President Obama is generally acknowledged as being an excellent orator, and is quickly implementing his vision and leadership style to the Presidency. Of particular significance is his style of frequent and direct communication with the American people. One recent example was when he addressed students at Wakefield High School at the start of the school year. In this speech, he spoke of the importance of education, encouraging students to take personal responsibility for their future and challenging them to work hard and stay at school. He shared many of his own experiences as a youth. A second example were his remarks to college students on innovation and sustainable growth delivered at Hudson Valley Community College in New York State. He again challenged the audience to make the most of themselves, explaining how he is taking steps to change past practices to ensure that post-secondary institutions have the resources necessary to deliver quality education. A third example came when he spoke to the National Academy of Sciences Annual Meeting — a gathering of distinguished American scholars engaged in scientific and engineering research. Again, he clearly stated the direction of government policy on education and innovation.

Importantly, in all of these communications, he outlined the steps government is taking to ensure that change occurs. By communicating national policy to the entire nation, the President sets the direction that provides guidance to all corporate and society leaders, and offers hope to citizens. Communicating an inspiring positive vision of an achievable future provides everyone — particularly young people — with the motivation to strive for excellence in everything that they do. These activities exemplify the best qualities of responsible leadership.

National Address to Americas School Children:
www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-in-a-National-Address-to-Americas-Schoolchildren

Hudson Valley Community College Speech:
www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-on-Innovation-and-Sustainable-Growth-at-Hudson-Valley-Community-College

National Academy of Sciences Speech:
www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-at-the-National-Academy-of-Sciences-Annual-Meeting

Other Bytes

Here are some of the things going on in and around the engineering community:

• Many of us are increasingly overwhelmed by information. Some is worthwhile; much is simply distracting. Organizational and peer pressure often makes us feel inadequate if we are not “on top” of new information. Even with technological aides, information is difficult to manage effectively. In “Death by Information Overload” (Harvard Business Review, 87(9): 83-89, September 2009, www.hbr.org), Paul Hemp discusses practical ways for individuals and organizations to “subdue the multiheaded monster of information overload”. Hemp discusses the problem for both individuals and for organizations and provides strategies to help you manage information effectively.

• Those who are successful in business must be able to recognize, manage, and innovate around risk. By focusing on the negatives of risk, opportunities for innovation and growth might be missed. In “Creating Growth from Effective Opportunity Risk Management” (Corporate Governance Quarterly, pp. 16-20, Summer 2009, www.icsacanada.org), Tamara Bekefi, Marc Epstein and Kristi Yuthas discuss a risk and opportunity management process that will provide you with a model supplemented by tools and techniques to foster and manage innovation for improved decision-making.

• Success in today’s economy requires both knowledge of current trends as well as the ability to spot new trends. Two articles in The Futurist (43(4), July-August 2009, www.wfs.org) discuss this topic. In “Ten Forces Driving Business Futures” (pp.40-43), Michael Richarme discusses his perspectives on the ten most important social trends that will unfold over the next 20 years. Richarme concludes that organizations that engage in proactive long-range research will be the ones that will survive — it is important to be future vigilant. In “Assessing Global Trends for 2025” (pp. 30-36), Patrick Tucker interviews four policy experts who discuss prospects for United States influence in the global economy. Tucker's interviews grew out of the November 2008 National Intelligence Council Study “Global Trends 2025: a Transformed World” which lays out the possibility of a very different future to what we have become accustomed.

• When executives are developing strategy they typically scan the environment in which they operate and then create a business strategy. A second approach, discussed by Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne, in “How Strategy Shapes Structure” (Harvard Business Review, 87(9):73-80, September 2009, www.hbr.org), is a reconstuctionist approach where an organizations strategies shape structure. With this second approach, the business environment does not set the boundaries for shaping strategy. The authors describe the key differences between the two approaches and identify circumstances under which each one is appropriate. They conclude that business will need to learn to apply each approach as circumstances dictate.