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There are three "waves" of e-business, according to Gartner analyst and former Sun Microsystems CIO Dennis Wayson. And if you want to successfully implement e-business, you need to know which wave you're in and what steps you should be taking to reach the next level.

Utility computing, a much-hyped vision of the future of enterprise computing, is finally coming into focus. For years, full-service technology vendors such as Hewlett-Packard, IBM, and Sun Microsystems have touted a future in which all the components in a data center coexist in a flexible fabric that lets business-technology managers allocate and reallocate server capacity, storage capacity, network bandwidth, and other resources as needed. They're beginning to offer pieces of that vision, and some customers are starting to test whether the concept delivers the promised benefits.

In this breakthrough business book, Pascale, Millemann and Gioja troll the emerging science of complexity for "ideas [that] can produce a concrete bottom-line impact." Extracting key "dynamics of survival" from the life sciences, these three management consultants successfully show business leaders how to turn their companies into agile and adaptable "living systems" that achieve long-term vitality and sustainability in a swiftly evolving environment. Their four "bedrock" principles are "Equilibrium is a precursor to death"; "Living things move toward the edge of chaos"; "Components of living systems self-organize" in response to turmoil; and "Living systems cannot be directed along a linear path." Writing with clarity and verve, the authors illustrate these larger points by comparing the functioning of organic systems (e.g., Yellowstone National Park), the behavior of organisms (dental plaque) and of insects (fire ants) with detailed case studies of five companies (British Petroleum, Hewlett-Packard, Monsanto, Royal Dutch/Shell and Sun Microsystems) and the U.S. Army. Practical-minded readers will appreciate their nitty-gritty insights into the relative advantages of "adaptive" and traditional "operational" leadership, as well as their consistent distillation of concrete business guidelines. While the authors aver that "there is no permanent victory in this eternal cycle of life and death," they make a persuasive case that "understanding living systems does not decisively win the game but, most assuredly, it improves the odds."
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

This book has an official website at:
http://www.surfingchaos.com

CEO of Sun Microsystems Inc.

As the former president and CEO of Netscape Communications Corporation from 1995 to 1999, Barksdale now heads his own company, the eponymous Barksdale Group, which finances, advises, and services Internet start-ups. (His Netscape tenure ended when Netscape merged with America Online.) A native of Mississippi, Barksdale also held top positions at AT&T Wireless Services, Federal Express Corporation, and IBM. Now, in addition to running his own company, he's on the board of directors of AOL Time Warner, Federal Express, Sun Microsystems, Inc., and a number of other technology-oriented firms.

My mantra is "Look for the Second Right Answer." This has been my guiding principle for over thirty years. Much of our educational system tries to teach us to look for the "one right answer."

I find that looking for the second right answer is an incredibly easy way to open my mind. For example, when I'm looking for information, this mantra tells me to go beyond the right answers that have worked in the past and look for others. When I'm trying to be creative, it playfully advises me to put my ideas in unusual contexts to give them new meanings.

When I'm evaluating concepts, it implores me not to get stuck in the negative, and not to fall in love with one particular approach. And, when I'm implementing ideas, it reminds me that if one idea doesn't work, a different one just might, and to act accordingly.

Don't fall in love with ideas. By ideas I mean: systems, marketing approaches, technologies, partnerships, whatever. Because as soon as you as you fall in love with one approach, you lose sight of other possibilities. ...Every right idea eventually becomes the wrong idea.