Open up your mind and say, ahh...

Photo: Daimler

You may talk to your car, and some in cases it may even talk back. And you’ve probably thrown a few choice words at other drivers in a impromptu bout of rage. But cars are silently communicating with each other and with transportation infrastructure in two field trials that kicked off this month near Frankfurt, Germany, and in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Mercedes-Benz parent company Daimler is spearheading what it’s calling the “first ‘social network’ for automobiles.” But instead of sharing lolcat pics and mundane musings, the 120 vehicles in the project will be communicating with one another as well as with infrastructure to avoid accidents and traffic jams, along with a range of other applications. Daimler claims it’s the largest ever field trial of vehicle-to-X communication (V2X) – a combination of vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) communication – to show how the technology can be used to decrease accidents and increase driving efficiency. But in sheer number of vehicles it pales in comparison to a similar V2V field trial that the National Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) is conducting in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

The European trial is part of the sim^TD (Safe Intelligent Mobility – test field Germany) research project spearheaded by Daimler Research and Advance Development and sponsored by the German government. Other participants include automakers Opel, Audi, BMW/Mini, Ford and Volkswagen, along with automotive suppliers Bosch and Continental, Deutsche Telekom and several research institutes. The trial consists of 120 vehicles that will be hitting the roads of the Frankfurt Rhine-Main region until the end of the year. According to Car and Driver, the fleet includes specially equipped Audi A4s, BMW X1s, Ford S-Maxes, Mercedes-Benz C-Classes, Opel Insignias and Volkswagen Passats.

Vehicles will be connected to each other and to infrastructure via a form of Wi-Fi that has a range of just over 300 yards, according to Mike Shulman who is directing Ford’s participation in both trials and is the automaker’s technical leader of Active Safety Research and Innovation. The vehicles in the European trial will constantly keep each other posted on road hazards and traffic, much the same way an annoying acquaintance keeps you updated on his status by posting to Facebook every few seconds.

One beneficial scenario provided by Daimler: If there’s a traffic jam on the autobahn and it’s concealed behind the crest of a hill, vehicles barreling down the road at 100 mph-plus would be alerted to avoid rear-ending the last car. The company also points to possible environmental and convenience benefits of V2X systems, such as coordinating traffic lights according to traffic density to make driving more fuel-efficient and environmentally friendly, and even being able to seek out and suggest routes to the nearest available parking spots.

By comparison, the NHTSA Ann Arbor trial will last an entire year and include 3,000 vehicles driven by ordinary people, but equipped with Wi-Fi communications and other technology such as radar and cameras. The reason the U.S. trial requires a lot more vehicles and a lot more time is to gauge how a large pool of vehicles interact with each other over a longer period to gather enough data to determine the effectiveness of V2V communication to reduce accidents, says Ford’s Shulman.

One group will drive the cars for the first six months and then a second group will drive the vehicles for the last six months of the trial. “They’ll drive them to work, go shopping and wherever they want to go,” Shulman told Wired. “The drivers were carefully selected so that they work in the same area, drop their kids off at school in the same area and have the same shift time. The idea is that, over this year-long period, we could see how well these cars really perform. Are they getting the timely warnings? Are they getting a lot of false warnings? What’s really happening that we haven’t seen on a track but under real-world conditions?”

In addition to the number of cars and duration, the big difference between the two trials is that the U.S. version is solely focused on reducing accidents. “NHTSA has done a study that says that more than 80 percent of the crashes could be impacted by V2V technology,” Shulman says. He adds that the federal agency is conducting the trial to determine whether V2V technology can be deployed to effectively prevent injuries and fatalities – and whether to mandate it on new cars. “They’re going to look at whether to apply this to new vehicles and other modes of transportation like trucks, buses and motorcycle, and even pedestrians and in aftermarket devices,” he adds.

