With the first billboard going up in town, Iâve been asked about whether my free wifi programme will cost ratepayers.
In a word, no. The wifi programme will be supported by selling the space on the home page.
Upkeep of such a service, and I am looking at several alternatives, is in the low five figures, though considering the benefits to Wellingtonâs GDP is measured in the millions, itâs a sound investment.
Where it could wind up costing Council is in the expansion of such a network. However, there are low-cost ways of doing that. The high figure is NZ$250,000 to roll it out to different areas, but lower figures have been proposed.
I would like to roll out free wifi to more than the central city, targeting neighbourhoods that could benefit from the educational uses of the internet. Newtown and Johnsonville seem to be communities that could benefit most greatly.
Iâd do this after the central city programme was successful and I think the figures will support my intentionally conservative estimates. There will be ratesâ gains to Wellington City thanks to productivity, improved businesses, and new businesses. If all indicators look good, then the rollout will continue to cost ratepayers the grand sum of zero dollars.
There are other ways, too, to make free wifi pay. Last week, two of my supporters sent me an article on Starbucksâ plans to capitalize on its free wifi service.
In Starbucksâ case, itâs launching a network that has premium content in news, entertainment, wellness, business and careers, and âMy Neighborhoodâ.
No money is changing hands: instead, the companies, such as Apple, are paying Starbucks for the opportunity to get new business.
And if Starbucks can do it, why canât Wellington City? The idea of opening up the home page to advertisers (incidentally, there is already interest, and we havenât even launched) is the same principle, albeit in a limited way. Expanding it during year one to include premium content from Kiwi creatives can only be a good thing for how we see our city.
Writing about cars calms me. So call me a freak. And maybe Iâve just needed to chill more in this last month as we head into the last few months of the mayoral campaign.
It surprises me that Autocade has reached 1,200 models: 100 in the past month. And since I knew we were about to hit 1,200, then subconsciously I did want something flash to mark that number:
I didnât want a repeat of 1,100 when the Nissan Cherry was the landmark model. (There actually was a miscount, but I wonât go in to that.)
And in the 1,100â1,200 cycle, I managed to find yet another likely error (about a Ford development code) in Wikipediawhich I harped on about over at my Tumblog. As I said in the 1,100-car post, Autocade is not perfect and I find errors in my own work. However, I donât intentionally put wrong information in, and the Wikipedia error with the Ford CE14 code is like saying, in car-nut terms, that Margaret Thatcher was a member of the Labour Party. This error has now propagated all over the internet so that, if Wikipedia editors were to check, they would find plenty of pages to support a mistake of which their site could have been the source.
As some of you know, I was at Cape Kidnappers last week, visiting the Napier area for the first time. (I tried getting there last October, but this was as far as I got.)
It was for the Audi A8 launch, and we at the office had a good laugh at this lovely and kind message that the company sent after the event:
The venue found some clothes in one of the rooms so if you are missing a pair of trousers and a jacket, we have them here.
Maybe itâs my warped sense of humour at this place, but the first thing I said to the team was, âIâm pretty sure I was wearing trousers when I got back on the plane, so it wasnât me.â
The conversation descended from there.
This weekâs humour spot: âSince Blogger/Google is USA based, they support the principles of âfree speechâ and of âinnocence until proven guiltyâ. Even genuine spammers are permitted to speak here, until they cross the line and become disruptive.â
As someone who has had legitimate comments deleted from the Google forums, and experienced that the actual stance is âguilty until proven innocence (sic)â, then this was another good laugh via the internet.
My friend and colleague at the Medinge Group, Ava Hakim, passed on a few papers from her day job at IBM. The first is the latest edition of a biennial global CEO survey, while the second asks the next generation of leadersâGeneration Y. The aim: to find out what these groups think about the challenges and goals for CEOs.
Unsurprisingly, both studies (involving thousands of respondents) had commonalities, though Generation Y placed global awareness and sustainability more highly on their list. Creativity, however, is ranked as the most valuable leadership trait. What society doesnât need, they tell us, is the same-again thinking if we are to make progress in the 2010s. The old top values of âoperational excellenceâ or âengineering big dealsâ no longer come up top in this new decade.
Or, as I heard from one gentleman yesterday, we canât afford to have the sort of âexperienceâ certain people tout, for they do not have 25 yearsâ experienceâthey just have one yearâs experience, over and over again, 25 times.
You know Iâm going to say it, so I might as well: this sounds like the sort of âexperienceâ some of my political opponents have had, day in, day out. Groundhog Day comes to mind.
Indeed, the studies indicate that we have a far more complex world, and same-again thinking isnât going to cut it.
In the first study (emphasis in original):
Creativity is the most important leadership quality, according to CEOs. Standouts practice and encourage experimentation and innovation throughout their organizations. Creative leaders expect to make deeper business model changes to realize their strategies. To succeed, they take more calculated risks, find new ideas, and keep innovating in how they lead and communicate.
The most successful organizations co-create products and services with customers, and integrate customers into core processes. They are adopting new channels to engage and stay in tune with customers. By drawing more insight from the available data, successful CEOs make customer intimacy their number-one priority.
