Lessons of the Rainforest

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Studying the environment to gain insight into organizational behavior can be a fascinating exercise, with advocates from Jane Jacobs to Margaret Wheatley among those who have helped us envision the inherent possibilities. What We Learned in the Rainforest takes a similar but uniquely focused approach, as Mitsubishi Electric CEO Tachi Kiuchi and environmental advocate Bill Shireman tie development and sustainment of the rainforest directly to progressive practices of businesses such as Hewlett-Packard, Coca-Cola, and Nike. Employing an interesting format--each section begins with the authors describing an ongoing parachute descent into the rainforest in order to illustrate a specific principle--Kiuchi and Shireman explain how concepts such as feedback, profit, design, and diversity aid both their natural laboratory and their corporate examples. In the "Succession" chapter, for instance, they relate a rainforest's "four phases of life" to the cycle of innovation, growth, improvement, and creative destruction that is experienced by successful businesses. With the goal of drawing on nature's wisdom rather than drawing down its physical resources, the book advances a vision of sustainability en route to profitability that is as provocative as it is potentially practical. --Howard Rothman

Book Description

What We Learned in the Rainforest presents a surprising new business principle: by applying strategies and practices gleaned from nature -- by emulating what it once sought to conquer -- big business can attain greater and more sustainable profits.

With clear, direct language and dozens of real-world examples, the authors show how a company can become, like nature, a complex living system that doesn't merely balance competing interests but truly integrates them. Examples from leading companies include Coca-Cola's use of diversity to drive sales; 3M's technique of managing for innovation; Coors's "all waste is lost profit" theory; and Shell's "industrial ecosystem" approach.

Customer Reviews:

Rainforest? These Guys Leave No Rainforest Behind!.......2004-02-07

Well, as soon as our species can survive on information rather than calories, this book MIGHT be of some use.

In the meantime, I find it a questionable, if not pathetic, apologia for megalomaniacal outfits like Coca Cola. Coke is a leader among the pack of those who apparently share a neverending pseudo-quest to combine illusory humanitarianism ("Coca-Cola does a great service because it encourages people to take in more and more liquids") with an unquenchable thirst for global market dominance ("until, eventually, the number one beverage on Earth will be soft-drinks-our soft drinks").

Can we contemplate the notion that 'unlimited growth' and 'sustainability' just might be mutually exclusive? Look up Ecological Economics, my friends. I beg you.

Waste Neither Money Nor Time..........2002-08-08

This title of this book is an alluring theme but the book is, upon reading, virtually worthless. The analogy between a natural ecosystem and an economic system is clear enough and certainly not an earthshaking discovery - the rhythms, cycles, feedback mechanisms, etc., of any dynamic system are obvious similarities. But try to draw too much parallel between a natural system and a man-made system will inevitably lead to meaningless conclusions.

The author proposes a theory and then cites real-world examples that conform to that theory, sometimes rather forcibly. One example: In a section on information, the author said that the Indian auto industry was protected by high tariffs and that it led to its stagnation and decline. The author claimed that it was because the industry "failed to encourage the use of information." Anyone with the slightest knowledge of free market knows that lack of competition was the real cause. Does the rainforest add anything?

At another point, the author pondered on how the eye was (or was not) the result of evolution, and after postulating that incremental evolution was not possible for certain very complex biological structures (such as the eye), he cites the new notions of "intelligent design" and "downward causation". High sounding names, but how do they come about now?? Well, intelligent design must be because evolution is not...As to downward causation, it is, as illustrated by the rainforest, a series of adaptation. Wow, I thought that was evolution.

There was also a lengthy tirade denouncing the Wintel platform's dominance "threatening the infospace." This was taken right out of the annals of the cyberspace sour grapes.

Finally, although the author tries to appear apolitical and centrist, his liberal bias was all too clear - from his dismissive comments about Dick Cheney to his proposal of (government?) setting rules on how software must be created to be modular, with open interface, etc., etc. Whew!

