AI or Human

Can machines think? Can a machine exhibit conversational behavior indistinguishable from a human. It's been predicted that by the year 2000, an average human would have less than a 70% chance of distinguishing an AI from a human in an imitation game where who is responding—a human or an AI—is hidden from the evaluator.

Why haven’t we as an industry been able to achieve that goal, 20 years past that mark? I believe the goal put forth is not a useful one for AI scientists to work toward. With AI now ubiquitously integrated into our phones, cars, and homes, it’s become increasingly obvious that people care much more that their interactions with machines be useful, seamless and transparent—and that the concept of machines being indistinguishable from a human is out of touch. Therefore, it is time to retire the idea that has served as an inspiration for decades, and set a new challenge that inspires researchers and practitioners equally.

Donald Hjelm - Enterprise Transparency

During the past few years, enterprises have been embracing transparency at all levels, from the C-suite down. However, despite taking important and, in some cases, impressive steps forward, many of these enterprises continue to face obstacles.

Why the roadblocks? Many enterprises are still talking about transparency, rather than exercising transparency. What is the difference? Enterprises that talk about transparency are obligated to continuously “push” transparency into their activities, functions, processes and policies -- because they know if they stop, then eventually so does the transparency. This “applied transparency” is the kind that enterprises can rent, but never own.

However, leaders within enterprises that exercise transparency do not feel the need to “force feed” transparency to employees. This is because transparency is embedded within the fabric of their culture. They own it.  As such, they unleash transparency from within to qualitatively and quantitatively improve employee engagement, workflow management, communication and collaboration, customer support and development, program and project governance, and more.  

Rather than confining key information (e.g. organizational goals, performance metrics, resource utilization plans, etc.) to a small circle of executives, transparent enterprises are marked by democratic information sharing. As such, these companies drive participation and engagement at all levels, leveraging 100 percent of their knowledge capital to make better decisions.

Instead of directing employees to perform tasks and then shielding them -- either by design or default -- from the effects of their efforts, transparent enterprises let employees see how their contribution fits the bigger picture. Why? Because they grasp that aligning input with impact is the smartest way to drive employee investment, which is not just the basis for growth: On a competitive landscape where talent is often more valuable the capital, it is critical for survival.

Transparent enterprises do not restrict innovation to the context of product, service or process development. Rather, much like transparency itself, they view innovation organically as well as functionally. To that end, they empower employees at all levels to innovate how the enterprise sells, markets, supports, develops, communicates and generates feedback.

Evolving into a transparent enterprise requires leaders to have knowledge and insight to make the right technology investments. More importantly, leaders must commit to changing their organizational structure from one that is hierarchical and centralized to one that is flatter and more democratic.

While there may be some growing pains associated with this shift, the effort is both worthwhile and necessary. In 2015, transparency is a “must” for an enterprise to achieve participation, alignment and awareness and to succeed as a democratic, forward-looking company.

Donald Hjelm - Bot Visits

A recent study found that not only do the number of bots (automated applications that crawl and scan websites) on the Internet outnumber human visitors, but smaller websites actually receive a disproportionately higher percentage of automated bot visitors -- up to 80 percent of all traffic on sites with fewer than 1,000 visitors a day. Malicious bots probe sites for vulnerabilities, effectively automating web hacking.

The rise of automation has broadened the scope of attacks, making small businesses just as vulnerable as Home Depot or Target. Today, all online businesses are at risk. You don’t have to be a Fortune 500 company to protect your business and customers from malfeasance. The following are simple measures any business owner can take to thwart attacks and prevent breach.

 Mind the gaps

Vulnerabilities are just that: exploitable weaknesses that allow attackers to penetrate systems. Fortunately, many of these vulnerabilities are well known and easy to patch. Specifically, there are two vulnerabilities all e-commerce business owners should be aware of: SQL and Cross Site Scripting (XXS).

Many sites, based on how their e-commerce application was built, are vulnerable to SQL injection attacks. Criminals probe web applications with SQL queries to try to extract information from the e-commerce database.

