Blog Assignment #8-Collaboration in the Real World for Higher Education

Collaborating in the Real World for Higher Education is a great perspective and title for the speech that was giving by Dr. Brad Wheeler. Collaboration is always best because it brings minds together to produce the best product. Two minds are always better than one is what people say.

Brad Wheeler who is the CIO and VP of Information Technology at Indiana University main goal in the speech was to get across the importance of collaboration and the importance the developing and implementing new information systems is going to have on the future. From a solutions perspective technology is becoming the answer more and more in today's society but its going to take a collaborative effort from individuals in order to make that happen, and that is one of the main points that Brad Wheeler is trying to get across. Dr. Wheeler also stressed that Project work is most likely a collaborative effort and working with others is always a positive thing because you learn your strengths in a group and your weaknesses, which strengthens your knowledge level and increases your Education.

Blog Assignment #7-Neural Network Applications

Creating Inspired Creative Intelligence

Watch this short video Creating Inspired Collective Intelligence  Describe its main message and discuss the lessons that can be learned. 

There is a difference between an inspired organization and one that is simply good enough, what separates a company or organization from being good and great is sometimes referred to as the margin of difference. This margin of difference is what takes a company from meeting expectations to exceeding expectations. It's the little things that take anything not just a company from being good to great. That applies in everyday life as well, but from business aspect going the extra mile results in receiving an extra mile down the line.

In the video they discussed the margin of difference and ways to create an inspired collective intelligence. "Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it" was one thing that stuck out to me in the video. This statement stuck out to me because it basically says anything is possible but in order to obtain your dreams you have to start first. No process can be completed without starting. The video gives many valuable lessons on the margin of difference. The thing that I learned is that in order to be great you have to go above and beyond to receive above and beyond results, but the most important part of all is just starting. If there is something out there that you want, then go and get it! It's up to you to make your dreams a reality.

Blog Assignment #5 - Collaboration and Collective Intelligence

Blog Assignment #5 (Due 4:00 pm Oct 20): Watch this video on collaboration and collective intelligence . Post a blog to summarize the key points your learn from the speakers.

I was very intrigued by the MIT video. The video discuss many key points surrounding collaboration and collective intelligence. One of the most common ways of collaborating these days is through social networking. That is one of the key points that come up in the video. Social Networking has become the new marketing scheme for a lot of companies and its taking the internet world by storm. In the video they discussed that people are providing their personal information and they are what is making the website popular but they are not seeing any of the profit. The idea that social networking should operate as non profit was also a issue that was brought up.

Another key point that was discussed was the virtual world of Second Life and how this is used in the corporate world. I know of companies who hold meeting inside of Second Life, which is odd but it’s another form of social networking and virtual gaming combined that show collaboration and Collective Intelligence. All in all I believe that Social Networking is a new phase that it here to stay because it is fueled by the youth, and its forever changing. Whenever Twitter or Facebook dies down as MySpace has now the next big thing will take over.

Blog Assignment #5 - Tony Hsieh

Talk about what you see and how you feel about the speech by relating to knowledge, experience, trust, learning, innovation, increasing returns, and competitive advantage.

The speech by Tony Hsieh was one of those moments where you really wish you were there. The knowledge and outlook on business that Tony has is incredible and one would love to have a sit down with him and just pick his brain because the knowledge he posses is priceless. From a knowledge standpoint Tony instructs you on the keys to a successful business. You don’t always want to go with what is cost efficient but you should strive for the best. Whether that means running your warehouse 24 hours a day to ensure the best customer service or weeding out the bad apples of employees by offering them a thousand dollars to quit, just to see if they are truly dedicated to a long term career. In order to have a good group of employees you have to build relationships with those employees and have a mutual trust. They trust you to continue to put them in the best situation to succeed and you trust them to continue to strive for excellence, so finding the bad apples is always better to do earlier than later. The mind and approach that Tony Hsieh has towards business is incredible and I'm glad I had the chance to hear some of his business tactics.

The speech in itself provides you with great insight into the mind of a great CEO, and he gives you years of experience that he has all in 55 minutes. The approach that Tony has is a great and new innovative approach to business. He's maximizing a quality product and quality service which is the best way to increase return. If you put a quality product on the market with great people to sell it, profit will take care of itself. This creates a competitive advantage for his company because he's selling a quality product at a reasonable price with sales reps that genially care about your customer satisfaction. You can’t really beat that.

