By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge


Yesterday I came across what I felt to be a provocatively brilliant quote by Elon Musk which I subsequently posted into my LinkedIn Update and Facebook Status feeds.

"The reason I haven't taken SpaceX public is the goals of SpaceX are very long-term, which is to establish a city on Mars."
-- Elon Musk

The next day, I awoke to find this little gem of a comment from my friend Chikako Uchinami of synopsis.TODAY below it:

"Elon is instructive of the principle of Divine Right.
He's not always right, but when he is he is the most interesting man in the world.
You can't inherit Divine Right- you take it."

-- Chikako Uchinami

Besides being incredibly insightful, Chikako brilliantly articulated the concept and application Divine Right

Divine Right.

And that's what it is. 

It 's not given. It can only be taken. The right can only be asserted.

Think about the power of those statements. 

Now think about the power and effectiveness of any leader (including you) who not only understands but lays claim to and assertively wields Divine Right.

This presentation, How to Jumpstart Your Career In Japan, was delivered to a large group of visiting high school students from The Harvey School (Katonah, New York).

In the presentation we covered:

• Developing your value and ROI as a candidate
  
• How one can future proof themselves in the face of the rapidly advancing societal and economic tsunami
  
• Impact and Opportunities coming from rapid adoption and utilization of technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), expert systems, machine vision, robots, 3D printing, autonomous vehicles, etc.
  

By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge


Many companies mistakenly think that they're fighting a "War For Talent" when their policies and procedures inadvertently have them waging a "War On Talent".

The "War On Talent" takes the form of overpaying for weak or misaligned talent while rejecting and filtering out solid performers and top talent. It 's often the result when firm is mired in destructive processes and practices such as Cargo Cult Recruiting™, Cargo Cult Interviewing™ & Cargo Cult Hiring™.

Companies that are concerned about this should investigate auditing, deconstructing or tearing down and replacing their current practices and processes as needed.

SiliconEdge's Supercharged Interviewing™ and TrueHire™ Methodology was developed for just this purpose. Use these programmes to confidently hire better candidates faster and cheaper while setting the stage for strong future employee engagement from the very first interview.

By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge


Many executive and business coaches proudly and publicly proclaim:

"I'm not here to teach you anything -- because I can't do that. 
 Rather I'm here to bring the best out of you, which you need to have brought out."

I’m adamantly opposed to this type of thinking and this is where my philosophy, frameworks and methodologies part ways with much of the establishment coaching industry and even media-annointed “coaching gurus”.

You see, unlike so many other executive and business coaches who are operating under the principle that it's somehow wrong to teach you things or to directly and explicitly provide a model for your success, I'm actually here to teach you things and provide a variety of models for success and improvement. 

Not to tell you things, but to teach you things. 

Sometimes you'll discover the solutions on your own. Other times, I'll drop hints or steer you in certain directions for exploration and understanding. But if or when that no longer works for you or we are not satisfied with the results, I'll step in and then together we'll look at various solutions and models, trying them on for size and future-pacing them to ensure efficacy and fit.

You see, besides teaching, advising and guiding you, I'm here to help you solve problems.  And yet within the traditional executive and business coaching industry it's almost verboten to do so. Perhaps this is because some many coaches don't have a sufficiently stocked tool box or a set of proven models to work with, choose from and future pace. 

From my vantage point, this actually wouldn't be surprising, since in the current business environment so many the current Western coaching models along with many of the associated coaching techniques appear to have hit a wall if they aren't straight-out broken.

The fact is many of these models and techniques were created by pure academicians who never had to battle-test, let alone battle-prove these models and techniques in the fast-paced and, more often than not, viciously competitive corporate  world.

If your coach can't help solve your problem, why work them? Anything less than solving a problem is simply therapy. There's nothing wrong with that as we all need a shoulder to cry on once in a while and it's always help to have someone available with which we can share our difficulties. But imagine how much better it would be to solve and mitigate if not eliminate the issues and obstacles confronting or confounding us.