Cross Site Scripting attacks can occur when applications take untrusted data from users and send it to web browsers without properly validating or “treating” that data to ensure it isn’t malicious. XSS can be used to take over user accounts, change website content or redirect visitors to malicious websites without their knowledge.

Because attacks on these vulnerabilities are directed at web application, a web application firewall (WAF) very effective in preventing them.

 Denial of service

Some criminals are taking a brute force approach and flooding websites with traffic to take them offline -- called a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack. For e-commerce sites, a DDoS attack has a direct impact on revenue. A single DDoS can cost more than $400,000, with some sources reporting costs of up to $40,000 per hour. With attacks ranging from mere hours to several days, no business can afford the risk of a DDoS attack.

Often times these attacks are accompanied by a ransom note demanding funds to stop the DDoS attack; other times the attack is merely a smokescreen, giving hackers time to probe the site for vulnerabilities.

In either case, rather than fall prey to extortionists, e-commerce sites should enlist DDoS protection to detect and mitigate the attack before it impacts their bottom line. DDoS protection is often available from hosting providers, so small businesses can ask their website hoster for options.

 Two-factor authentication

Stolen or compromised user credentials are a common cause of breaches. eBay reported that cyber attackers compromised a small number of employee log-in credentials, allowing unauthorized access to eBay's corporate network. Criminals use social engineering, phishing, malware and other means to guess or capture usernames and passwords. In other cases, attackers target administrators, whom they discover on social networks, using spear phishing attacks to obtain sensitive data.

Stopping this problem is as simple as implementing two-factor authentication. This second factor is usually a code generated via an app or received via text on a phone owned by the user. Two-factor authentication has been around for a while, but just as better smartphone cameras opened up a whole new market of photo editing and sharing applications, so too has the escalation in breaches increased the number of options for two-factor authentication.

Today, there are a number of great two-factor authentication solutions that are both easier to use and very effective at keeping hackers out. Many are free, including Google Authenticator, and are packaged as handy apps on smartphones. With the increasing risk of breach, it’s more important than ever that any application dealing with customer data be protected by two-factor authentication.

 Scan your site

Web scanners are an important tool for detecting the SQL injection vulnerabilities and XSS mentioned above, as well as a host of other vulnerabilities. Information from these scanners can be used to assess the security posture of an e-commerce website, providing insights for engineers on how to remediate vulnerabilities at the code level or tune a WAF to protect against the specific vulnerabilities.

However, in order to be effective, businesses need to use them regularly. It’s important to subscribe to a service that scans on a periodic basis -- not every three years.

 Know your vendors

Third party providers -- hosters, payment processors, call centers, shredders -- have a significant impact on breach likelihood and scope. You wouldn’t trust your money to a bank without rigorous, proven security measures in place. Nor should you trust a software vendor without security practices in place.

When seeking new providers, make sure they're compliant with security best practices like the Payment Card Industry’s Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS) and cloud-security certification SSAE16. Don’t be intimidated to ask cloud software vendors how they’re managing security and what certifications they have. If they have none, you should think twice about working with them.

Don’t overlook this. No matter how good the product, if the software introduces risk to your business, it’s not worth it.

Today the risk of data breach is greater than ever, for large and small businesses alike. But security does not have to be complicated. By using the right tools, partnering with the right vendors and implementing safeguards, online businesses can reduce risk.

UX Transitioning to CX

User experience (UX) is a mature enough discipline that most medium-to-large companies invest in it as a valuable in-house capability. But the emerging field of customer experience (CX) is still new enough that most companies are grappling with how to develop the organizational capability to deliver it well.

The problem is that while there is a growing urgency about making good customer experience everyone’s responsibility, nobody actually has the responsibility to do that.

Improving CX capability, then, is important, and it requires two big changes. The first is a move into service design. The second, harder, change is governance at a high-enough level in the organization to manage this move well. Customer experience depends on people from many areas of a company who are typically siloed off from one other.