This book was recommended by a number of big name business people, whose businesses got a fair bit of free PR from this book. My recommendation: waste neither money nor time on this book. Do enjoy the rainforest, but learn your business skills by studying the free market instead.

Great primer on sustainable business principles.......2002-03-01

Bill Shireman and Tachi Kiuchi's book is an accessible, well written treatise on the economic and social power of applying natural principles to business. Unlike other books on industrial ecology, which can be heady and boring, Shireman and Kiuchi have broken down the natural cycles of the Rainforest into easily understandable principles and then provide brief case studies illustrating the application of those principles in a business setting. The book is a great primer on corporate sustainability.

Great sustainability primer.......2002-03-01

I learned a lot from the Rainforest.......2002-02-20

The parallels in the authors' experiences with contemporary business issues are very compelling. This book offers a fresh perspective on some difficult issues, and can give managers a new way to think about their company's relationship to our world.

Lessons from Amazonia: The Ecology and Conservation of a Fragmented Forest

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Lessons from Amazonia: The Ecology and Conservation of a Fragmented Forest

Manufacturer: Yale University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Tropical Forest Remnants: Ecology, Management, and Conservation of Fragmented Communities

ASIN: 0300084838

Book Description

Deforestation is occurring at an alarming rate in many parts of the world, causing destruction of natural habitat and fragmentation of what remains. Nowhere is this problem more pressing than in the Amazon rainforest, which is rapidly vanishing in the face of enormous pressure from humans to exploit it. This book presents the results of the longest-running and most comprehensive study of forest fragmentation ever undertaken, the Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragments Project (BDFFP) in central Amazonia, the only experimental study of tropical forest fragmentation in which baseline data are available before isolation from continuous forest took place.

A joint project of Brazil's National Institute for Research in Amazonia and the U.S. Smithsonian Institution, the BDFFP has investigated the many effects that habitat fragmentation has on plants, invertebrates, and vertebrates. The book provides an overview of the BDFFP, reports on its case studies, looks at forest ecology and tree genetics, and considers what issues are involved in establishing

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Ecology and Management of a Neotropical Rainforest, Lessons learned from Paracou, long-term experimental research site in French Guiana.S. [A book review from: Forest Ecology and Management]
H.t. Steege
Manufacturer: Elsevier
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

Elsevier | By Publisher | e-Docs | Formats | Books
ASIN: B000RR2RJS

Book Description

This digital document is a journal article from Forest Ecology and Management, published by Elsevier in 2005. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:

New lessons from the rainforest: a conservation group offers additional free lesson plans online.(We hear from readers)(Letter to the Editor) : An article from: Curriculum Review

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New lessons from the rainforest: a conservation group offers additional free lesson plans online.(We hear from readers)(Letter to the Editor) : An article from: Curriculum Review
Fawn Stehlin
Manufacturer: PaperClip Communications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Curriculum Review, published by PaperClip Communications on December 1, 2004. The length of the article is 410 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: New lessons from the rainforest: a conservation group offers additional free lesson plans online.(We hear from readers)(Letter to the Editor)
Author: Fawn Stehlin
Publication: Curriculum Review (Refereed)
Date: December 1, 2004
Publisher: PaperClip Communications
Volume: 44 Issue: 4 Page: 2(1)

Article Type: Letter to the Editor

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Lessons of the Gogol: A cautionary tale : woodchipping in lowland tropical rainforest near Madang, Papua New Guinea

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Lessons of the Gogol: A cautionary tale : woodchipping in lowland tropical rainforest near Madang, Papua New Guinea
George Seddon
Manufacturer: s.n
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

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Lessons of the Rainforest.
Suzanne and Robert Heinzman (Eds.). Head
Manufacturer: Sierra Club Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000NGX66Q

Mrs.Parrot's Rainforest Lessons (Pickle Hill Primary)

