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Innovaro Blog – Future of Innovation: Future Innovtion Bets for Ireland
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| Cool and innovation »April 22, 2009
Future Innovtion Bets for Ireland
I was back in Dublin last night giving an Innovation Leaders talk at the Dublin Institute of Technology. As one would expect conversation was lively and questions direct and in some cases provocative. We talked about everything from innovation in public sector and future of the workplace through to national innovation strategies and views on toxic asset bailouts – good or bad?
Subsequent discussions over dinner prompted another view of which countries are role models (Finland, Singapore etc) and if the Irish Government were to be bold and do what Finland did with its investment in Nokia in the last ’80s, where should it place its big bet. Referring back to previous opinions about the need for global leadership and high stickiness, the answer was unequivocal – enable the accelerated convergence of food and pharma and support development of next generation nutraceuticals in companies like Glanbia. Already a strong company in the space, focused technological support coupled with typical Irish investment could make Glanbia as major a player as Nestle and provide a significant and sustainable growth platform for the nation.
The outstanding question from dinner was however, in the current economic environment, would any politician be so bold as to place such a clear but focused bet on the future?
Posted at 04:45 PM in Core blog, Future Views | Permalink
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Résumé
Gordon Montgomery BA MSc | gordon@xovation.net | mobile: (+1) 512 299 3637Digital Strategy Consultant
profile | skills | career | education | interests | references
Availability: Negotiable
Work type: Day-rate strategic consulting Location: Austin, Texas, USA (GMT-6hrs) Date of birth: November 26, 1968 Nationality: British/Irish (Permanent U.S. resident)Goal
Consulting with innovative brands and social businesses to facilitate them in “thinking like a user” to optimize technology-mediated experiences. This strategy aims to create more value for strategic business goals and push towards shifting the clients’ current paradigm.Profile
An energetic speaker on innovation, connectivity, community and “what’s next” at conferences, workshops and smaller tailored sessions. I am passionate about helping people identify and reach their goals, through a role as ‘growth teacher’ : an energetic catalyst for change, an entrepreneur and a customer experience strategist. I am intellectually inspired by the desire to improve the ease-of-use of artefacts in human-designed environments. I have enjoyed sculpting my own path, connecting with others to form strong alliances and have decades of solid, international experience.
- A member and speaker within the Usability Professionals Association and member of the British HCI Group.
- 2000: Nominated to speak at the ASIS annual conference in 2000
- 2004: Key instigator of the 2004 accessibility initiative ErgoBoston – helping Seniors with the Internet
- 2005: Monitor and de-brief facilitator for the Knowbility Accessibility University conference
- 2005: PR/Media Chair for the Knowbility AIR-Austin event
- Annual guest lecturer for the Master course in Usability at the University of Texas School of Information
- 2006: Speaker on the Design and Social Responsibility panel during SXSW conference 2006
- 2006: Web editor for the Information Architecture Summit
- 2006: Guest editor for the second edition of Steve Krug’s book on usability: Don’t Make Me Think
- 2007: Sponsor of Austin’s first ever Penguin Day – opensource software for non-proft organizations
- 2009: Delivered the Master Course in Internet Marketing for the University of San Francisco, online
- 2009: Board member with Knowbility’s award-winning Access Works accessibility program
- 2010: Guest judge for the Destination Imagination Extreme event where students learn creative problem solving
- 2010: Recipient of a SxSW Interactive, Dewey Winburne Community Service Award
- 2010: Sponsor of Steve Guengerich‘s new book launch event at the Austin Museum Of Art
- 2010: Judge for the Digital MBA program at St Edwards University, Austin, Texas
Key Skills
- Strategic Customer Research, UX, Social Media, Usability, Information Architecture, Accessibility
- Account Management, Client Presentation, Thought Leadership
- Focus Groups, Surveys, Statistical Analysis, Heuristic Reviews, Usability Lab design and construction
- Knowledge of current web application technologies
- French fluency. Knowledge of German, Spanish, Russian, Italian, Greek.
Career
Nov 2010 – Present : Chief Strategist, Tocquigny; Austin, TX.- Agency-wide role to assist clients as they plan and organize their future business growth via thought leadership in areas such as social media, seo, paid search, user experience design, and interactive marketing.
Jun 2010 – Oct 2010 : Business Solution Strategist, Neudesic; Austin, TX.- Creating, evangelizing and selling the User Experience (ux) and technology message for strategic business innovation to key client accounts, within the Enterprise Solutions Group, nationally.
Sept 07 – June 2010 : Practice Director, Neudesic; Austin, TX.
- Co-founder of the national User Experience (UX) practice, strategic oversight for national UX sales & operations. Member of the strategic corporate leadership team.
