Disqus - Latest Comments for gwong

Re: The Reputational Damage of Non-Responsiveness

gwong — Mon, 12 Aug 2013 06:38:16 -0000

totally agree with you Brad

what I find is the middle level guys/ staffers (who probably is eyeing another job) who would behave like this more often, as they would prefer not to say NO (just in case)

therefore, I would try do deal with founders of funds or the very top guys if poss both LPs & GPs..

but even at that level, some might do what you described, and sadly I have to do what you did also as it is in my nature to help but yes, I also remember those moments when they went silent on me. ;-)

sometimes I feel as though we nice guys just have to help to 'be true to ourselves" but sadly in some situations do get 'exploited'.. we just have to decide our own 'rules' and stick with it.

(just to fore-warn others, I generally cannot reply to everyone).

BR
@GarethWong

Re: Fracking 'backfire' fear over lack of staff and rigs

gwong — Mon, 12 Aug 2013 05:35:41 -0000

In short term government/industry's perspective, it is understandable the long term effects of spillage or 'possible' & long term environmental effects might not come high on the priority list.. you just need to look at the "dead zone" in gulf of mexico, that is without moving the deep earth and fracking deep earth's stones for gas.. that problem is just watering plants and used too much chemical/fertilizer upstream.. who takes responsibilities? some might argue that the typical answer is "not me" from almost everyone. Who suffers? the fishermen & economy downstream that rely on having their seashore just 'being normal'.. sadly it is not! see: (Gulf of Mexico "dead zone" puts seafood industry at risk - CBS News http://bit.ly/142fymj )

We are inn 2013, surely some clause/regulations should be built in as government propose/support the next big thing (brilliant, we need cost effective, and abundance & readily available natural resources for sure), some form of pooled/profit reserve need to be put together for future potential/possible disasters that might happen 2-3 governments down the line..

as without this kind of forward planning, who will really suffer and who can really fix the problems arises?? possibly no one as our world economy is still focusing on maximising shareholders (not stakeholders) value. Thus when the sh*t hit the fan, those people that put together the new regime is long gone and might be relaxing in their private island(s) by then.

Its easy to survive without seafood (comparatively) but if it affects your own water supply or your house's foundation (yes, your own 'castle'), this might not a pretty prospect.

Therefore, ontop of shortage of people and rigs, this might be much more important area to consider ontop of having cost effective supply of energy (of course it is important but balance need to be drawn somewhere!).

happy & keen to learn more if there are any lessons learnt from other Fracking pioneers that have these areas addressed.

Re: 68% of CEOs have ‘no presence’ on any social media (but they like LinkedIn)

gwong — Wed, 07 Aug 2013 20:35:05 -0000

Given the tenure of major CEOs are typically between 3-5years, it is understandable that they focus on what is needed (whilst they are still in power or has the job), namely offline meetings/gatherings/functions.

50%+ of all my connections are of the top calibre CEOs mentioned above, my typical observations of them on Linkedin are:

1.) the more senior/demanded/important they are, more likely they would rely on PA (unless banking/media/tech), thus connecting on Linkedin would take even 3-5years since I invited them (typically when they are about to change job) of course we are in touch meanwhile, and when schedule allows, some do make time to join my non profit private CXO Europe/Asia gatherings

2.) they start actively using social network and status update when they are are on holiday/ or about to change job/looking for jobs/has new investments/JVs

3.) start using personal email address when they are not in their job, but they would typically keep their CEO/Chairman title until they find something.

4.) only the really media/tech savvy one would be actively engaging via multiple social media networks, and they typically would have their own domains/ blog sites (very small minority)

5.) big percentage of them (I would agree with above, I would say 70-80%) rely solely on emails and indeed they are so important that they already speak in major industry/charitable/foundations events and also host industry functions etc. Therefore, to be frank, they are JUST too busy!! some has their time slot managed down to 15 minute slots.. and therefore no, they would not have time to entertain 'why' they should have a linkedin profile or twitter account.. these are the people that get personal invites from World economic forum and sign off on half a million budget or more for just one WeF meeting!