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Mrs.Parrot's Rainforest Lessons (Pickle Hill Primary)
Michael Cox
Manufacturer: Scholastic
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Race for the rainforest II: Applying lessons learned from Lak to the Bismarck-Ramu Integrated Conservation and Development Initiative in Papua New Guinea

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Race for the rainforest II: Applying lessons learned from Lak to the Bismarck-Ramu Integrated Conservation and Development Initiative in Papua New Guinea
Julie-Ann Ellis
Manufacturer: PNG Biodiversity Conservation and Resource Management Programme
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Natural History | Nature & Ecology | Science | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 9980999187

Race for the rainforest: Evaluating lessons from an integrated conservation and development "experiment" in New Ireland, Papua New Guinea

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Race for the rainforest: Evaluating lessons from an integrated conservation and development "experiment" in New Ireland, Papua New Guinea
Rob McCallum
Manufacturer: PNG Biodiversity Conservation and Resource Management Programme
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

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ASIN: 9980999144

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Dont Judge a Book By Its Title

NASCAR Confidential: Stories of the Men and Women Who Made Stock Car Racing Great
Peter Golenbock
Manufacturer: MBI Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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The Wildest Ride: A History of NASCAR (or, How a Bunch of Good Ol' Boys Built a Billion-Dollar Industry out of Wrecking Cars)

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Flat Out and Half Turned Over: Tales from Pit Road with Buddy Baker

Real Men Work in the Pits : A Life in NASCAR Racing

ASIN: 0760314837

Book Description

The heart and soul of NASCAR is bared in this collection of stories from people intimately involved in stock car racing. Best-selling author Peter Golenbock interviewed a wide range of known and not-so-well-known players in the NASCAR game, ranging from the feisty female racer from the 1950s, Louise Smith, to the legendary champion Fred Lorenzen and announcer Benny Parsons. Golenbock draws incredible stories from these people, and has assembled a collection of stories that tells the tale of not only NASCAR's transformation from a regional backwater sport to an empire, but also brings to light new twists on the most dramatic stories of the sport. Golenbock's interviews pull out the human side of the men and women of racing, offering an intimate glimpse of life on and off the track. Highlights include: - The story of Louise Smith, one of the first women to race NASCAR, whose husband didn'tknow she was racing the family car at Daytona until he discovered a headline in the newspaper: 'Louise Smith Wrecks at Daytona.' - The story of Judy Judge who was engaged to Fireball Roberts. Their wedding was scheduled to take place just one week after he was killed. She has quietly carried a torch for him ever since. - Tim Richmond's wild life on and off the track, and new stories of his final days at the race track, as well as reactions from fellow racers to his tragic death. - The inside tale of how Jeff Gordon's talent drew attention, and then how he and crew chief Ray Evernham were paired to create one of the most successful teams in NASCAR history.

Customer Reviews:

Dont Judge a Book By Its Title.......2005-03-16

If you are looking for an expose on the world of NASCAR and pick up this book , you will be sorely disapointed, but it was an entertaining read and it was fun to learn about some of the legends Of NASCAR. Fireball Roberts, Curtis Turner, etc.... There are better books that pertain to the history of NASCAR but this is an enjoyable read for any fan.

Amazon.com

A remarkable range of examples for the idea of visual thinking, with beautifully printed pages. A real treat for all who reason and learn by means of images. -- Rudolf Arnheim

Customer Reviews:

Amazing book for information design.......2007-07-15

I am the type of person who dabbles in all kinds of design, and I think of the ideal designer as one who knows a little about everything. Designers design ways of output, whether it be lemon juice from a lemon or ways to fit all vital components in a laptop in the most efficient way. This book is about the output of information from our multidimensional world to the flat paper space, and he does it brilliantly.
It's even worth mentioning the book itself as a good piece of design. All the images are vivid, the pages feel crisp and durable, even the color of the pages I bet was an attention of detail (it's slightly offwhite, but in an extremely good way). It's like good ol' fashioned timeless design.
He covers the subject wide and far, dips into everything from visual illusions to hardcore information displays. Sometimes you wonder where the heck he gets all these wonderful images, they span from the stoneage till today and show the vast variety of ways to display information, both simple and complex.
It is a beautiful book and an absolute must for people interested in the design of information. Actually, I'd say it's a must for anyone interested in information at all, be it for powerpoint or for magazine layout. This will be one of the most intelligent books on my shelf.