Tony Hsieh's story is amazing because you can directly relate to it. Tony Hsieh started his journey to entrepreneurship by selling pizza's in his dorm room and now the CEO of Zappos. Zappos sells mostly shoes and other appeal online and has become one of the biggest online vendors to date. In listening to the interview you can really see that Tony Hsieh genuinely cares about his company and he is really selective of who he lets into his company as well as the product that he lets leave his company. Tony Hsieh's approach to running a business is astonishing and he has many different tactics and methods to ensure customer satisfaction and maximize the potential of his employees. I admire Tony Hsieh not only as a CEO but as a person as well.

Blog Assignment #4 - Improving Healthcare

Imagine walking into a gigantic safe filled with currency that totaled seven hundred billion dollars. You look around in amazement because you have never seen this much money in your life. Next they bring in a shredder and a dumpster, and they tell you that they want you to dispose of every single dollar. As you watch each dollar shredded and thrown away you are getting a dose of what the medical system experiences every year. Seven hundred billion dollars is an estimate of how much money is wasted each year in the medical system. Due to unnecessary treatments, redundant tests, fraud, errors, and a slew of other things large sums of money are wasted each year. How can this be fixed? What systems need to be implemented or modified in order ensure money is not being wasted because of he medical system? IT and Knowledge management can directly affect and change things around in the medical system.

One of the biggest reasons that money is wasted in the medical system is fraud. An easy fix for this is to strengthen the security on insurance information as well as have a more detailed process for checking into medical institutions. Nobody wants to fill out papers all day which is where IT comes into place. Medical institutions can incorporate a new system in where you fill out generic information such as patients name and insurance carriers online prior to your visit. This will shorten the wait time for patients as well as give the medical institutions a chance to review the patient and their insurance information prior to visits to avoid fraud. Knowledge Management also comes into play. Not having properly trained staff members have lead to unnecessary treatments, and if someone is treated with the wrong treatment you have to go back and correct that which is a waste of money, also in some cases there are redundant test. This can be easily fixed with more extensive training and hands on practice. This way IT and Knowledge management can be incorporated together to solve this problem. Medical Institutions can implement an online simulator that puts their staff in real life situations in which they have to think on their feet. 700 billion dollars is a lot of debt so these small changes won’t make up for all of that but its surely a start.

Blog Assignment #3 - Composing a Career and Life

Linda Mason's story is very relatable and inspiring. We all would like to help out those in need but how many of us actually do it? Linda faced road blocks and detours in her planned career in management because she wanted to see change.  Linda left Yale in 1979, which is one of the most prestigious Universities in the United States to work in Cambodian refugee camps. She only worked for a year but she felt a void in her life and the perfect chance to help with change came knocking at her door. The opportunity was "Save the Children" and a famine that swept Western Sudan.

Linda's story is inspiring to me because she went after what she had a passion and a love for which was helping people. When choosing a career I feel that most people go for money instead of what they actually love. Linda chose to continue to help people instead of corporate America because that's what she had a genuine love for which is always more important in my opinion. One of the things that she said that stuck with me is “Discover your passions, and combine them with your skills" which spoke directly to me. You should find out what you have a love for and a passion for first and then combine that with what you do well in order to choose the career that is best for you.

Blog #3 - Knowledge as a Strategic Asset

A wise man once said that "Knowledge is power" and there are a lot of truths behind that statement. When it comes to measures of your stature as a individual, anything from money, to a certain occupation can classify your social status to be superior to another individual, but those things can be taken away. A job can be taken away, and we all know that money comes and goes daily, but there is one measure of an individual that is everlasting and can never be taken away and that is knowledge. A person can never stop learning and gaining knowledge which is why companies should treat knowledge as a strategic asset. An asset is something you have ownership of or possession of that is useful or valuable quality and unlike products or money which can be taken away, knowledge can’t.


Companies must treat knowledge as a strategic asset because it is a valuable asset and the root of many decisions made by a company. Knowledge is important in many different ways in a company. A company needs knowledge in order to make the correct decisions to keep the company successful. You are only as strong as your leader so if the heads of the company are not knowledgeable about the business and smart enough to make the correct decisions the business will falter. Knowledge is not only important at the higher level positions but all the way down to the lower level positions. You may have a person that is very intelligent and has graduated with every honor that there is but if that person is not knowledgeable about the system in place and does not know how to perform the job they are assigned they are not very useful. Knowledge is everlasting and individuals are forever yearning for more knowledge. Knowledge, not profit or even customer service, is the base of a company because without knowledge you won’t be able to gain a profit or be knowledgeable about how to provide customer service.

