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Juan Hindo in
Today, the White House is bringing academia together with the public and private sectors to discuss progress on President Obama’s Materials Genome Initiative. Announced last June, the effort seeks to harness the power of modern computing and communications technologies to enable U.S. companies to discover, develop, manufacture, and deploy advanced materials at twice the speed than is possible today – at a fraction of the cost.
One of the projects that the White House sees fit to highlight today as an example of this kind of innovation and collaboration just happens to be an effort hosted on IBM’s World Community Grid. The White House is pointing to the work of Prof. Alán Aspuru-Guzik, an associate professor at Harvard University’s Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, whose team is running The Clean Energy Project, perhaps the largest computational chemistry experiment ever.
With oil production peaking in the near future, alternative sources of energy are becoming increasingly important. In order to develop new energy-related technologies, highly engineered materials are needed. In particular, novel designs for solar cells and fuel cells based on organic molecules often require molecules with very specific characteristics to efficiently capture and store energy.
Instead of physically testing and manufacturing all or even some molecular materials with high potential, the Aspuru-Guzik group is performing a massive number of computational chemistry calculations to predict the properties and behavior of seven million organic molecules. Then, only the most promising candidates that might boost the performance of solar cells based on organic molecules are more closely examined. Last year, the team identified a molecule that could make for extraordinary semiconductors. Within about a year, data from the 1,000 or so of the most tantalizing calculations will be made available to all for further development.
What makes Professor Aspuru-Guzik’s project even more interesting and relevant to the Materials Genome Initiative is that it is being made possible by IBM’s World Community Grid. World Community Grid exemplifies the extraordinary results of a partnership among academia, the private sector, and the general public. World Community Grid marshals the spare computational power of PCs volunteered by the general public, and provides it – free of charge – to scientists who want to accelerate their research into cures for cancer, AIDS and other diseases; advance solar energy and clean water; and develop healthier food.
Volunteers download a small application to their Windows, Mac OS or Linux computers which crunch numbers for researchers when the volunteers’ computing devices aren’t otherwise being used – even between keystrokes. To date, nearly 600,000 individuals and organizations in more than 80 countries have registered two million devices for World Community Grid’s use on 21 projects. Scientists have told us that it collapses research times of 100 years or more to just 12 months or so.
Since its inception, World Community Grid has delivered more than 620 million research results. It is equivalent in speed and capacity to the some of the world’s 15 fastest traditional supercomputers, and is the largest and most diverse grid computing project dedicated to practical humanitarian research.
So, if someone wants to talk about practical mechanisms to accelerate the pace of discovery at a lower cost, they needn’t look terribly far. Certainly, there are many other resources, technologies and collaborations to enable the research and development of all sorts of novel materials. However, we couldn’t be prouder to offer a resource that resonates strongly with the scientific community and volunteers alike, and is available today and for the foreseeable future.
Juan Hindo is a program manager with IBM’s Corporate Citizenship & Corporate Affairs group.
More on the Materials Genome Initiative
Article: White House Highlights Materials Genome Initiative
Article: New Commitments Support Administration’s Materials Genome Initiative
Materials Genome Initiative for Global Competitiveness
Fact Sheet: Progress on Materials Genome Initiative
More Articles About World Community Grid
Anatomy of a Project for Sustainable Water
Simpler is Better for Saving Our Waterways
Helping to Find Cures for Childhood Cancer
World Community Grid and the Greening of Information Technology
The World Environment Center just awarded its annual Gold Medal award for International Corporate Achievement in Sustainable Development to IBM. The company was recognized for its commitment to advancing environmental sustainability and for providing business solutions in support of more sustainable cities and the planet.