An Obsolete Glance At A Classic Problem.......2007-06-28

This is a short book, 126 pages. An interesting cursory exploration of the subject. However, it feels like it predates information technology (1990 predates the web by 5 years), and seems to have more in common with how to communicate elements of a hand-drawn map atlas if you were living in the 1700s than it has with using Adobe Illustrator to convey an idea for the web. I bought this book to see if it would help me as a web developer, and instead when it arrived I realized I got a weird coffee table book that feels like it was written in the 1960s, at the latest, to summarize that you can use different icons or pictographs of small size to communicate important ideas without words. (Sorry, I already gave away the story of the book.)

I know this review isn't going to get very popular marks, but, put simply, this book is probably good for professional or student pure designers, but it's useless for me. I honestly don't think the book targets web designers, but somebody here reviewed that it was "great" for web designers, so because of that remark I bought it. Sorry, but I don't see the applicability. But then, I only skimmed over the book before I put it back on Amazon Marketplace.

While one should normally never judge a book by its cover, in this case I think you should.

one of three or four.......2007-01-10

this is part of a series from tufte. he uses examples to describe techniques of visualization. if you do presentations to others or write reports that present complex data, several of his books should be in your library.

A wonderful book!.......2006-11-04

No designer should be without this book. I especially enjoy the historical accounts of information design. Of course hind sight is 20/20 so his redesigns seem obvious from our perspective.

An outstanding addition to my library.......2006-06-23

An outstanding addition to my library, Edward systematically explores the presentation of data showing the value of data rich content when it is properly displayed. After reading half the book, I couldn't sit through a presentation without coming up with at least 3 ways to improve it. The illustrations in the book are beautifully rendered and cover a diverse set of subject matter each as interesting as the next. The only topic concerning this book that I struggled with is whether or not to mark it up. In the end, as I do with all of my books I intend to refer back to, I did.

David Byrne: E.E.E.I. (Envisioning Emotional Epistemological Information)

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Art Can Happen
silly
David Byrne loves PowerPoint
Disappointed
It's not just for business anymore...

David Byrne: E.E.E.I. (Envisioning Emotional Epistemological Information)
David Byrne
Manufacturer: Steidl/Pace/MacGill Gallery
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 3882439076
Release Date: 2003-07-02

Amazon.com

David Byrne is the only rocker who could have imagined turning Microsoft PowerPoint into an art form. When Time put Byrne on the cover in 1986, the title was aptly, "Rock's Renaissance Man." Indeed, the one-time lead singer/architect of The Talking Heads composes operas, symphonies, and soundtracks, made a film (True Stories), and was a wunderkind video artist and designer (Time even let Byrne create his cover). Byrne's oddly-titled 2003 coffee table book ("epistemological" is a philological look at the origin, methods, and limits of human knowledge) is new version of mixed media, a rough dissertation on a visual, universal language. Bryne mixes the familiar images of a PowerPoint presentation out of the norm, be it a complicated flow chart or altered icons. The message is blurred at times (as with the title, big words prevail), but the project takes a fuller form on the accompanying DVD that's region-free with NTSC and PAL formats, making it playable practically around the world. The five presentations (approximately 25 minutes in all) are accompanied by original musical compositions. Byrne plays the usual patterns of PowerPoint--overlays, swipes, and fades--resulting in an intriguing art exhibition that could even play on a laptop computer with DVD-ROM drive. The least interesting chapter of the book ("Physiognomies") is the most moving piece on the DVD. The final result could be considered art, or just a high-minded swipe at the "Dilbert" office world that uses the program. Regardless, E.E.E.I. is a unique concept one might have to "stop making sense" and just enjoy the experience. --Doug Thomas