“The Europeans are not looking at regulation; they’re looking at this as a voluntary deployment, at least for now,” Shulman says. “They’re looking at it more as a mobility application, using vehicles as a probe to show travel history and congestion over routes and determine the best routes to take based on real-time congestion. It can warn of traffic and construction up ahead, but it’s not for that last second before a crash. It’s more for information to the driver or information from the vehicle back to the traffic management center.”

Shulman says that the European trials should be thought of as, “not the first step, but a long-term step, and there’s other benefits that driver could enjoy as we get this technology deployed. We’re trying to learn from both and bringing harmonization where we can, and move toward the concept on the connected vehicle. How we’re approaching it is it will go on different paths to different places.”

I had an interesting comment from someone at an event recently. We were picking apart my Twitter stream and I was explaining my philosophy around it. He raised his hand and said, “Well, to be really honest, I wouldn’t be all that interested in seeing your pictures of bacon.” In this case, he meant quite literally the picture above, but in the larger sense, he was saying, “I want a business-focused person to follow.”

My response was that it was perfectly fair to feel that way, but that it also meant that he wasn’t likely my buyer. In my very specific case, I tend to work with companies that value personality as well as professional ability. It’s every bit as important to me that my kind of customer have an interesting personality, a quirkiness, and a tolerance for the atypical. That’s a choice, though, and it’s something I encourage you to consider.

We Choose Our Customers

Look, when we’re hungry for business, we just want to see the cash register ring. I’ve been there, and I’ll be there again. But when we do have the opportunity to consider our ideal client, it’s important to take a moment and work through that, to really determine what it is that will help you qualify who works with you or not.

In the case of media making and your online presence, what you put out there for the world to see on your social channels and your blog is what people are going to weigh into other equations when determining whether to buy from you. At the moment I’m writing this blog post, my last 20 tweets say nothing about what kind of business I’m in. My Facebook account is completely personal and not for business. My last few posts on Google+ are actually more business-focused, but that’s just happenstance. Why? Because I use social networks as a kind of liner notes for the personality behind the business.

Why Choose Your Customers?

Hold on there, Brogan. It’s a barely recovering economy and my kids have to eat. Why should I choose who my customers are? Why should I go out of my way to disqualify potential buyers?

Because customers that aren’t a fit create friction.

Simple. The deal you make when you take on a customer that doesn’t fit your personality or work style is that you’re asking for their money and signing up for however you will clash with them. This, in turn, may (will!) cause procrastination, may (will!) cause a less-than-stellar effort on your part, and will detract from the kinds of customers and clients you have more in common with. Those, by the way, are the people who will spend more with you over the long term, and who will form the core of your business relationships, not these folks you accept because you “need the money.”

Is This Crazy Talk?

I’ll let you tell me. Jump into the comments. Tell me about the times you’ve taken that customer who wasn’t really down with your particular kind of crazy. Hey, if you’ve had the opposite experience, that’s cool, too. I know someone out there wants to share some Kumbaya story about how working through one’s differences is a rewarding experience. My take? Life’s too short.

In today’s changing work environment, it’s important for leaders to provide clarity of direction. If they don’t, fear, frustration, and inefficiency start to creep in.

In the same way that a bicycle is wobbly when it’s standing still and becomes more stable the faster you pedal, the same is true with personnel issues at work. It’s when the organization is standing still that people start to squabble.

Three leadership strategies can help. The first is having a clear sense of where you’re going. The second is having a plan for your people so they each know their role going forward. The third is having the tenacity and stick-to-itiveness to make that plan sustainable.

Fail in any of these three areas, and the result will be lackluster financial performance and the creation of an atmosphere where negative human dynamics will begin to grow. Humans cooperate best when they are all moving toward a common goal. When an organization is standing still, the pushing and shoving starts. Parents know this. When do the kids start fighting in the car? When they are sitting still with no place to go.