IBM RECEIVES TOP SUSTAINABILITY AWARD FROM WORLD ENVIRONMENT CENTER--IBM Chairman Samuel J. Palmisano, right, accepted the World Environment Center Gold Medal for International Corporate Achievement in Sustainable Development for IBM's corporate environmental efforts and smarter cities technology at the National Building Museum on Thursday, May 3, 2012 in Washington DC. IBM is the first company to receive the award twice, having also been the 1990 recipient. Also pictured are (L-R) Dr. Terry F. Yosie, President and CEO, World Environment Center, and Ronald Daniels, President, Johns Hopkins University. (Feature Photo Service)
The importance of environmental sustainability has exploded in recent years. It is implanted in the minds of leaders no matter what aspect of business, government or society they serve. But to be realistic, it hasn’t always been this way.
The broad popularity of environmental sustainability has been cyclical since the first
Earth Day back in 1970. If the sustainability of our planet is indeed a future imperative, a relevant question for any organization is: How do you sustain sustainability over the long term?
At IBM, environmental leadership has been practiced regardless of its popularity or the company’s financial performance at any given point in time. Environmental sustainability is managed as a strategic imperative. We work to anticipate opportunities and prevent problems. Underlying this commitment is a conviction that good environmental management makes good business sense.
In fact, this was the first time in the WEC Gold Medal’s 28 year history that a company has earned it twice (IBM had previously received the award in 1990). We do indeed work hard to sustain sustainability.
For global institutions at large, I am certainly encouraged. That’s because the next generation is far more passionate about environmental sustainability than any other in recent memory. We’re on the front edge of a new wave of leaders who want to perform work that not only delivers a return to shareholders, but also who want to perform work that is good for society. It’s a generation that thinks not just about stockholders, but also stakeholders.
From where I sit, I see opportunity for institutions to capitalize on insights from data analytics gleaned from our instrumented and interconnected world. Today’s leaders are blazing the trail and making systems – such as physical infrastructure – more efficient, intelligent and sustainable. It’s happening throughout the world because such innovation delivers not only environmental benefit, but also value and competitive advantage. And this can help the world sustain sustainability.
The good news is that the key requirement for real change now exists: People want it.
And they are hungry for leadership. Such a moment doesn’t come around often – perhaps a few times every century – and it will not last forever. Those seizing it today are the leaders of tomorrow. I am convinced that the forward-thinking individuals, communities, companies and countries of the world can build a smarter, more secure and more sustainable planet.
Wayne Balta is IBM’s Vice President for Corporate Environmental Affairs and Product Safety. A version of this article first appeared on WhiteHouse.gov.
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A little over three years ago, a group of faculty members at the University of Virginia were meeting weekly to see what they might do to encourage awareness of issues of global sustainability among their students. The faculty members represented seven different schools and brought diverse expertise to the subject. But how to start was the more elusive question.
The new Vice President for Research, Tom Skalak, challenged the group to devise a simulation model that could be played as a game with student participants. The faculty were a bit skeptical of the idea, but thought it through anyway. It was decided that the Chesapeake Bay would make a good subject for this simulation game. The Bay represents a complex socio-environmental system, the University is located in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, and the Bay is under considerable environmental stress.
Thus was born the UVA Bay Game®. Mustering support from an outside consultant with experience in modeling environmental systems, and with the help of a team of systems engineering graduate students, the initial version of the Bay Game was launched on Earth Day 2009 with over 130 U.Va. students playing the game in the roles of crop farmers, land developers, watermen, and assorted regulators.
Built in a scant four months, Bay Game 0.9 had its bugs and glitches, but it validated the idea that a well-designed simulation game would achieve the goal of bringing students to an understanding of how complex socio-environmental systems give rise to often unanticipated outcomes. These outcomes are not predictable and would be different with every game play as different assumptions and decisions would lead to very different outcomes — a learning experience.
Buoyed by the success of this the initial version, the faculty continued to work to improve the Bay Game adding more realism, richer graphics and data, and more role-types. Now in its third major release, the Bay Game has been played by undergraduate and graduate students; actual regulators, farmers, and watermen; at the U.S. House of Representatives; and with great reception from businesses. Executives from IBM, GE, Dupont, Goldman Sachs, Coca-Cola, and Intel to name a few have played the Bay Game and derived insights leading to innovative solutions to the problem of water quality that their firms could act upon.