I feel that companies should treat knowledge as a strategic asset because it comes to play in all areas. Training your employees is very important and a key element in success. This is can be used as a strategic asset because if your company is more knowledgeable and better trained than your opponents you will always come out on top. A company may have more money or more customers than your company but if you use knowledge as your strategy to success you will always end up on the better end because that knowledge and training will provide many ideas that will produce profit and that training will produce great employees that customers will love.

Blog Assignment #2 - Increasing Return

The word return can have an array of meanings. The literally definition of return is to go or come back to place, condition, or activity where one has been before, to render, or in some cases the income or profit arising from such transactions as the sale of land or other property. To increase is to enhance, to add to, to boost, etc. so increasing return would be an instance where an individual came back to a place, condition, or activity, where one has been before over and over again, or depending on your definition of return it could mean increases the income or profit arising from a transaction. Thinking from more of a financial mind frame increasing return to me is more so referring to increasing profit or rendering return on an investment.


In a business you have a goal, and in most cases that goal is to make more money than you spend, which is referred to as a profit or gain. There are many ways in which you can increase your return depending on your product that you are selling. You can charge a lot more for your product, or you can pay a lot less for the resources that you are using in order to make your product, but in most cases you will increase your return. To me, increasing return is not always an easy task but the in terms of retail or selling the best way to increase return is to make a quality product at a reasonable price, believe in that product and make others believe in it. The term increasing profit, as it refers to profit, means to me creating a quality product and creating a great financial strategy that gives you the best chance at success.

Increasing return can also refer to return on an investment. When you invest in a company or idea you are thinking long term. That investment may not pay off initially but you are looking towards the future. To increase return from as it refers to an investment to me means that you want to invest in something that you have a great feeling about. No one wants to invest in something that will lose them money or have a diminishing return opposed to an increased return. Investing can always be hit or miss because something that you think may be successful may not turn out in your favor. Increasing return as it refers to investing to me means researching and studying an investment before making your final decision and finding multiple positives to ensure a increase in return.

Stefon Porter

Blog Assignment #1

One thing that an individual can never have to much of is knowledge. Continuing to gain knowledge and training can go a long way in the workforce. An effective knowledge management system can be very helpful.. An effective knowledge management system is first only a thought or an idea in someone's head. In this blog I will inform you of how Xerox took their idea and turned it into reality



Problem (Why):
The issue that Xerox had was that they did not have efficient solution for their customer service representatives. This is an issue because of the knowledge base that the employees have. They are not able to effectively assist end users with issues due to the fact that they are not knowledgeable about the solutions that should be implemented as well as having invaluable solutions.

Solution (What and How):

To solve this issue Xerox implemented a new knowledge management system called Eureka. Eureka was knowledge management application developed so that engineers could log into the system and now easily document newly created solutions using various templates through their office laptops.

Benefits:

The major benefit that I believe came along with Eureka is they could access it from their laptop. This process is best because if the engineer is on site and handling an issue they can document that issue directly after coming up with the solution opposed to having to both write up the solution and submit it or wait to submit the solution.

Difficulties:

The biggest difficulty was just getting people to use the system. You have this great knowledge system but no one is really in a rush to put more work on themselves. A engineer is just looking at that as more writing and more work that they have to do opposed to the actually end goal which is helping out others. I believe in order to be more efficient with this system would be to introduce it to the engineers first and get their opinions, what they like what they don’t like, how it would be more efficient for them, etc. If they buy into the system first it will be easier to implement, because it’s something they believe in.

Lessons Learned:

There are many lessons that can be learned from this case, but I believe the most important is "The Customer is always right". As cliché as may sound, this case was developed to assist in Customer Service efforts and the customer is what is important at the end of the day. Another valuable lesson that I learned is never settle for less. There were some solutions in the Xerox knowledge base but they weren’t all efficient, and they weren’t all correct. They strived for excellence in this matter and that's the only thing that they would accept. They wanted to best solutions and real life solutions and that's what the new knowledge management system did for them.