Book Description

For more than a year David Byrne has been employing the ubiquitous sales and presentation program PowerPoint as an art medium. E.E.E.I (Envisioning Emotional Epistemological Information) is a book of images and essays, plus a DVD which plays 5 of his PowerPoint presentations accompanied by original music. The book component contains a dozen new exploratory texts and a whole lot of bold, graphic images created with the help of PowerPoint's built-in tools and visuals--not to mention the fun of plastic overlays and nifty foldout pages. And you may ask yourself, what is the meaning of this? And you may ask yourself, what is this about? It is about taking subjective, even emotional, information and presenting it in a familiar audiovisual form--using a medium in a way that is different, and possibly better, than what was intended. It is about appropriating a contemporary, corporate staple and making something critical, beautiful and humorous with it.

Customer Reviews:

Art Can Happen.......2007-08-29

David Byrne's E.E.E.I. is a prime example that art can happen in the most surprising places and with the most surprising tools. It's a delight to see something as ubiquitous and utilitarian as Powerpoint employed as a personal medium. Byrne takes this humble, low level technology and infuses it with wit and sophistication. The short (think haiku) but sweet DVD suite is also surprisingly subtle and intimate when viewed on a desktop monitor. The same can be said of the companion book. It's a work of art, a collector's item, and a clever little meditation on the ambiguities of our culture's evolving soup of language, images, technology, and communication. As with most art, some will love it or hate it, but it's worth the leap and look (and a listen to a little more of Byrne's musical imagination).

silly.......2005-06-13

E.E.E.I. is simply silly - the man is a legend, in person on-stage he can move audiences even when they do not speak english (I saw him in Rio and he lit the place up!)
but he is no philosopher, this book is a read/watch one time and file in the round bin

David Byrne loves PowerPoint.......2005-03-04

....or maybe not...

Less than a week before embarking on a coast to coast dozen or so cities PowerPoint lecture tour, Byrne did three nights of his rock n roll show at the Warfield in SF, which in turn was on the heels of two weeks of the same in Australia. This mind bending energy may be final proof of the rumor that David Byrne is, in fact, a nuclear powered android after all.

The PowerPoint presentation has nothing to do with his rock musician persona. In this role (and there is, indeed a theatrical aspect to it), he plays a much more professorial/academic character, beginning by showing how PowerPoint has all kinds of oddball graphics, etc. pre-loaded into the program("for what???"). During the event, he also discusses that renown PowerPoint critic Edward Tufte makes the argument that the whole thing dumbs down the users and receivers of the program. One of Byrne's messages, to the extent there are any, seems to be that PowerPoint is symptomatic of the superficiality that is passed off as substance in just about every aspect of society today (Ashley Simpson on SNL anyone?).

After the one hour session, he takes audience questions, and delves into some pretty heavy philosophical, and maybe even metaphysical areas. Asked who his target audience was when he came up w/ the idea of doing the PowerPoint thing to begin with, he said "art crowds much like I would expect most of you are, yet, interestingly, it got the unlikely attention of CNN, The Wall Street Journal, Wired magazine, New Yorker, etc. who asked the question 'HE'S DOING WHAT???'"

As to Byrne going around the country showing how he's basically subverted what was intended to be a very linear, business type program, it arguably fits in with his career long insult of, and disdain for, multi national corporations. One thing is for certain: he must truly be laughing all the way to the bank as he undoubtedly pockets a handsome fee per 2 hour session from doing nothing other than playing around with, and poking fun at PowerPoint.

Stay tuned for more irony from David Byrne.

Disappointed.......2004-03-25

Unnecessarily heavy paper and binding. Way overpriced.

The CD/DVD does not run, and there is no way to troubleshoot or replace it.