Building on this success, the University of Virginia team decided to investigate the underlying simulation model — highly aggregated in the Bay Game — and develop a much more detailed, simulation-only model. It became apparent that such a model would require enormous computing capacity to execute. That’s when we discovered IBM’s World Community Grid. U.Va. submitted a proposal to the World Community Grid and the proposal was accepted with two other proposals — both water-related.
The simulation model developed for execution on the World Community Grid is called Computing for Sustainable Water. Although this model was initially developed to study the Chesapeake Bay, it was designed for rapid deployment to other bodies of water. Computing for Sustainable Water was first announced to the public on April 19, 2012 . It runs on many of the more than 2-million computers volunteered by individuals in over 80 countries. Within one year, the results of more than 1.3 million separate simulation experiments will be gathered for analysis by the team of scientists at the University of Virginia.
This productive collaboration between the University of Virginia and IBM is an example of how to leverage the intellectual capital of both organizations toward solving one of the pressing problems of society. Even before all the results are in, we at U.Va. consider this a great success!
Gerard P. Learmonth is an associate professor of systems and information engineering at the University of Virginia
Related Resources:
Podcast with Dr. Learmonth about Computing for Sustainable Water project
Read the Press Release Announcing Computing for Sustainable Water project
More Blog Posts About World Community Grid:
Simpler is Better for Saving Our Waterways
Helping to Find Cures for Childhood Cancer
World Community Grid and the Greening of Information Technology
I’ll Take “Curing Malaria” for $1,000, Alex
Philippe Cousteau — environmental advocate, University of Virginia OpenGrounds Fellow and Azure Worldwide co-founder — writes about how World Community Grid is using donated, unused computing power to help save the Chesapeake Bay Watershed.
As a social entrepreneur and environmental advocate, I know first-hand how easy it is to become overwhelmed by the challenges facing our world. How can I make a difference? Where do I even start? These are questions I ask myself frequently, and questions I know many others ask all around the world. Fortunately, one of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned over the years is that big challenges don’t always require big complex solutions.
In fact, in many cases the answers might be right in front of us.
Such is the case with the Computing for Sustainable Water Project from World Community Grid and the University of Virginia. This project tackles a very big, very complex challenge: predicting the environmental and economic impact of human actions on critical water resources over the next 20 years. Before we look at the unique approach IBM and the University of Virginia are taking to address this challenge, let’s take a moment to look at
the importance of the undertaking.
My grandfather Jacques-Yves Cousteau and my father Philippe called Earth the “Water Planet” for a very good reason. Water, not oil, uranium or gold, is our most precious natural resource. In all of its forms, from salt water to fresh, water supports all life on Earth.
With an increasing world population and growing stresses from agriculture, pollution and development, water is quickly becoming one of our most endangered resources. Effective and smart management of our water resources requires targeted information and strategies today, not some point in the distant future.
This is where the Computing for Sustainable Water Project comes into play.
Based on the University of Virginia’s model that simulates the actions of the more than
17 million people living on the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, the Computing for Sustainable Water Project aims to provide insights that could be used to inform policies and decision making for major waterways and ecosystems worldwide. To do that in a timely manner, however, the University of Virginia and IBM teams would need to condense 90 years of computational research into just one year – an expensive and time consuming proposition.
Which brings me back to one of my original questions: Where do you even start? As it turns out, the answer was sitting on desks, counters and kitchen tables in homes, schools, businesses and offices around the world. Through a free application, the World Community Grid makes it possible for all of us to be part of the solution by powering the Computing for Sustainable Water Project through our computers when they aren’t in use. This is a relatively simple solution that’s fast, runs automatically and requires no time or effort from its volunteers. Best of all, it’s a great starting point for people to become engaged and involved in the stewardship of our planet.