We see a number of traditional UX consultancies positioning their work to incorporate CX. But is this just a renaming, or the evolution of UX, or is there more to this transition? Many of the essential practices of UX work can support the development of great, holistic customer experiences, but the methods and approaches to frame the objectives here differ substantially between the two fields.

UX designers are well equipped for CX work

Both fields practice human-centered design. Both seek to understand people deeply, to develop insights about the ideal-use cases and to describe the experience of the user (as opposed to the functioning of the system).

Almost inevitably, there will be digital interfaces as essential parts of a service system. These may be self-service tools for customers, software for frontline employees or an underlying platform that serves both customers and staff. There are few service experiences these days that don’t rely on good UX work. So, it makes sense that the line that divides the two disciplines is blurry.

That's reason enough for this new field of CX to be full of UX practitioners. Afterall, we UX people have most of the necessary skills.

But not all.

The difference is one of scale. You’re not designing a thing. You’re trying to design what happens as a result of many things you directly designed, which is very different from UX. UX is bound technically by a clear and limited use case: It always involves someone interacting with a device.

Service experiences, however, are broad and ephemeral. They happen in time, and might involve the design of spaces as well as spontaneous interactions between people. UX work is often focused on optimizing something that has already been defined, not necessarily generating something new.

Unlearning some UX practices 

The biggest change for me personally in making this transition has been in the approach to quality. The definition of a great service depends on whether it is an open or closed system. Most digital systems are closed. Software should work the same every time. For software, improving quality means fewer deviations from how things should be.

But for open-service systems, standardization can set the bar for quality at only a mediocre level. A standard for consistency defines the floor, the lowest level of acceptable service. To deliver great service, people need to be themselves, and represent their organization with good judgment and real agency. That will inevitably be delivered with a lot of variability.

Designing for unanticipated-use cases, then, is the unique challenge of CX work.

Some unlearning is just the recognition of your frame of reference: Starting from the vantage point of digital experiences can cause us to predetermine the solution. This is the old “When you’re holding a hammer everything looks like a nail” problem. Beware of bias toward what we do well. Many UX firms make great software, but CX solutions are likely bigger than that.

New methods and priorities

An early prototype of a total customer experience is a bold act of make-believe. Designers play the part of front-line or call-center employees, to deliver the entire service and test it. Customers should judge the customer service portrayed as though it were a real thing in the world. 

The goal is to have the most polished-seeming presentation of the service to customers with the most jerry-rigged, expedient hacks running the back-of-house.

Prototypes are enacted performances. They teach us how to prepare for contingencies and show us a range of scenarios, so we are ready for the new ones. They help us outline formal training, as well as design the “stuff” that helps us be ourselves in character. This is the stuff that in a theater would be production design and costumes, designed as much for the actors as for the audience.

Designing social interactions. You know, among people.

In doing CX, we also need to understand more broadly the nature of “jobs to be done” in the system, and assign them optimally, between people and technology. Everyone is familiar with a UX experience where they just want to deal with a person, but increasingly our dealings with people feel like bad human-computer interactions.

For example, if the person at the call center must obey a decision tree and follow a script with no personal discretion, then his or her humanity is wasted; it’s not an asset. 

Better data is crucial to this process. The sharing of data is what companies want, so they will make fewer mistaken assumptions about you. Communications in this digital age are not as personalized as we had hoped they would be by now; they're just targeted, in precise and arbitrary ways. Not personal at all.

But service is nothing if not personal. It’s not the same thing as digital self-service. The question for a purely digital designer is, “How can I leverage this device to create the best overall experience for my customer?”

In CX, in contrast, the question is, “What can we do to build the best possible relationship between customers and our company?”

Open Source Technology

As a techpreneur, you always have questions to answer. It can all feel pretty overwhelming, but luckily, there’s a fantastic resource you can use to solve an abundance of entrepreneurial problems: open-source technology.

