market

“Tom Malone, professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management and author of the HBR article “The Age of Hyperspecialization,” explains why breaking jobs into tiny pieces yields better, faster, cheaper work — and greater flexibility for employees…”

The future of work 2.0

“This interesting post, published by TechCrunch on February 4^th 2012, does not only remind us of how one of the greatest inventions of our generation has already changed the way we communicate, share information, or shop but also gives us a taste of what is still to come: The Internet is changing the way we work – the web is disrupting labor and transforming the definition of employment as we know it!

The post discusses the rise of the “independent worker”, who is one that operates independently and flexibly in today’s work environment – unattached to any particular company. The author, Nick Cronin, summarizes what he believes are the main factors contributing to this development, how these changes are affecting companies’ hiring processes, and the increasing importance of labor efficiency for maintaining a competitive edge.

“The era of the lean, flexible workforce is here and guess where both companies and independents are increasingly locating each other. Yep: The Internet.”

Read the full post “Labor Efficiency: The next great Internet Disruption” on TechCrunch

In that sense, check out the leading online project marketplace for freelancers and businesses in Germany:

projektwerk

According to an article on fins.com (2011), the job market for freelance technologists is continuously growing. Research company Forrester Research estimates the total U.S. business and government spending on IT goods and services to grow to $876 billion in 2012, up 8.8% from 2011 and a 16.2% increase over 2010 levels. Read the full post here:

Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action | Video on TED.com.

According to Simon Sinek’s “Golden Circle Rule”, people don’t buy what you do, but they buy why you do it. Even if it is no secret that many successful brands gain an irrational edge by appealing to our emotions, in his TED talk, Simek presents a innovative model which explains why some organizations and leaders are able to inspire action while others are not. Some of his examples include Apple Inc., Dr. Martin Luther King, and the Wright brothers. Enjoy.

We have known for some time now the rocketing demand for mobile app development, however, the fact that firms are literally scrambling for engineers who can write software for mobile devices is somewhat amazing. Apparently, the supply of sufficiently experienced software engineers is seriously lagging behind the high demand. According to the WSJ, companies have reacted with increased wages to retain top talent and outsourcing to third-party developers. Mobile apps have worked their way into various industries. As stated in the WSJ article, Google Inc. and Apple Inc. expect revenues for the App Store and Android Market to tripple to about $15billion in 2011…

Check out the full article here: Mobile App Talent Pool Is Shallow

The German IT inter-trade organisation Bitkom is alarmed

Recently the Bitkom reported that the delays caused by the incidents in Japan would not be as terrible as it first seemed. The high-tech market didn’t seem to be seriously affected.

However now, a random survey of manufacturers and merchants of electronics shows that actually the economical effects are becoming a growing problem. The survey was based on information and communication technology as well as consumer electronics. By now you can see price increases very clearly: Products or components are about 20 percent more expensive.

The Bitkom didn’t specify which products are affected. It is generally difficult at the moment, because even the Japanese themselves do not share information. Of course the greatest consequences will be seen at products that can not be made without Japanese influence. For example some car manufacturers need a special component for their cars, that is only produced by the Japanese company “Hitachi”. Due to the total failure of Hitachi, production stops occured.

Shortages are also expected in the production of the special Blue-Ray lasers, made by Sony. Currently it seems as if the Japanese are doing everything to start their production again, so that they won’t lose their customers to the competitors. Due to the current situation of power supply, further problems are expected.
Even if the same quantity can be achieved again, a potentially radioactive contamination could affect the supply chain. Precise appraisals are not possible at the moment.

Some price increases are, certainly only speculative. For example the Taiwanese memory chip market DRAMeXchange.com reported that the prices for NAND flash memory chips are increasing by 5 to 15 percent. These chips are integrated into e.g. USB sticks, digital cameras, memory cards, smart phones and tablets.

The second largest producer in the world for these memory chips is the Japanese firm Toshiba whose factories are located in the South of Japan where the work continues ostensibly without problems.

The economic problems in Japan will probably take several weeks and months, so that we can just make a guess about the consequences now. Did you notice something about price increases or delivery shortages? We are looking forward to your comments.

About this talk: “In a world of too many options and too little time, our obvious choice is to just ignore the ordinary stuff. Marketing guru Seth Godin spells out why, when it comes to getting our attention, bad or bizarre ideas are more successful than boring ones.”

Portfolios trump resumes, more workers telecommute, social media continues its spread, and mobile marches over desktop: Online magazine CIO provides technology and business leaders with insight and analysis on information technology developments and gives an interesting forecast of some of the key trends for the next year.

According to CIO, the workplace has evolved in new and exciting ways and has become even more centered on the Web. In 2010, mobile applications gained on desktop apps as many companies focused on facilitating smartphones and tablet PCs. Traditional marketing techniques were edged out by web-based marketing via search engines and social media. However, one of the most important trends is the continuous growth of online work. According to the CEO of one of the leading marketplaces for online talent: “It’s a digital world, and the smart companies will hire more flexibly and get more work done online in 2011″. Read the full post on CIO.com.

Technology-centered work trends for 2011:

• Digital portfolios replacing resumes
• Mobile is the new desktop
• Online work: Hiring in the could
• The HTML5/Flash War: Programmers needed
• Businesses will get even more social
• The decline of traditional marketing

TED (technology, entertainment, design) is a non-profit foundation that is best known for its annual conferences, in which lectures or ted-talks are devoted to one mission: “spreading ideas”. founded as a one-off event in 1984, ted-talks have grown in popularity and now cover a wide range of topics (science and culture). Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Bill Gates or Richard Dawkins are just some of the prominent figures who have given ted-talks.

curious: when “ted-talking”, the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers are challenged to limit their speeches to 18 minutes. the best talks and performances from TED and partners are available on ted.com official website or the ted youtube channel.

click the link for upcoming and ongoing tedx events.

a recent survey, conducted by elon university, found that cloud-computing will increasingly gain importance in the future. the majority of social analysts, internet and tech experts questioned in the survey, predict this form of internet-based computing, whereby shared resources, software and information, are provided to computers and other devices on-demand, to prevail. mashable offers a great summary of this study.

image by mashable