It’s innovative partnerships and projects like these that give me the most hope for the future. My grandfather and father had a simple vision of creating a world where every child can breathe fresh air, drink clean water and walk on green grass under a blue sky. Sometimes, simple visions and simple solutions can be our most powerful tools of change.
Explorer, social entrepreneur and environmental advocate, Philippe Cousteau is the son
of Jan and Philippe Cousteau Sr., and the grandson of Captain Jacques-Yves Cousteau.
In addition to his work in environmental education and media, Philippe is co-founder of Azure Worldwide, a strategic environmental design, development and marketing company. Projects include work in green site design/planning, eco-tourism and new media.
Through an alliance with the University of Virginia, where he is an OpenGrounds Fellow, Philippe is aiding in the development and promotion of the UVA Bay Game®, a revolutionary interactive game that simulates the impact of individuals and communities on the health of critical water resources.
Related Resources:
Read the press release about this announcement
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Helping to Find Cures for Childhood Cancers
World Community Grid and the Greening of Information Technology
How can information technology (IT) and data analytics help cities provide better qualities of life for their residents? Can a smarter approach to sustainability serve as a foundation to corporate social responsibility? Carnegie Mellon civil and environmental engineering professor James Garrett comments below on the connections among IT, data analytics, and building a smarter planet.
At a recent conference on computing in civil and building engineering, I made the point that the most pressing challenge for infrastructure over the coming years will be to determine more effective approaches to spending the least amount of money to deliver the highest quality services.
Consistent with IBM’s Smarter Planet vision, I see a huge role for information technology (IT) in addressing this challenge. We need to move to a model where the delivery, maintenance and management of roads, buildings, bridges, pipelines and other infrastructure is highly predictive and proactive, and where information is relatively cheap
to collect.
For example, data on the physical condition of a specific bridge can be collected from a combination of sources, including the data from vehicles that drive over them, weather databases – and any sensors on the bridge, including those used for purposes such as deicing. This data can be analyzed and interpreted, and then used to understand the current state of the specific bridge in addition to the trends and true causes of accelerated deterioration of that bridge.
This analysis will lead to a better understanding of how, how fast, and for what reasons a bridge is deteriorating, and will much better inform agencies about what actions to take.
It will also inform future design cycles and thus avoid similar problems.
Actual data could make it much easier to increase public support for more governmental funding for maintenance and upkeep. Until we make our processes for assessing and maintaining our infrastructure more rational and effective, it will be difficult to make the case to the public that they should allocate more money for repairs and improvements.
The Role of Technology
Our biggest challenge related to the role of IT is building predictive models of the usage, condition and trends of our infrastructure. IT can be based on extremely large quantities of actual data captured – or soon to be captured – from the thousands of infrastructure systems currently in use. However, drowning our infrastructure providers in data will make matters much worse than better. If they are not provided high-quality information and models of the current and future condition of their infrastructure systems – whether pipe networks, road networks, or bridges, fused from the many different sources of collected data in order to help them make decisions – they might as well not have the collected data in the first place.
Instead, we need data-driven, intelligent and automatic decision support tools that help highway departments, water authorities and other infrastructure service providers make the best use of every dollar they spend. In other words, such a system will make the management and operation of our infrastructure much more sustainable.
As engineers, we still face many challenges in our attempts to move toward this envisioned support for infrastructure providers. When it comes to maintaining our infrastructure, we cannot afford to continue business as usual. This has been made clear by continued infrastructure deterioration despite extremely large amounts of funding dedicated to its upkeep. Replacement without concurrent commitment to changing the management process is a short-sighted solution. It will only push the crisis 20 years further out.
James H. Garrett Jr., Ph.D., is Thomas Lord Professor and Department Head,
Civil and Environmental Engineering, at Carnegie Mellon University, and Faculty Co-Director of the Pennsylvania Smarter Infrastructure Incubator. Dr. Garrett also consults with government agencies and private sector companies on how to use sensors, data management and modeling, and analytics and intelligent decision support to manage infrastructure systems more sustainably.