Dec 06 – Sept 07 : User Experience Lead, Razorfish; Austin, TX.- Responsible for the entire UX process from ideation though to execution of business strategy.
- Key clients: Nokia, Dell, AT&T.
Dec 05 – Sept 07 : Executive Director, Webguides.org; Austin, TX.
- Web usability project consultancy for mission-based corporations.
May 04 – Oct 10 : International Information Design Consultant, G|META; Austin, TX.- Full project lifecycle services for International Web strategy, Information Architecture, Usability research and design.
- Key clients: PerkinElmer, SAP, The University of Texas, The State of Florida, and many others.
Aug 02 – May 04 : International Usability Manager, Staples; Boston, MA.- Full project lifecycle services for International Web strategy, Information Architecture, Usability research and design.
- Projects spanned all purchase channels: web, catalog & store.
- Designed, built and supplied input into several usability lab facilities.
- Devised simpler, faster and more effective usability methodologies, tools and reporting.
- Received an outstanding contribution award for my work on the International web site platform.
- Key clients: Staples.ca, Staples.co.uk, Staples.de, Quill.com, MAP.com, Smilemakers.com,Stapleslink.com.
May 01 – Aug 02 : Consultant, GMETA; London & Northern Ireland.
- Web & mobile strategy, usability testing, development and hosting.
- Key clients: BT Looksmart UK (Genie) – France, Germany, Netherlands; AmberLight usability consultancy; HSBC student & graduate banking services.
Mar 01 – May 01 : CIO, xtology; Florida. Somerville, MA.
- Involved at all levels of this marketing communications start-up.
- Responsible for all internal and client usability and technology development.
- Key figure in Client presentation, Project Documentation, Marketing and Branding services.
- Provided strategic web planning services to xtology’s sister online order fulfillment company.
Feb 00 – Mar 01 : Senior Information Architect, Fusive; Florida & Boston, MA.
- Determined site blueprint and user experience by translating business objectives into functional and usable requirements.
- Responsibilities included: Analyzing user scenarios and personas, researching competitive analysis, defining site interaction, architecting navigation schemas, usability testing and heuristic reviews, ensuring accessibility and documenting best practices.
- Deliverables included: wire-frames, sitemaps, content hierarchies and content matrices, usability reports as well as client presentation and strategic thought leadership.
- Key client contact for IA and e-commerce strategy issues.
- Evangelized, negotiated and helped build the corporate IA function.
- Interviewed, mentored and managed IA team staff.
- Provided input at all levels within the company to help expand the core business.
- Advocated Section 508 universal accessibility design – to give access to information for all possible users.
- Attained “employee of the month” for my management and leadership of The State of Florida Portal project.
- Consulted with The State of Florida, Texaco, Lehman Bros, TISI, Interland, Invesco, TSW, Overnite, Home Shopping Network, Southern Company, MoneySuite, AICPA.
Aug 99 – Jan 00 : Freelance Consultant.
- Private client work : strategy, usability testing and Visual Basic [VB] development.
Jan 99 – Jul 99 : International developer, NCR; London. Nice, France. Ohio.
- Performed lead information design and usability role for new Sales Force Quotation Tool.
- Developed portions of the Quotation Tool using VB 6.0.
- Coordinated fully customized MS Outlook Contacts Management System project.
Apr 96 – Sep 97 : Freelance Consultant.
Jun 97 – Sep 97 : Support and Development, Mobil Oil; London, UK.- Developed a user-centric call-logging database in Access.
- Excel VBA spreadsheet automation.
- Windows and Network: support, administration and development.
Mar 97 – Jun 97 : R&D Support, Proctor and Gamble; Brussels, Belgium.
- Developed a user-centric inventory database in Access.
- Windows and Network: support, administration and development.
Nov 96 – Mar 97 : Support, Mobil Oil; London, UK.
- Windows and Network: support, administration and development.
Apr 96 – Nov 96 : Support Team Leader, Arthur Andersen; London, UK.
- Managed Support team and acted as issue escalation point.
- Involvement in the implementation of user-centric time management and billing system.
- Instrumental in ensuring the smooth post-merger orientation of new staff.
- Windows and Network: support, administration and development.
Nov 93 – Apr 96 : Business Analyst / Developer, Skandia Life; Southampton, UK.
- Developed the first, VB-based, investments portfolio daily fund-pricing application from conception to completion.
- In-house usability testing.
- Windows and Network: support, administration and development.
- Project maintenance using MS Project.
- Facilitated European launch into Finland, Germany & France.
- Edited Corporate Management newsletter.
Education
Mar 2011 : PhD Social Psychology, Walden University Psychology, online, part-time- The goal is to research and design better ways for people and groups within our broken social systems to comprehend, communicate and collaborate.