Clear direction is especially important when dealing with people who’ve been with the organization for an extended period of time. Leaders and organizations generally do a good job of clarifying goals as they are getting new people up to speed. With long-time employees, however, leaders often assume that the employee instinctively knows what’s important. As a result, leaders generally don’t spend the same amount of time and energy communicating clear objectives to seasoned employees that they do with new hires. When this happens, it’s not unusual for veteran employees to lose the focus and discipline necessary to achieve their individual goals.

Three strategies for leaders

Good performance begins with clear goals. That’s job one. If you don’t know where you’re going–as the Cheshire Cat said to Alice in Wonderland–any road will get you there. Leadership is about going somewhere, and clear agreements are the first step. It’s a process of creating clarity about why we’re here, what we’re doing, and how we’re going to work together.

We did a study a number of years ago with a large petroleum company in North America that shows how rarely this clarity occurs. We asked more than 2,000 employees and their managers to share their goal expectations with us. To begin, we asked the employees to rank the top five things they felt they were responsible for. Then we asked the managers to list and prioritize the five things they were actually holding each of their direct reports accountable for. We saw only a 19% agreement across the population of 2,000 people!

After clear goals are set, leaders must use strong communication skills to make sure everyone’s eyes are on the ball. This includes regular one-on-one conversations with direct reports that include feedback and evaluation of how each person is doing against established targets. This helps employees understand how their role impacts the larger picture. It also allows people to have a say in the actions, decisions, priorities, and goals that are subsequently set. Leadership is done best when it is something you do with people instead of something you do to them.

The third step is for managers to help people notice and experience the incremental successes they are having. In the past, this was accomplished through extrinsic reward and recognition. Today we use a more intrinsic approach that focuses on discovering the incentives that are meaningful to individual employees to fuel their passion for the task or project they are working on. It’s about creating an environment that leads to sustainable performance.

A little structure goes a long way

On the surface, producing effective results can sound like it’s about driving performance and cracking the whip–but, when it’s done right, it’s more about moving people in the right direction. You can begin by answering these questions: What are we trying to accomplish mutually? What is the organization trying to accomplish? What is our department’s role in accomplishing that? And what are individual contributors being held accountable for?

Your role as a leader is to use your management skills to place a certain rigor and clarity around goals. When performance is not what it should be, first ask yourself whether goals have been made clear. Goal clarity helps reduce issues regarding relationships and personnel that plague so many organizations. Set a clear vision and show people how they can contribute to it. When folks are moving in a common direction with clear goals, most workplace struggles will take care of themselves.

Image: Flickr user Paul Joran

NEW ORLEANS – Speaking during a keynote session at CTIA Wireless on Tuesday, AT&T CEO Ralph de la Vega said Facebook is good for his company’s business.

“I think that social networking is going to be a major force in this industry for years to come,” says Vega. “I think it helps people communicate. That’s what we do.”

T-Mobile CEO Philipp Humm agreed, adding that Facebook’s social networking app was his company’s “number one app right now” and has customers “picking up their phone 150 times a day.”

When asked if Facebook was worth the same as Verizon, Verizon CEO Dan Mead said “our market value is very solid,” and that he would leave commenting on Facebook to the experts.

The CEOs of all four major carriers participated in a keynote session at CTIA entitled “Beyond LTE – Carrier Innovations.” Each CEO was given the opportunity to talk on a topic of their choice. Mead spoke on the need for spectrum.

Sprint CEO Dan Hesse said “it has never been more important for the industry to gain the public’s trust, ” adding that even cable and oil companies currently rate higher with consumers than mobile carriers.

Hunn talked about the need for intelligent unlimited data plans, while Vega showed off some of AT&T’s plans for home automation. He demonstrated how your smartphone can lock your doors, let you know what your kids are doing at home, and monitor energy use.

What effect do you think social networking has on mobile carriers? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

Maurice Sendak passed away this morning at the age of 83. He’ll be celebrated by millions of fans, and has already been memorialized with great writing all over the internet.