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John Lamb in
IBM Senior Information Technology Architect John Lamb, Ph.D. explains the inner workings of World Community Grid, and how it contributes to humanitarian research while helping to reduce the environmental impact of large-scale computing.
By making use of our unused compute power, World Community Grid has saved an immense amount of electrical energy and reduced the carbon footprint that would have resulted from the use of traditional High Performance Computing. World Community Grid is a significant contributor to green information technology (IT) and is a great way for anyone to be involved in green IT with the added benefit of helping to address global environmental and health concerns.
World Community Grid is based on grid computing, and like cloud computing – the subset of grid computing that includes utility computing and other approaches to sharing computing resources – is based on the concept of IT virtualization. The IT industry is on a track to use virtualization to manage the needs of IT customers in a way that helps reduce the needs for energy consumption and computer hardware. For each of its projects, World Community Grid aggregates the unused computing power of more than 200,000 donor machines around the world to form a virtual supercomputer. World Community Grid then makes its massive computing power available free of charge to humanitarian research projects – everything from the search for cures for disease to simulations that yield insights into global environmental concerns.
One of those concerns – the energy resources and carbon footprint associated with large-scale computing – is addressed directly by World Community Grid. In fact, some World Community Grid research projects are environmental in nature and are helping to reduce carbon footprint in other ways. Searching for new molecular compounds that could be used to make less expensive and more efficient solar cells is just one example.
By consolidating the unused computing power of machines that in some cases draw 30 to 40 percent of their maximum energy requirements even when idle, World Community Grid is designed to help reduce environmental impact. This is detailed by the chart below, which shows the typical utilization rates of different classes of computers – from large corporate mainframes to the Intel-based servers used for smaller computing jobs and in most PCs.
Multi-million dollar mainframes typically are utilized on a 24/7 basis at least partly because of the large financial investments they represent. Mainframe processes are typically computing intensive, and are run at all times – including nights and weekends. By contrast, smaller Intel-based servers are not typically used at night or on weekends. Therefore, creating virtual servers from underutilized Intel-based machines not only allows much better and easier sharing of resources, but also distributes utilization more evenly on the large physical machines that host virtual servers.
The PCs that supply their unused computing power to World Community Grid have similar characteristics to underutilized Intel-based servers. Most Intel-based servers are only utilized between five and 15 percent of the time, and most PCs – in terms of their true computing capacity – are utilized almost none of the time!
It is important to note that World Community Grid aggregates spare computing time unobtrusively and without substantially increasing energy consumption. Contributors to World Community Grid are not asked use their computers any differently than normal.
That is, they are not asked to run them 24/7 or prevent them from going to sleep or shutting down. In addition, World Community Grid defaults to using only 60 percent of spare computing time to use less energy. On a typical laptop computer, World Community Grid use increases power consumption by only three watts – less than an incandescent night light. Community members also can adjust the default 60 percent figure to whatever is preferred or appropriate for their hardware or software.
By making use of otherwise unused compute power, World Community Grid saves an immense amount of electrical energy and reduces the carbon footprint typically associated with High Performance Computing using supercomputers. A supercomputer, in addition to its own power consumption, needs a very large additional amount of power for cooling. World Community Grid avoids this issue since participating machines are usually single units that do not substantially increase the heat in their environments. Thus, running a research project on World Community Grid typically requires much smaller energy expenditure than running the same project on a supercomputer.
All of these factors enable World Community Grid to make significant contributions to green IT. As one of the hundreds of thousands of contributors to World Community Grid, I am proud to help support vital humanitarian research while helping to bring about the greening
of IT.
John Lamb is a Senior Technical Staff Member and Senior Certified IT Architect for IBM. Dr. Lamb is the author of The Greening of IT: How Companies Can Make a Difference for the Environment (2009).
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Posted by
Donna Barlow Casey in
Centennial Grants support projects that apply IBM’s smarter planet strategies to community service, and can become a model for similar volunteer engagements elsewhere. IBM has awarded 11 Centennial Grants of up to $100,000 each, totaling nearly $1 million worldwide. The grants fund innovative projects developed by IBM volunteers in areas such as healthcare, energy conservation and food safety.