- Walden’s Ph.D. in Psychology is one of the only course-based distance-learning programs of its kind. It follows a scholar-practitioner model that encourages the integration of scholarly research with practical expertise. Taught by respected researchers and practitioners, this Ph.D. program prepares students to make a difference in a wide variety of settings.
2002 : Northern Ireland Business Startup Programme, NIBSP; N.Ireland.- The course comprised 10 modules focusing particularly on sales and marketing, financial management, legal and statutory issues, technology and general business practices.
Sep 97 – Nov 98 : MSc Software Engineering, Napier University; Scotland.
- Courses included object-oriented software development methodology (UML), project management, hands-on programming and database development.
- I graduated in first place in Human Computer Interaction (HCI).
- My thesis was part of the Personas project for the Swedish Institute of Computer Science.
- I developed a proof-of-concept e-mail client application. This incorporated intelligent software agents based on a central user profile server. An email attachment could be automatically re-saved before sending, such that all recipients received the attachment in their desired format.
- Designed and built a Task Management database system as a project for Marconi and prototyped a tourist information kiosk for Edinburgh Waverly train station.
- I was the student spokesman for Faculty liaison.
Sep 87 – Jul 92 : BA(Hons) French with Linguistics, Southampton University; England.
- Courses included psycho- and sociolinguistics, semantics, pragmatics, syntax, phonetics, phonology, morphology; French literature, society and politics.
- This comprised an academic year at the University of Strasbourg, France and a year of Computer Science.
- I was president of the French Society which entailed Faculty-level interaction.
Sep 80 – Sep 87 : Portora Royal School; Enniskillen, Northern Ireland.
- 1987 – Advanced level subjects: French, German, Mathematics.
- 1985 – Ordinary level subjects: 10.
- School prefect, food committee liaison officer.
Interests
Ultra-distance endurance trail running, Reading, Writing, Travel, Judo, Cycling, Rugby and “Technology as a tool for social advancement”.Board member for information design, with trail running club hctr.net, 2010
Volunteer organiser with Tsunami Volunteer in Khao Lak, Thailand.
Volunteer organiser with ONE.org, the global campaign to Make Poverty History.
Volunteer organiser with Katrina Support (Austin), post-hurricane relief services.
Volunteer with the City of Austin Community Emergency Response Team, FEMA-trained for community disaster management.References
Margie Schneider
Vice President, tengoldenrules.com -
Xovate :: help others. be brilliant.
Strategic business & social innovation consulting focuses on pulling ideas into an organization and then forcing the resultant creation back out on the public at a cost that ensures only the corporation profits. Xovation sets about to alter that paradigm forever. We believe that all the parts of the solution already exist and just need to be re-connected.We focus on our broken social systems, ensuring we all profit:- Healthcare (access to support when you need it)
- Education (access to the future because we need it)
- Lifestyle (choices)
- Prosperity (the end of poverty)
- Environment (there’s no green without the blue oceans)
- Religion (spirituality and coexistence)
You can contact us easily via: (512) 299 3637 or gordon@xovation.net
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The meaning of life
Passion AND Purpose….perhaps? Here are some “memes” to consider:
- What will be on your epitaph?
- Connecting with others – how and why?
- Reality shocks – are we all in a state of shock right now?
- The supple bend in the strong wind – only the flexible will survive
- Multi-threading existence – now many threads…strands…personas could/should we persist?
- Make and mind the gaps – it’s the space between “the stuff of life” that builds reality not the stuff itself
- Only do what you do best and enjoy, but do it better and more often
People to read:
Po Bronson Tony Robbins Dr Wayne Dyer In the wider world of religion The purposes of a Hindu’s life are Dharma, Artha, Kharma, and Moksha.
- Dharma is the fulfillment of one’s purpose;
- Artha is prosperity.
- Kharma is desire and enjoyment and
- Moksha is of course, enlightenment.
Buddhism talks of The Noble Eightfold Path
In order to fully understand the noble truths and investigate whether they were in fact true, Buddha recommended that a certain lifestyle or path be followed which consists of:
1. Right Understanding
2. Right Thought
3. Right Speech
4. Right Action
5. Right Livelihood
6. Right Effort
7. Right Mindfulness
8. Right Concentration
Sometimes in the Pali Canon the Eightfold Path is spoken of as being a progressive series of stages which the practitioner moves through, the culmination of one leading to the beginning of another, but it is more usual to view the stages of the ‘Path’ as requiring simultaneous development.
The Eightfold Path essentially consists of meditation, following the precepts, and cultivating the positive converse of the precepts (e.g. benefiting living beings is the converse of the first precept of harmlessness). The Path may also be thought of as a the way of developing ala, meaning mental and moral discipline.
In tougher times, do we need to dig deeper into “meaning”?
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