Rule 2: Focus on outcomes

Humans are habit-driven creatures. Some research suggests that up to 95 percent of the day, the average human is purely on auto-pilot, executing according to the habits that have been built up over the years. Habits have many advantages, including not needing willpower to execute them, but of course, there are risks. The primary risk … Read more

Rule 1: Clarify your purpose

One of the wonderful aspects of western society is that if you’re willing to work and have acquired a decent set of relevant skills, you can always find a way to make a living. I’m sure that there are exceptions, but I believe that, by and large, this actually is the case for many of … Read more

10 rules for thriving in a digital world

Digitalization often focuses on new products, solutions and service opportunities through the use of software, data and artificial intelligence. Although this is an entirely relevant and valid viewpoint, many tend to forget that it’s not just the offerings that change. The people that work in a digital world also need to change. Our priorities, norms, … Read more

Don’t go down with the ship

Last week, we had a workshop with the Software Center companies on new business models and their coexistence with traditional models. The overall trend is that all companies are looking to transition from traditional, transactional business models to more continuous ones. The challenge is that the more continuous you aim for your business to be, … Read more

Your money isn’t real

Last week, my spaceship got destroyed, I read about NFTs and I pondered about bitcoin. Allow me to explain how this is all related. As I mentioned in an earlier post, occasionally I play Eve Online, an open world set in space. The most valuable areas in the game in terms of resources and loot … Read more

What it means to have a platform

Recently, I participated in a discussion set in the automotive realm. At some point, the conversation turned to platforms. After a while, I realized that there were several definitions of platform getting mixed up. Having worked with platforms since the 1990s, it has been really interesting for me to see how the very notion of … Read more

Culture versus strategy

Recently, in one of the company boards that I’m part of, we approved the new product strategy. This strategy is quite a deviation from the previous one in that we balance much more between investing in the current, main product, which used to get virtually all investment earlier, and new product initiatives to serve adjacent … Read more

Prepare for the worst

Recently, the Netherlands experienced some inclement weather including snowfall and strong winds. Interestingly, the entire country shut down with trains not running, highways closed off and recommendations of staying at home. It led to a bit of hilarity in our Swedish household as we experience this kind of weather regularly during the winter months and … Read more

Bringing AI to the edge

It seems that much of my work these days is concerned with bringing AI to the embedded-systems domain, understanding what the implications are and how companies should deal with it. In the discussions with technical experts and business leaders, however, I constantly run into several misconceptions. First, there are still several people out there who … Read more