Exploring the edge

I first came across the word ‘edge’ being used in the context of business organisation in the work of John Hagel III and John Seely Brown. The material in their book, “The Only Sustainable Edge” and in John Hagel’s blog “Edge Perspectives” (http://www.edgeperspectives.typepad.com/ and http://www.edgeperspectives.com/) provided a rich vein of resource material as I began to think about how to respond to the increasing uncertainty in my own work environment. If you are familiar with situations where your efforts to improve productivity are like sticking ‘a finger in the dyke’ and there are alluring but poorly quantified references to the benefits of outsourcing and offshoring, then give this material a look. However, they are not on their own; powerful support comes literally in the form of “Power to the Edge” (http://www.dodccrp.org/files/Alberts_Power.pdf), a treatise by David Alberts and Richard Hayes on a transformation that is being proposed for military organisation. With an occasional nod to the industrial and commercial world, this book describes in compelling fashion how networked communication provides the only basis for an effective and affordable force, capable of responding in diverse conflict situations. If the words ‘flexible’ and ‘agile’ are being bandied about in your business, read these texts.