Later:
Facing a world becoming dramatically more complex, it is interesting that CEOs selected creativity as the most important leadership attribute. Creative leaders invite disruptive innovation, encourage others to drop outdated approaches and take balanced risks. They are open-minded and inventive in expanding their management and communication styles, particularly to engage with a new generation of employees, partners and customers.
And:
Creative leaders consider previously unheard-of ways to drastically change the enterprise for the better, setting the stage for innovation that helps them engage more effectively with todayâs customers, partners and employees.
The study also highlights an increase in globalization, especially in developing markets, leading to greater complexity. It also says the most successful leaders are prepared to change the business models under which they operate.
In fact, the world we now live in demands that our leaders are globally aware, and see the need to compete in a global market-place.
The implications for this city are that Wellington can no longer afford to see itself as merely the capital of New Zealand or the geographic centre. It is one of many cities that must compete for attention and resources at a global levelâwhich means creating world-class centres of excellence for our industries. Creating such clusters can even help them stay domestically owned.
The study indicates that the style of leadership is going to be, necessarily, internationalistâwhich means we canât afford to have leaders who are monocultural, and fake multiculturalism. This, like any aspect of a brand, must be embodied for real. It doesnât mean giving up what âbeing a New Zealanderâ is; it does, however, mean that we have to be able to communicate with other nations and cultures, seeking advantages for ourselves.
Innovation is a driver both in terms of internal processes and as a core competenceâso leaders had better be prepared to do this. And being closer and more transparent with customersâor in the case of a city, citizensâis something practised by the most successful leaders, says the study. It reminds me of the topics in the first book I contributed to, Beyond Brandingâwhere integrity and transparency were at the core.
When it comes to the Generation Y study, the results were similar. This table summarizes the two quite well, and notes how the two groups differ:
I donât want to be giving the impression that the second study is less important, but realize that some of you are sorely tempted to see me wrap up this post.
I will say, quickly, that the lessons are clear: the next generation expects leaders to be globally minded and sustainable.
Chinese respondents in the second study, in fact, valued global thinking ahead of creativity. This perhaps highlights where the Peopleâs Republic, above the other Chinese territories, is heading: looking outwardly first and delivering what customers in export markets want.
As creativity is naturally a trait among Wellington businesses, itâs nice to know that many are already prepared for the challenges of the 2010s. And some of our most successful names would not have got to where they are without global thinking, even if some have been acquired by overseas companies: 42 Below, Weta, and Silverstripe come to mind.
However, I canât see these traits being reflected in politicsâand thatâs something I hope we can change in the local body elections, for starters.
I learned the sad news that Norman Macrae, CBE, ææ„ç« , passed away on June 11, just shy of his 87th birthday.
Norman was one of the great visionaries and forecasters of the 20th century, and served as deputy chief editor of The Economist till his retirement in 1988.
Among his forecasts was the fall of the Berlin Wall, the advent of the internet, the move toward teleworking, and the pressing concerns of sustainability and the global income gap.
His work included a series of âretrospectivesâ written from a future date, which continued Normanâs trade-mark analysis on current and emerging trends in the global economy. With his son, and my friend, Chris, Norman authored The 2024 Report, whose predictions of broadband internet and its implications, made in 1984, only began coming true over the last decade. At the time, critics said Macrae and son were too optimisticâalthough history has proved them right.
I sent my condolences to Chris earlier today. The world has lost one of its foremost business editors, a great socioeconomic expert, and visionary.
Without Chris I would not have joined the Medinge Group, and it was through him that I realized so many of the Economist forecasts that I had read over the years were the work of his father.
I understand The Economist will publish an obit this week.
Certain media are reporting the cityâs [debt] in the $200 millionâ$300 million mark but our outside-council research reveals this is a very conservative estimate. Itâs likely to be more.
Regardless of whether itâs $200 million or half an (American) billion (scary just saying it), any deficit thatâs nine digits long canât be good for a relatively small city.
One of my plans after I get into office will be to balance the budget, which is why I have been going on about growing jobs and businessesin such a big way. In a very shortcut way of explaining it: more new businesses, more ratepayers, fewer reasons to increase the rates. Which, I might add, this current administration has already locked in for us over the next few years, letting the next mayor get the blame.
I object to any cuts in library services, even if there is a strong denial that that is happening. In a knowledge economy, we cannot afford to create a class system of the knowledge-rich and the knowledge-poor.
On this note, recently I asked Don Christie of the New Zealand Open Source Society to examine an open-source strategy for Wellington City. For starters, we discussed how the library software is a proprietary system that costs this city a considerable amountâwhen there is a New Zealand-developed open-source program that many other cities have implemented.
While it would be nice to keep believing we can afford expensive software to run city services, I donât like debt, and I certainly donât like owing people any money.
And Iâm not prepared to sell off our water to technocrats or any profitable part of the family jewels to see the hundred-million figure reduced.
There are good examples of open source working for cities and creating significant savings. Zaragoza, Spain, has been moving to a complete open-source desktop. And itâs not the only one.
