Share the gold mine - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

Share the gold mine - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog A Fast Company article from 2002 tells the story of a Canadian gold mine threatened by bankruptcy: McEwen [the owner] believed that the high-grade ore was present in parts of the 55,000-acre Red Lake stake if only he could find it Eventually, the groups attention turned to the Linux operating system and the open-source revolution. I said, Open-source code! Thats what I want! McEwen recalls His reasoning: If he could attract the attention of world-class talent to the problem of finding more gold in Red Lake, just as Linux managed to attract world-class programmers to the cause of better software, he could tap into thousands of minds that he wouldnt normally have access to. He could also speed up exploration and improve his odds of discovery. He released all his corporate survey data from the companys land, information that is: The heart of any mining operation Very expensive to come by Normally an extremely well-kept secret He organized a contest on the internet to point out the best sites to dig. Anyone could access the survey data and participate. The first prize was $105.000. The result? The company has drilled four of the top 5 winners sites, and have found gold in all four. Which proves that you can get very valid and valuable results from this approach. The first prize winners? An australian geoscience outfit whod never been to the mine or even to Canada. Which proves that this approach can open new sources of information that youd not have access to otherwise. Corporate information is worth little when its locked up. Dont keep all data in your business a deep, dark secret. Insteat, open your companys inner workings to the world. The good and the bad! The perils of secrecy In the information age, many businesses have fallen into a trap: They have correctly identified information as the key to success or failure, but they have incorrectly concluded that the best way to profit from the information is to lock it away from the world. They make corporate information secret by default. This goes for financial information, project development, new partnerships, strategies and plans and virtually every other aspect of the business. Knowledge is our corporate, intellectual capital and we must protect it or it will be stolen from us. seems to be the thinking. But this approach comes at a cost: It reduces the efficiency of employees who dont know whats going on It makes the company look untrustworthy to the public It limits the potential for generating new ideas and partnership The opposite approach, to make all information public by default and only keep a few select areas secret, makes much more sense. This is especially true in an information-dense environment which carries a high probability that a companys dirty secrets will be revealed sooner or later. In fact, as we saw, releasing top-secret corporate data can be a gold mine. Literally. Heres another example. Be open with customers Another great example of the open approach is Semco. Yes I know I write about them all the time, but they get it, dammit. They get it and they do it. In his excellent book The Seven-Day Weekend, Ricardo Semler tells the story of a negotiation with a potential customer for a huge contract. Of course Semco had done their homework and made calculations showing what their profits would be depending on what price they could negotiate. At the meeting, Semler showed the customer these calculations, letting them know exactly how much Semco stood to make from the deal. This honest, open approach impressed the customer and Semco got the contract. Businesses should ask themselves these questions: What are we keeping secret and why? What information could we share, that would bring us new ideas, new partners and increased profits? What risks are involved in sharing this information? Are they offset by the benefits? What risks are involved in not sharing it? That last question is often left out, as businesses list the dangers of openness and ignore the dangers of secrecy. If you liked this post, Im pretty sure youll also like these: Why overpaid CEOs are bad for business Top 5 business maxims that need to go Why secret salaries are a baaaaaad idea Thanks for visiting my blog. If you're new here, you should check out this list of my 10 most popular articles. And if you want more great tips and ideas you should check out our newsletter about happiness at work. It's great and it's free :-)Share this:LinkedInFacebookTwitterRedditPinterest Related