The challenges facing executives as well as entrepreneurs are legion, ranging from communication issues, office politics, marriage and relationship problems and so forth. All of these are addressable and must be addressed for the executive or entrepreneur to operate at peak or near peak effectiveness without over revving their engine and burning out.

Problems never take years to solve, unless you go a therapist. 

By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge


One of the frequent topics I like to discuss besides the myth and meme that "Necessity Is the Mother of All Invention" is the fact many of Silicon Valley's most vaunted startups are all post-tech businesses. 

Yes, you read that right. Post-tech.

They surely use technology in their day-to-day operations just as UPS does, the Hilton hotel chain or even Walmart. However, many of these startups may actually use even less tech than these brick and mortar firms. Examples of such startups and ventures that are post tech include Airbnb, Uber and Zappos which is analogous to an online Nordstrom in terms of the excellent customer service experience they provide. Further, the technology required to run these companies is often available right of the shelf for a pittance (relatively speaking). There are plenty of other non-Valley, post-tech companies such as Groupon, Gilt Groupe and Dollar Shave Club to name just a few.

What does all this mean?

As we've discussed many times before, this means that what many of these startups are facing (or will face) as their primary challenge is primarily human in nature not technical.

Specifically, the markets that post-tech startups will want to or tend to target are those which are massively inefficient (thus, having huge profit potential while populated with tepid or ossified competitors) due to the use of regulatory capture by rent-seeking incumbents.

Over the last 18 to 20 years (and especially during the last 7 years) the skills and knowledge needed to quickly and cost effectively build, mass produce and even consume these technologies and tools have now become almost completely common place.  Consider that the amount of computing power (and bandwidth) we have in our smart phones to a person 10 years ago as is the ability to buy right off the shelf most of the things we need to create just about any product or business. 

We're no longer concerned with the theory behind building a router or the design and development of packet switched (versus a circuit based networks).  Even IPTV is no longer a hazy dream but a daily reality. 

I could go on and on, but I won't so as not to bore you.

Beyond core technology, the Valley has now grown and matured in regards to the knowledge, processes, skills and resources needed to not only build a product but to launch a company and to make it successful (although, often times, the Valley still struggles greatly with market-based productization and ultimately the monetization off the product. These two sticking points, therefore, provide huge opportunities for the next generation of entrepreneurs to focus on).

For me, I'm glad I lived in the Valley and still do business there. It was a very huge turning point and chapter in my life, however, for many reasons, not everyone can get there, at least now. 

Yet they worry and fret. Don't.

My advice, is don't worry or fret, do the best you can, with what you have, where you are. If the Valley is in your future you'll be there. And beyond that, there is a downside to the Valley -- too many posers, Drive-by entrepreneurs, Lottery Ticket Louts and so forth attending events and conferences rather than staying home or at the office building product or businesses. Better yet, spending the time getting in front of customers. The point is the Valley is a huge echo-chamber where luck and one-trick ponies are seen as "systems", "processes" and "truths" and where almost no one I have met can separate talent from systems, brand and product.

That's the downside. A major downside.

The upside is that even if you aren't in the Valley, you can still read and see what's going on, in real time, without being pulled into the Valley echo-chamber and backslapping "ataboys" that are often made with good intentions but damage companies and entrepreneurs in the long run.

The glorious fact, and I do say glorious,  is that now with all of the knowledge, mentors, books, forms, templates and so on I question this "race to setup in the Valley"  Further, we should consider and clearly understand that most of the "tech pain" and "tech risk" has been taken entirely out of the startup equation. 

To summarize, in effect, so many of these startups are post-tech. They surely use tech in their daily business or operations just like KFC, Burger King and UPS does but they aren't tech firms. This doesn't make them better or worse than any startup. But it does mean they should acknowledge this new reality as should every startups, potential entrepreneur as well as incumbent.

By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge



In conjunction with the Asia-Pacific Coaching Alliance (APCA), SiliconEdge is creating a series of High-Impact Training & Certification materials to help raise the standards of the executive, business and performance coaching industry.


More information and details can be found on the Asia-Pacific Coaching Alliance's website.