I was looking forward to seeing this, but now feel like I was sold snake oil.

It's not just for business anymore..........2004-03-22

Ok, first off honesty and self-debasement: I bought this work mostly because it has David Byrne's name on it. Now I feel better, and can continue.

There's obviously more to this book and DVD than simply "David Byrne" - there's a sorely needed look at just how some of the simplest and most seemingly benign aspects of our lives can inculcate us into a certain manner of being or indoctrinate us into a specific world view. We often use tools and or processes as if on auto-pilot and the nuances escape like nibbling gerbils in a shoebox. That is the basic underlying theme of this work, regardless of one's opinion of the artwork or the, what seems to be, over emphasis on a Microsoft product.

Byrne says as much in the book's "exegesis": Microsoft Powerpoint, through the use of such make-it-as-easy-as-possible tools - "wizards" or "auto content managers" - has the ability to sink into our daily lives and affect our behavior and opinions on things if used uncautiously (really, like anything else in the world). On the flip - and far less pernicious - side, such tools can be downright fun to play with if one lets themselves go and thinks of the tool outside of its original purpose. So, again, in the "exegesis", Byrne makes an assumption: Powerpoint is a means of expression much in the way that finger paints, clay, or crayons are. He assumes that Powerpoint can be utilized as an art form. In this way the software takes on a new life, and forces someone to look at it in an entirely new way. It's not just for boring business presentations anymore! Wake up, people, it's fun!!

All of the above is not readily apparent if one dives into the accompanying DVD tabula rasa. At first sight, one is bound to find the work frivolous and maybe even juvenille or pretentious. At the very least these pieces will probably evoke the typical question of "why?" The answer to this useful interrogative word is that these pieces are not meant as ends unto themselves, but as processes, as ways of evoking new ways of thinking about something most of us take for granted. By the very asking a new way of thinking can open up. So, whether or not one appreciates these pieces as works of art is probably not the point of this project. Seeing everyday things in a new and playful way is probably more on cue than any pure aesthetic or artistic endeavors.

I'll admit straight out that this book and DVD has influenced the way I look at Powerpoint. Being one of the few survivors of the recent Information Systems employment slaughter, I use Powerpoint frequently and witness the Powerpoint presentations of others a little too frequently. The other day I actually sat down and played with Powerpoint. It was fun, I almost hate to admit it. I sent my work to some co-workers and asked them to "be ready to present on this 7am Monday morning". Of course it was all nonsense in Spanish, English, French, and Japanese complete with unconnected twirling and dissolving pictures and meaningless pulsating charts and graphs. I'm not sure what my co-workers thought of it, but I had fun.

There's more to this work than a glance can capture. Deep down there's mostly fun and a new perspective that can be applied to all avenues of one's mundane business life and software.

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A modern method for Enterprise Vision

The joy of stakeholder applause

Capability Cases: A Solution Envisioning Approach
Irene Polikoff , Robert Coyne , and Ralph Hodgson
Manufacturer: Addison-Wesley Professional
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0321205766

Customer Reviews:

A modern method for Enterprise Vision.......2006-08-19

Today, the difficulty for business leadership, especially in high technology fields is to lead a team towards a "vision". Kelly Johnson from the famed Skunkworks was a visionary with a way of getting his team to see the vision and develop a path towards solutions through his unique way of attacking the problems. Time and time again, he was able to bring to market his breakthrough products faster than everybody else. The process of "Solution Envisioning through Capability Cases" employs a disciplined method for taking a "vision" and getting a team to map through a solution space using capability cases.