Therefore, my thinking is that the study can be improved next time by looking at the use of social media of 'just has been's.. and you may find the % of CEO using social media is dramatically increased (especially on Linkedin).

Twitter/facebook sadly is still too 'social' and frankly too mis-understood and rather scary, especially for publicly listed firm's CEOs, and I totally understand and respect why they try to stay away... and some might argue rightly so!?

Fact of the matter is, social media bring huge amount of transparency, potential connections, but at the level of CEOs of firms with US$5m+/£3m+ profit or even in billion dollar+ firms, there is only one way to build trust, that is via face to face (hopefully via trusted contacts' introductions) and it will still be a year or so before any deal is done (unless it is a straight forward/buy &Sell or government backed project). Mutual Trust & personal chemistry can only be built by having more meetings and OVER time.

How we do business sadly has not changed much, namely we still need to shake the hands (I especially scared of the dead fish hands!), look into their eyes and see how they act with you and other people.. & see how they follow up.

Saying that, it is not only for top CEOs, even for the tech sector! why else do you see so many meetups /hackathorns and startup events worldwide now? For me it is even harder work as you have to meet with millions of failing/about to failed Zuck to hopefully to have made friends with the future Zuck.. pure number games and deal flow it seems.

IMHO, this trend will persist unless/until there is some market/economic incentive for CEOs to engage via social media like LinkedIn (or even Twitter), so far, most would like to just do their job (might use social media to keep tap of what others are doing).. and stay alive and hopefully will hop into a even better job in 3-5years time... (Reid & Jeff, ping me if you wanted my suggestion to help you get to 50/80%)

from my personal experience, Twitter need to improve on its private twitter functions before many top CEOs would embrace it. It took me 2 years before I use it, and now I have my private twitter account and public reach out one, rather complicated and I do not see any benefit (yet).

good luck to us all navigating the maze and hope the social network firms we invested time in using will not go bust and all our connections/data created lost! ;-)

(see my last blog response: @GarethWong: my comments, indeed! and your present lives in facebook could also be lost! In a Rush to Modernize, MySpace Destroyed More History @ianmilligan1 http://bit.ly/176TKrS )

@GarethWong

Re: The Best TED Talks By B-School Professors

gwong — Tue, 30 Jul 2013 05:54:40 -0000

He is not a professor (as he is too busy practising & helping Ogilvy to make money & form industry/world opinions) but if he was, he would one of the best one...

I would suggest to add this lecture by @RorySutherland The next revolution will be psychological not technological - YouTube http://bit.ly/1e7SGGT

Re: Why Big Corporations Are Putting the Brakes on Social Media | Blog | Daily Dose | Entrepreneur.com

gwong — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 18:55:57 -0000

there might be good reasons for this.

IMHO, social media engagement need to be top down, rather than bottom up.. especially for big corporations, as social media executives would need to be 'empowered' to engage, escalate, and hopefully resolve potential challenges.. (otherwise, it would just be lip service, which would be counter productive, and created many faux pas..)

but in big corporations, the leaders are generally not really that 'secure' (unless they founded the firm and/or have majority ownership, i.e. tenure not certain, but even so, maximum 3-6years) ... thus, opportunity cost dictates that they should put most energy into

1.) growing the company top & bottom line (esp. for listed firms)
2.) doing the internal & external politics
3.) looking at doing more M&A (either for real growth or to confuse market/shareholders)

than investing into social media..

and sadly, bigger the firm, the more 'old school' the leaders are.. some top guys I know now still don't do their own emails, but with their daily schedules managed down to 10/15minutes slots.. therefore, not likely they would be able to use let alone understand the need of social media...

At the end of the day though, surely this is great opportunities for the smaller/mid size firms as they can use social media to level the playing field.

in fact this is a great status quo, maybe not so for the sudden arrival of multitude of social media experts/gurus who are trying to sell their services.. ;-)

just a thought.

