Perry

Hewitt

Tag: harvard

  • Understanding Truthiness in Digital Media

    Yesterday the Berkman Center hosted a conference focused on defining and dissecting the ways propaganda and (mis)information spread online. As usual, the stellar participants contributed along with the presenters to deliver a thoughtful and provocative event.

    There are already several liveblogs, and Storifies, and a whole host of tweets tagged #truthicon from people able to stay for the full day. The morning session I saw reminded me that amid all the technology excitement (at its annual peak with the Dow high and SXSWi this weekend) there’s a lot to watch out for with the deliberate and accidental creation and spread of misinformation online – there was good fodder here for the tech dystopian crowd. Individuals and institutions need to think about how we educate ourselves in the critical thinking and practical tactics to get the truth out there as we all wade into the fray.

  • What new leadership looks like

    Last week I was lucky to hear two fascinating talks: from Bill George, HBS prof and author of True North, and Wael Ghonim, the Google employee and internet activist who energized pro-democracy demonstrations in Egypt just over a year ago.

    The theme that emerged for me was distributed leadership. George spoke about IBM’s collaborative organizational structure and shifting definition of leadership. In a workforce of 440,000 employees, he described IBM as cultivating 40,000 of them for some kind of leadership role. Ghonim focused on current and future challenges for Egypt and pointed to the importance of the many “ordinary” young Egyptians in the uprising — while disavowing narratives that position him as the movement’s hierarchical leader. (Good NPR review of his book, Revolution 2.)

    The point about the death of command-and-control and emergence of new, global organizational models is not a new one. What was striking to me was two such different men with vastly different life experiences, both underscoring the imperative of reaching that conclusion.