On a blustery December morning in Randolph Center, Vermont, the faculty, staff, and students of Vermont Technical College found themselves in a clamorous game of Jeopardy! with only one category of questions: Energy. Janette Bombardier – the Senior Location Executive for IBM’s Essex, Vermont facility – had whipped the audience into a frenzy of enthusiasm (both in-person and via live video feed to six other Vermont Tech locations) as answers were yelled out and prizes were distributed. Working with IBM on a project funded by an IBM Centennial Grant, Vermont Tech had just committed to reducing its 2012 electrical consumption by 5 percent – an amount roughly equal to 250,000 kilowatts and $25,000 in costs.
Senior Location Executive Janette Bombardier Leads the Jeopardy! Round
Vermont Tech’s Center for Sustainable Practices is championing the project, which is a collaboration between IBM and the Vermont State College system. The “Managing Energy – Sustaining Our Community” Centennial Grant will provide funding to Vermont Tech to implement the most promising energy-saving ideas identified through a campus-wide initiative, and for monitoring campus energy use to help meet the 5 percent reduction goal.
On that December day, the college announced a faculty mini-grant program to encourage curriculum alterations focused on data analytics and energy reduction. Vermont Tech also announced the state college system’s first Green Revolving Fund. With seed money from the IBM Centennial Grant, the fund will support energy-efficiency projects developed by students, with cost savings recycled into the fund to perpetuate its legacy.
At the end of the day, participants were urged to spread the word and to submit their energy use reduction suggestions to a special email account. The first 100 people to submit ideas will receive prizes provided by IBM and Efficiency Vermont – a nonprofit operated by the Vermont Energy Investment Corporation. Those ideas will be evaluated based on projected return on investment, and then implemented to help Vermont Tech meet its 5% energy reduction challenge.
Stay tuned for a report on our progress!
Donna Barlow Casey is Director of the Academic Center for Sustainable Practices (CSP) at Vermont Technical College. As the first full-time CSP director at the state’s only technical college, Ms. Casey is charged with applying green technologies and sustainable practices to educational, operational, student- and community-focused efforts to develop a vibrant, green economy in Vermont.
Related Article:
Flipping the Smart Grid Switch in Vermont
Read more about IBM Centennial Grants in Vermont:
IBM awards more than $500,000 in grants to Vermont community organizations
IBM awards grants to more than 100 nonprofits and schools in Vermont
Posted by
Mark Wakefield in
We who are increasingly preoccupied with maintaining our energy supplies may not appreciate that the luxuries of indoor cooking or lighting after dark remain dreams for billions of people around the world. Closer to home, our abundant energy may remain out of reach for the elderly on fixed incomes who must sometimes choose between food and heat. That’s why I was inspired after attending the IBM Start Sustainability Summit at Lancaster House last year, and have been heartened by our recent Smarter Cities Challenge engagement to help end fuel poverty in Glasgow.
The Start Sustainability Summit – a nine-day brainstorm on social, economic, and environmental sustainability – produced the idea of providing universal access to affordable and sustainable energy. The idea was put into action earlier this month with the announcement of Energy Aid, a new global charity with a mission to provide sustainable energy for those who have limited or no access for heating, lighting, cooking, communications and mechanical work.
Not having basic access to energy is profoundly limiting in many ways. Lack of access to energy limits the quality and duration of life. And while it diminishes the chances for economic prosperity, lack of access to energy – perhaps surprisingly – also damages the environment. As families scramble to find ways to cook their food, they diminish their available energy sources – depleting bio matter faster than it can regenerate, and driving large-scale deforestation and environmental degradation. It’s unsustainable.