@garethwong

@cxoeurope

Re: Entrepreneur friendly Britain

gwong — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 22:01:10 -0000

Indeed, this are all great news for entrepreneurs in UK indeed.

there is also likes of http://www.newentrepreneurs...

don't forget the multitude of networks and events..

Question is that will we have more quality entrepreneurs (present & future) to rise up for the challenges & opportunities.. certainly hope so, as we need everyone to chip in to create great companies and build up economies and not just a lot of noise & no substances.. we need endurance runners not people that are after 5/15min of fame across the whole value chain.

now back to work (for me).

@GarethWong
http://GW.CXOVIP.org

Re: Morgan Stanley Exec Who Bit Off A Colleague’s Ear “Mike Tyson-Style”: Current Vice Chairman Of Deutsche Bank Securities

gwong — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 13:25:42 -0000

this happened in 1999, you would have thought:

1.) there would be a picture of this said russian ex-model surface by now
2.) more juicy & bizzare story coming out from the excess of the lavish money market.. ?

Re: Blog :: Joseph Javier Perla

gwong — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 05:21:04 -0000

Joseph, curious to see your thoughts about Google, tried their adwords etc.?

@GarethWong

Re: Dip Station

gwong — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 14:33:04 -0000

could you put us in touch with their owner so we can be informed when Frank is ready to ship in London? thats brilliant! thks you two!

Re: Bessemer's Top 10 Laws of eCommerce: Introduction

gwong — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 19:59:51 -0000

These are great rules, thanks for sharing.

Surely though, the biggest elephant in the room is what can be done to accelerate the adoption of e-/m-commerce by the 92.9% of people that are paying for goods?? or am I missing something??

therefore, if that is the case, guess the 10 points above address that or do you think this merits a new point??

my first thought by glancing through ..

@GarethWong

Re: LAUNCH - Blog - How to name your startup (and land the perfect domain)

gwong — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 20:39:00 -0000

I think the above is a great, and long post instructive post on how best to choose name and paying over the odds for the 'online real-estate'..

One cannot but in noticing one thing, as per my lunch conversation with a major bankers in Pall Mall, London, the key part of the equation is somehow totally missed or ignored to this day, which is: WHAT IS THE BUSINESS?? WHAT are they selling??

but of course maybe it is so obvious that it was not even necessary to be mentioned by even one line in this otherwise fantastic post.

maybe I am just tired and didn't "see it"..

@GarethWong

Re: Why e-commerce IPOs will soon be the smarter buy

gwong — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 09:10:31 -0000

good one indeed. ultimately, it is still 'cash flow' is king. sometimes people forget cos they got hype or 'recognitions' which sometimes are meaningless and unsustainable!

Re: Holiday Web Shoppers Are Spending. But Not at Mom and Pop’s Web Site.

gwong — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 21:42:40 -0000

The Web democratise content, but sadly without ways of bridging 'trust & confidence' means invariably, most still do NOT transact online, but even if they do, they skewed towards those with best price and services (which most likely will get best perceived offers from the big/consolidated brands)

It is sadly at present unlike YouTube democratising content.. it does not bode well for retailers.. as despite the great 'market place' of likes of eBay.. it is still 'buyers beware'.. but one would trust the local market more vs. market in Istanbu.. but eBay is still mostly black art for most of the mass market (we are not talking about internet 'penetration' here)..

the pervasive retail environment is still sadly a LONG way away..

@GarethWong

Re: Managing high impact/low probability opportunities

gwong — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 08:37:54 -0000

Hows your integration of 3i's portfolio going? did you guys acquired the partners also or just the portfolio?

good post as ever.

@GarethWong

Re: Cool Map: Asia’s Dominant Social Networks

gwong — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 07:02:48 -0000

This map is much needed so far..

just hope you can keep up the good work and keep updating it as much as you can!

many thanks

@GarethWong

Re: Say it ain’t so? A Red Bull MVNO?

gwong — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 07:42:54 -0000

Make perfect sense..

