Fighting tunnel vision

Have you ever had those moments when you're surprised by how much your way of working is determined by the culture of your company?

I get that feeling a lot, usually when I meet someone who's straight out of school or when I chat with a friend who comes from a completely different line of work.

There are many things about our respective corporate cultures that we take for granted as being 'right' or 'correct' when in reality it's just the way we happen to work. If you go to another firm, chances are you'll find a different but equally (if not more) effective way of doing things.

It's so easy to fall victim to tunnel vision! If we don't make the effort to mingle with folks from other companies or professions, or to read up on topics that are not related to our careers, we stagnate.

How about you? How do you stop yourself from becoming too entrenched in your way of working? How do you nourish the ability to appreciate new ideas? How do you nurture an open, inquiring mind? Please share.

Corporate Twitter Solutions?

After yesterday's tragic shooting at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), it naturally occurred to me that a private Twitter-based system could have been used to send SMS alerts to students, faculty, and staff.

And that's when I figured that organizations may be able to acquire Twitter-based solutions if Obvious were to:

• Licensing. Allow private organizations to license the Twitter platform to deploy a private Twitter network. All costs associated with sending messages would of course, be borne by the organization;
  
• Appliance. Package the Twitter technology into a 'black box' solution that is sold as an off-the-shelf 'appliance' with ports that are simply 'plugged' into the appropriate networks (easier said than done, but certainly doable);
• OEM. Allow other solutions providers to OEM the Twitter technology into their product suite.
  

You know how Internet technology was adapted to internal corporate use and became known as intranets? Why not take Twitter's platform (which I think has already proven itself) and acquire your own corporate Twittering capability (assuming instant mass SMS notification is what you need)?

Side note: In the second (7.30pm) press conference related to the shooting, a Virginia Tech spokesman said that they had started looking into text-based alert solutions last August, but that a system has not yet been deployed. [more info]