We wanted to take a minute to reflect on the example Sendak set for other creatives of all ilks. He was a fearlessly honest writer. He was a talented artist who illustrated over a hundred books, and designed opera sets, musicals, and television shows. His cultural commentary on pretty much any topic–from publishing and mental health to being a young gay Brooklynite in the 1960s–cut to the quick of human experience. He came of age during a period of cultural sanitization, and was often criticized for being “too” honest in his books, which spoke frankly to the sometimes-terrifying experience of being a child. Some of his best quotes on creativity, publishing, and children are collected below.

The Sanitization of Children’s Literature

Sendak, the child of two Holocaust survivors, refused to shy away from the realities of childhood; nightmares, monsters, rebellion, and arguments make frequent appearances in his work. Talking to Maus author Art Spiegelman in 1993, he described unsavory parental praise thusly: “People say, ‘Oh, Mr. Sendak. I wish I were in touch with my childhood self, like you!’ As if it were all quaint and succulent, like Peter Pan. Childhood is cannibals and psychotic vomiting in your mouth! I say, ‘You are in touch, lady–you’re mean to your kids, you treat your husband like shit, you lie, you’re selfish… That is your childhood self!”

Though he was routinely criticized by conservative groups for portraying what they saw as “adult” themes, he stood his ground, maintaining that parents (and authors) need to be honest with children. In his acceptance speech for the Caldecott Medal in 1964, he had this to say about how adults misrepresent childhood:

“From their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions – fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, they continually cope with frustrations as best they can. And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming wild things.”

The City

Sendak was fascinated by the city he grew up in, and portrayed it often as a sometimes hellish, often wonderful riddle. Though he’s obviously most famous for Where the Wild Things Are, he wrote frequently about his native Brooklyn. As the New Yorker’s Amy Davidson notes today, In the Night Kitchen is one of his most mesmerizing books, telling the story of Micky, a little boy dreaming over Brooklyn (taking cues from the classic turn-of-the-century Little Nemo comics).

Davidson writes that Sendak was unceasingly honest in his portrayal of life in the city: “he found the images and words to let children know that he recognized that their lives had cryptic alleyways.”

On Creative Success

Sendak was honest about struggling to succeed early in his career. He took a job at FAO Schwartz doing window installations, telling NPR’s Terri Gross that eventually he ran out of steam. “I was too frightened. I just lost it.” A friend paid for his first therapy session, and he made it a fixture in his life. He talked often about feeling pressure from his parents and peers: “Everyone said, ‘Oh, you’re so talented and you’re going to get a book and you’re’ — and, of course, nothing happened as soon as I wanted it to.”

Talking to the AP, he described his sucess as mundane, saying “I didn’t sleep with famous people or movie stars or anything like that. It’s a common story: Brooklyn boy grows up and succeeds in his profession, period.”

A Book is a Book is a Book

Sendak was a firm believer in the universality of stories. He laughed at the idea that children’s literature is a separate genre from literature in general. In the same 1993 New Yorker piece with Art Spiegelman, he said “Kids books… Grownup books… That’s just marketing.”

In an era of iPads and Nooks, he dismissed the digital readers an ultimately unimportant fad, telling the Guardian in 2011, “I hate ebooks. It’s like making believe there’s another kind of sex. There isn’t another kind of sex. There isn’t another kind of book! A book is a book is a book.”

On Living and Dying

In 2011, he talked about being preoccupied by death (his long-term partner passed away in 2007): “I have nothing now but praise for my life. I’m not unhappy. I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can’t stop them. They leave me and I love them more. … What I dread is the isolation. … There are so many beautiful things in the world which I will have to leave when I die, but I’m ready, I’m ready, I’m ready.”

One last quote from this 2011 interview speaks to both his life and work: “I can’t believe I’ve turned into a typical old man. I can’t believe it. I was young just minutes ago.”