Furthermore, open source will mean jobs in Wellington. This will mean new jobs. I have already gone on about the tech clusters being a vital part of this cityâs economy. Open-source skills are in high demand, and if overseas trends are anything to go by, we can attract these skilled people to our city. Already Wellington is a centre of excellence in many IT-related fields. Iâm talking about extending this and making a real claim to open-source. Let the world know that Wellington is the home of not just the most advanced software and visual effectsâ companies, but logically extend that to open source as well.
Itâs projected that by 2020, 40 per cent of jobs in IT will be open-source-related, so if we donât do it, another New Zealand city will. Iâm not about to give up one of our most important advantages, one which has been emerging in the capital since the 1990s.
Such moves can be done with the city and Wellingtonâs private enterprises working togetherâbut this will need to come from the top, and be put in motion by a mayor whoâs passionate about job creation. Itâs one of the biggest challenges we face, and I seem to be a lone voice on focusing on this for our city.
There have been a few times in the history of this blog where I stepped away from writing regularly. At the end of 2006, I had a pretty good excuse: I was in France. This time, my reasons for stepping away for a few weeks do not include: (a) I was spending too much time with the Miss Universe New Zealand contestants; (b) laziness; (c) being trapped in 1983 and discovering that DCI Gene Hunt controls the Lost island.
I was, however, chatting to a few more of the parties that we needed to realize some of my election promises. And doing a few media interviews. And looking at more ways Wellington could get nearer balancing its budget, as our deficit has ballooned over the last decade.
On May 15, I joined my opponent, Councillor Celia Wade-Brown, on Access Radioâs Espace Français, in what was my first political interview in French. I expected a nice-natured chat till our hosts said they wanted a political debate. So the Councillor and I gave the audience one, coming from very different angles. I believe we are the only two Francophone candidates. And I donât think Access does a Cantonese programme.
You can listen to the interview here, though they only store the programmes for six weeks. You can also download from this link.
I kept Leauna Zheng waiting for weeks while I prepared my emailed responses to her interview for Skykiwi, the leading Chinese expatsâ site in New Zealand. Despite her wait, she wrote a marvellous article (in Chinese, here), and for those of you relying on Google Translate, please note that the term Chinese expatriate is not translated correctly. (I believe this is the first Chinese-language interview to include my name in Chinese ideographs.)
And, finally, my interview with Bharat Jamnadas on Asia Down Under aired last Sunday. Heâs very kindly put it on YouTube, though the aspect ratio is a tad off and I look thinner than usual. There are very nice comments from two members of the Wellington business community, Laurie Foon of Starfish and Brent Wong of Soi, to whom I am extremely grateful.
The conversation at the end about Wellington v. Auckland was a good laugh, but there were some serious bits.
And this Tuesday just gone, it was a pleasure to play a âdragonâ in a Dragonâs Den-style setting analysing some of New Zealandâs entrepreneurs for New Zealand Trade & Enterprise.
My thanks to Bharat, Leauna, Kenneth Leong, Laura Daly at Access Radio, Jean-Louis Durand and Arlette Bilounga, and Maria Gray and David Powell.
I had a very insightful meeting today with one of the countryâs leading information strategists, which put things into perspective for me regarding the mayoral race.
His thoughts (though not exactly his words): Wellington has almost always voted for the right person at the right time. We needed someone like Mark Blumsky to give events and retail a boost in the 1990s. Some will argue that we needed his successor, the incumbent, Kerry Prendergast, to continue some of those policies in the early 2000s. As Wellingtonâs state sector grew, it could be argued that we needed property development, something intimately associated with the current mayor.
But with a shrinking state sector and economy, the next stage is not more and more buildings. Nor is it more politics as usual.
The reality is that the power is shifting to usâwe, the people.
The next stage in this new decade is entrepreneurship and building world-class businesses. It is about making Wellington a cosmopolitan, international city thatâs a world player. Itâs also about using the technology we have for greater transparency, increasing citizen participation. We all want a say in our city and our country.
Of course I agreed with his thoughts about what we need next, as they form the cornerstone of my campaign.
I firmly believe that most of us actually want to be engaged in local politics and reject that we under-45s are apathetic. Weâre more aware of whatâs going on in our world that we want to play a part.
Regardless of for whom people vote, I think itâs important we hear from the other 60-plus per cent of Wellingtonians who have traditionally stayed silent during the local body elections. With this growing awareness we now have of our world, I believe we will.
You have to love the thinking behind the local newspaper in Wellington when it comes to the mayoral election. We have five people shown here in their poll, one of whom (Councillor Foster) hasnât declared his candidacy.
Spot anyone whoâs missing?
Iâm very glad to say âNone of the aboveâ is leading at the time of writing, and I understand from my Facebook fan page that some are my supporters.
Ah, old media. Now youâll never know what the breakdown of the âNone of the aboveâ is!
As for me, I rather like being at the bottom of the table. It mirrors the alphabetical order of the polling form where I hope people will vote for me and âNone of the aboveâ!
PS.: Just received this post-Facebook-message screen shot, thanks to my supporters. Loving your support!âJY