People from IBM, Practical Action, the London School of Economics and Political Science and other organisations are working hard to create the infrastructure needed to sustain Energy Aid, and the results of their work will become clear in 2012. But for Energy Aid to succeed, it will need both financial and ideological support. That’s why when I talk to groups of school and college students about the importance of studying science, maths, engineering, and technology, I remind them of the importance of applying their skills. Simply being a brilliant mathematician or engineer is not enough to help solve the problems of today’s world. You must transform your ideas into action.
Building a Smarter Planet is a great idea, but it’s even better when that idea becomes a reality.
For the second consecutive time, FORTUNE magazine has named IBM as the #1 Global Company for Leaders. As part of our series on IBM Leadership, Vice President for Government Industry Strategy & Solutions Sharon Nunes comments on entrepreneurship and the global enterprise.
It bothers me when I hear people say that entrepreneurship is only valued at small companies. It’s simply not true. Just take a look at IBM’s CEO Study, where more than 1,500 CEOs said that creativity is helping navigate today’s volatile and complex business environment.
Granted, you need creativity to be a successful entrepreneur – from how you run a business with limited resources, to how you think about starting a new line of business or creating a new market. But creative instincts are not enough – entrepreneurship requires more than vision, a business plan, and funding. It also takes leadership and due diligence.
Five years ago, when I looked into starting up a “smart” water management business at IBM, very few around me imagined that our company would go in that direction. There was no ecosystem to plug into, because the market for these smart systems barely existed. So I began learning about the market and competition. Conversations with academics and city managers helped me understand what the technology play for water management systems would look like. IBM’s water business went on to be a strategic part of the company’s Smarter Cities global initiative.
This “internal start-up” process taught me leadership lessons that I think could help like-minded entrepreneurs at big companies, whether they are heading up a project, starting a product line, or jump-starting a new business unit. For example:
Strive for first-mover advantage
Being an entrepreneur takes energy and a lot of homework. You need to research industry developments and demographic trends because the market, and society, are always changing. It’s important to understand what the market is doing and what events are influencing it. That will give you insight into business needs and how the market is responding so you can shape it.
Just think about social media. It took less than a year for it to morph from a way to communicate with friends and colleagues into a critical tool for chief marketing officers in just about every industry. Organizations that anticipated and responded to these trends were the first to capture the benefits and new business opportunities that social media provides.
As Wayne Gretzky famously said, “A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.”
Stay away from sycophants
The last thing you want is to operate in an echo chamber of consensus. It’s helpful to vet ideas with two or three people who don’t think like you and who will be brutally honest. It’s also a good way to build a network of allies. If you can convince skeptics, they will become your most loyal advocates and help sell your idea through their own internal networks. They will also press you to answer difficult questions that may not have occurred to you.
Know what you don’t know
It’s important to be self-aware. If you are an idea person, surround yourself with financial and operations experts. If you are an “execution” person, seek out visionaries and market analyzers. If you are good at recognizing a big market opportunity, surround yourself with people with a deep understanding of how it will stack up against competitors and be perceived by customers. And reach across sales, marketing, and other lines of business to gain different perspectives on client needs so you have your best shot at market success.
While the safety net at a large company may be bigger than at a small firm, the challenges to entrepreneurs are quite similar. You have to be a risk-taker and believe in your gut that it is the right thing to do – but don’t ignore market signs. And remember – it takes homework, not hubris.
BOTTOM LINE: Why vision, a business plan and funding are not always enough for budding entrepreneurs. #ibmleaders
Read more about IBM Leadership:
Why IBM Is the Best Company for Leaders by Randy MacDonald, Senior Vice President, Human Resources
A Global View of Leadership Development by Stanley S. Litow, Vice President, Corporate Citizenship & Corporate Responsibility and President, IBM International Foundation
How Private-Public Partnerships Can Lead Through Innovation by Rod Adkins, Senior Vice President, Systems & Technology Group
A New Model to Cultivate Global Leaders by Tony Mwai, Country General Manager, East Africa
Leadership Must Evolve in an Interconnected World by Bridget van Kralingen, General Manager, North America