Although primarily introduced as an IT domain, this method can be applied to the "hard" manufacturing as well. The difficulty for today's leaders is that the competitive landscape is changing so rapidly. The combination of Moore's Law & Metcalf's Law is yielding a competitive business enviornment that requires very agile development and careful investment of research and development funds. The timelines are so compressed, that a new paradigm for bringing new capabilities to market has to change. Those companies that can survive the near term will do very well and those that are stuck in their process domains will suffer the same fate as the dinasours. Similarly, as the budget for the DoD goes down and more emphasis is placed on NetCentric capabilities, those programs that can execute quickly and show wide benefit, through Capabilities Based Acquisition process will survive. Those that are narrowly focused will have more difficulties. Solution Envisioning will not solve all, but gives a quick method to sort out what is important to the project by being responsive to the 3 voices (business, customer and technologist). It's like starting with an enterprise architecture, it's a good tool to visualize what the enterprise is about. In this case, solution envisioning helps the team visualize the solution through 3 phases using capability cases as the vehicle.

This book is an excellent read but be prepared to take some time to get through it. It is designed to take the trip in "chunks". I found it very useful and informative and have combined it with other techniques that are outlined in the book such as enterprise architectures, UML Use Case models, influence diagrams, lean thinking, QFD, system engineering, business modeling and others. It has a nice "how to" feature for conducting phased events as well as some great examples of capability cases and envisioning events.

Frank C. Alvidrez, CEA

The joy of stakeholder applause.......2006-03-27

That the majority of larger system development projects fail to meet expectations is well known. Further, the futility of redoubling efforts to elicit customer requirements is now being recognized. What to do?

The more advanced system thinkers and a few simply lucky practitioners are discovering the value of capabiltiy cases as enablers of solution envisioning.

This book describes 36 aspects of system envisioning, including insights into the mysterious decision flow called system architecting. It provides a repertoire of 15 example Capability Cases. Further, it shows the reader how capability cases can be defined, thusly bootstrapping his/her repertoire. Moreover, it shows how new capability cases can be shared and vetted thus leveraging the 'wisdom of crowds.'

Invest in this book. Because it costs less than one wasted personhour of project effort your ROI can be very high.

Design Conversations: Envisioning Content-Rich Enterprise Systems

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Design Conversations: Envisioning Content-Rich Enterprise Systems
Dale Hunscher
Manufacturer: South Wind Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Programming | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

Systems Analysis & Design | Computer Science | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0972766812

Book Description

As the world enters into a new century and millennium, information technology stands at the cusp of a new era. The unification of all human intellectual knowledge is within our reach, if not our grasp. A variety of enterprises - businesses and governments, educational institutions and non-governmental organizations - have transitioned in a few short decades from ponderous, inward-facing, manual bureaucracies to highly automated electronic communities that freely and easily interconnect with others. The Internet forms a backbone over which travel the messages and transactions of a global marketplace of commodities and ideas.

There are, however, still numerous construction delays on the information highway. Envisioning these new systems is much harder than anyone ever expected. The premise of this book is that the design of complex, content-intensive systems - the hallmark of what we refer to as the content-rich enterprise - is problematic because our mental models of both the problem and the solution are inadequate. We don't yet know how to converse intelligently about information architecture and system design - and yet, every non-trivial system starts its life in hour after hour of conversation among the decision-makers, end users, and IT staff.

This volume is a tutorial for managers, professionals, and IT staff in the concepts that can transform your organization's fragmented and compartmentalized data stores into an effective repository of knowledge propagation, and the enterprise itself into a highly adaptable learning environment.

You'll learn a pattern language for content-rich systems, an integrated set of concepts that makes immediate sense to those who work in information technology, but also comes easily and naturally to members of the decision-maker and end-user communities. You'll see the new language in use in realistic design conversations where stakeholders struggle to understand the possibilities and find an optimal solution.

What emerges is a way of collaboratively envisioning and designing effective and adaptable information spaces. Where traditional architecture integrates materials and landscape to create an environment that is useful and esthetically pleasing, information architecture integrates an enterprise's available internal and external content to form an environment for working and learning—an environment that is as pleasant to use as it is productive. It also structures safe access paths into the enterprise corpus for the general public as well as privileged outsiders, and help us to re-envision access to the Web itself as a tool for competitive advantage.

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