It all began in the '90s when there was a big push to create operating systems to make using new computer technology more efficient. Companies saw the value in these operating systems and acquired creators such as Linux to write the code.

Then, when the code was written, databases were created to store the information that was relevant to the company. Finally, the era of applications that execute functions within an operating system began, which brings us to open-source software.

Open-source software allows you to customize applications to suit your business’s needs. Companies can take a developer’s open-source environment and build on top of existing platforms to create a customized solution at a relatively low cost.

Gauging open-source software. With 80% of companies in non-technical segments adopting open-source software, it’s pretty clear that it can be leveraged to benefit your business. However, as with any new technology, you should always understand the pros and cons of utilizing it before making any decisions.

A big advantage of open-source software is that it reduces supplier risk. But with open-source software, your customers know that your product and community will endure.

What’s more, open-source software saves you money because many are entirely free.

Not only is open-source software free, but it’s also readily available. This may seem like a good thing, but remember the code is available to everyone, your competitors included. Economically, however, it’s still a better choice, and it’s just as effective as the licensed software that costs an arm and a leg.

Lastly, like anything in business, you need the right people. If you’re going to leverage open-source software, you need team members who really know how to use it and understand your business’s needs. If you don’t have the right people to customize and build on open-source tech, you’ll simply be moving in circles.

Which path will you choose? After you’ve looked at the pros and cons, you have to decide how you’re going to leverage this great resource -- and don’t be afraid to get creative.

1. Open-source tech can be used to help you execute what you already do and assist your preset processes to become more efficient as a whole. Think of it like using an HR or customer-relationship management system to better manage the company structure you already have in place.

2. You can also use open-source tech as a foundation for building your own apps or creating a new product. This allows you to make money off of existing tech by using open source as a key ingredient with which to build a software model. A word of caution, though: Using open source as a business model only works if you keep building and adapting the tech.

Whether you use open source as an enabler or a business model, it’s a gift. Use open source to differentiate your business or simply to get your business up and running quickly from a relatively advanced stage.

Disruptive Technology Requires a Change-Centric Culture

Organizations face a constant barrage of change, whether they’re grappling with shape-shifting technology, avalanches of data, or the relentless demands of global integration. It’s no wonder that this constant fire drill makes it difficult for even the most forward-thinking companies to manage the constant pace of change, let alone think strategically about it.

Yet, being able to anticipate and make the most of these disruptions is what distinguishes market leaders from followers. How do organizations compete--and even thrive--in a world where the business of business keeps shifting? How do you make change work, when the work keeps changing?

We learned that the organizations that make the most of disruption are embracing three critical building blocks:

1. LEAD AT ALL LEVELS

Why do most companies struggle to manage change successfully? Because they don’t cultivate a change-centric culture.

Change has to start at the top, and it needs to include the entire organization.

Whether it is top or middle management, change must become a personal responsibility. Change-leadership activities and skill building need to be included in personal goals.

Companies that harness disruption also consistently engage employees communication channels and collaborate.

Finally, they recruit emerging internal leaders. These new leaders, with their collaborative networks, can have thousands of followers internally, giving them more influence over employees than many top managers.

2. MAKE CHANGE MATTER

It’s crucial to create a clear vision of the importance of change within an organization. Yet, 87% organizations say not enough focus is put on change management in critical projects. And most invest only 5% or less of total budgets in change management activities.

Study respondents point to five barriers that create a discrepancy between the financial resources allocated and those needed, ranging from a lack of understanding of the benefits of change management to little understanding of how change management roles relate to one another.

It is critical that top managers establish the right organizational context by making change a priority. They must create this vision, reinforce the benefits, and inject change management into the corporate culture.

3. BUILD THE MUSCLE

The accelerating pace of disruption is accompanied by difficulties to keep up with shortage of resources, process changes, and IT. It's the job of change professionals to manage and direct highly skilled, enterprise-wide resources to mitigate these risks.

