycle of the expected' if you will.

And that is pretty smart I suppose, and good business. SHRM Annual especially is a pretty large commitment of time and money for attendees, and the risk of not delivering to them what they know and expect is pretty high for the organizers. While it feels hard to break in to the SHRM Annual line up as a speaker, it seems much easier to stay there once you are in (and if you have figured out how to deliver to those expectations).

Having said all that, or having said that little, I press on towards the event and the other things I am up to - thinking about the idea of meeting audience, reader, or even public expectations. 

It's all pretty safe, the assessing, defining, and meeting expectations game. If I do that in my session on Monday, I will probably get decent ratings, and maybe get invited back to speak again. It's just a formula really. The speaker is going to talk about X, the attendees are coming to hear him or her talk about X, and they leave knowing something about X. It's simple.

But it all seems kind of boring, kind of forgettable even.

The best events, speeches, ballgames, picnics, movies, songs, books, etc. - the ones that you remember and that resonate beyond their allotted time horizon for your attention - only do that when they ignore, (or at least pretend not to care about) your expectations and deliver on their vision, and not be beholden to yours. But it can be hard to do that. And scary. And that's why it's done so rarely. But I will give it a try on Monday. Probably fail. Probably not be back in 2014.

Let's test it out:

The HR technology landscape has been transformed in the last 5 years, and if you don't keep informed, markets will shift globally and will eventually destroy everything you love.

Maybe.

Have a great weekend, and if I see you at SHRM, please say hello!