But the demand for change capabilities is outpacing the efforts by organizations to address it. Most companies report that the average amount of in-house change management experience is six years or less. Companies need to attract, retain, and develop change professionals and build up internal knowledge and skills. They can’t wait to address these needs by reinventing activities and roles on a project-by-project basis.

Change leaders know this. They’re formalizing change expertise and systematically building enterprise-wide change capabilities.

Disruption today is a constant. Despite the fact that many companies have solid know-how in making change work, they haven’t gotten better at actively managing it. By understanding the gap between themselves and change leaders, they can start to close it.

Set Brilyuhnt Goals

It’s a commonly accepted sentiment that setting goals will lead you to success.

Many of us believe life will be better by reaching those goals, so we make our plans, put our nose to the grindstone, and work our butts off until we’re there.

Many high achievers I’ve worked with over the years reach their goals, but they end up missing their lives in the process--and not in a trivial “I’m-working-too-hard-to-have-friends” kind of way.

No, they reach their goals and discover they were the wrong goals and the wrong path to get there. No one taught them how to set goals that would give them the life and the career they wanted.

Here’s how to set the right goals for the life you actually want:

1. STOP SETTING GOALS FOR THE WRONG REASON

The first step to setting goals that will bring you an awesome life is to stop setting goals that won't.

Most goals are about a destination. “I want a million dollars.” “I want enlightenment.” “I want a truck.” If you tend to set your goals based on the destination, and don’t consider the journey, try switching it around.

2. CHOOSE A GOAL TO CREATE A JOURNEY

Instead of setting life goals, think about setting a life direction. Figure out the things that would create a fun, meaningful, compelling journey.

Ask yourself:

1. How do I want to spend my time?
2. What daily activities make me want to leap out of bed?
3. What do I want to learn?
4. Who do I want to hang out with? Talk with? Collaborate with?

Now set your goal. Choose one that will create the journey you just designed.

In fact, the specific goal you set is almost arbitrary--it’s simply setting a direction so the pursuit itself gives you the life that you want. With the right journey, it won’t even matter if you reach your goal.

For example, Chris, a mid-career finance executive, had an original life goal of making a small fortune. That goal led to an education in securities and securities law, a life of financial analysis on Wall Street, and a community of financial professionals. Despite the money, Chris feels like life is slipping by in a gray fog.

Any number of goals could send Chris on a different journey. Here are his answers to the above questions:

1. How do I want to spend my time? “Helping people.”
2. What activities make me want to leap out of bed? “Problem solving, using my body, and public speaking.”
3. What do I want to learn? “History, anthropology, and urban design.”
4. Who do I want to hang out with? ”Creative, ambitious, motivated people who expose me to new ways of thinking and challenge my assumptions.”

Many possible goals can bring about this journey for Chris. He could help an immigrant neighborhood plan annual events to preserve its cultural identity; work on designing his city’s response plan for weather emergencies; or champion a real estate development in a historic section of town.

These goals are wildly different from one another, but what they all share is that the journey to reach them will motivate the activities, learning, and community that Chris really wants out of life.

3. IF THE GOAL DOESN’T WORK, CHANGE IT

As you can see, the goal is really just a way of making sure we take a meaningful journey. Some journeys are so much fun, people stay on them forever. My friends that work in the tennis industry often say, “Why would I retire? What I do isn’t work; it’s pure fun!”

But if your job involves staring at a screen and filing TPS reports, you may not share that sentiment. As much press as persistence gets, keep in mind that you can always change your direction. Your goal is there to shape your life in a way that delights you, not enslaves you. If the pursuit of the goal is draining your life, then why keep it?

We adopt goals for one reason and one reason only: to change our lives. Rather than adopting a goal you hope will change your life once you reach it, do it the other way around. Choose the journey that for you would be awesome--the activities, personal growth, and friends. Then choose a goal that acts as a compass to give you that life as part of the journey.

And if you ever feel your direction needs changing, change goals. Because it’s not about where you end up, it’s about the life you live on the way. Your life is too precious to settle for less than extraordinary