Redbull is great for marketing/PR..

but are they good at CRM?

would be interesting to see.

@GarethWong

Re: Social Media and the Future of Newspapers

gwong — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 18:29:23 -0000

I would agree with Thomas, don't be anti-social..

other than LinkedIn, I was very much against & had no time for blogs, twitters etc.

now through twitter, I manage (when I try) to learn outside of my industries (finance/insurance/gaming/gambling/strategy) and learn more about agencies/media etc. and seeing this post/video is a testament.

However, TRUST is a key point and as one of the lady say, because of its physical, the 'trust' aspect goes up dramatically.. and I am not sure if the internet/social/mobile media could ever 'replace' that .. unless/until some short hand to aid and bridge this trust & confidence gap..

the fact that as Thomas suggested, we should all have a blog, its madness not to.. this would sadly ultimately make the trust issue worst.. like X-Factor, and how the judges smirk at some guys/girls who really don't have talent.. a lot of people's 'blogs' might or might not be useful.. and thus might discourage others to join the blogsphere..

thought provoking stuff..

thanks for this

@GarethWong

Re: Seedcamp 2009

gwong — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 19:40:53 -0000

thks.
;)

btw, some semi-heated discussion going on about seedcamp.

might be interesting to hear your thoughts on this Fred.

http://blog.crowdstorm.co.u...

am looking at this closely and hope to be able to pull some cross EU/Asia transparent C-combinator, given the above post though, seems like it might be more complicated than I imagined.

BR
@GarethWong

Re: Seedcamp 2009

gwong — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 20:23:35 -0000

wonder if you can share your insight Fred.

how about the other side of the equation? do you feel there are as many gr8 VCs as ready to invest vs. SFO or even NYC? my limited experience observe that not only there is a divergence of smaller markets (vs US), a good percentage of guys/ladies, that made it tend to disperse and focus on 'lifestyle' and 'link out' rather than in some way compete (amicably mostly) and look for bigger/next big deals..!?

happy to hear your feedback here or via private email/DM.

How about Asia?

thanks

@GarethWong

Re: Is Apple the Enemy of the TV Industry? Microsoft Thinks So

gwong — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 03:26:46 -0000

Co-creation plus converged distribution (TV/satellite, internet, mobile etc.) to bring perceived or measured value will be the future, as consumers would be happy to keen to pay for such service.

In order for that to happen, the market need co-creating throughout the value chain.. which sadly not enough is being done at the moment, as businesses are mostly focusing on their 'own patch'..

but it will happen.

@GarethWong

Re: Extroversion

gwong — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 19:21:21 -0000

Fred. you are very brave.
Pioneers generally are.

I have not come across you until I started using Twitter (a yr after I created the a/c in 08) as I never read any blogs (was a not so entrepreneurial corporate telecom guy)..

It is a balancing act, but really depends on who the writer is, their work and their likely extravert lifestream's impact might have on their job/common perception of them.

I have just started to be cautiously opened on twitter & facebook (doing pretting much same thing) but update on my works/tribulations/challenges and people I meet around the world. It has given more transparency and in some ways helps when to establish contacts with some key guys and vice versa.

However, I am also dreading that it might become a 'chore' and my life might be too 'opened' up, professionally (I try to keep all family stuff private, unless for specific friends/industry colleagues after many years, y. very old school)..

My gut feel is that brave pioneers like you at the top of the profession is the exception, rather than the norm. but thankfully with likes of twitter etc. we can filter the normal/mundane out comparatively easily to find some limited Gems..

keep up the good work and sharing of insights, role model for some of us, but sadly I still have NO time as an entrepreneur to share insights via original blog posts.. .. yet.

Belated happy birthday. (e.g. another example, I try to keep my birthday private also!)

@GarethWong

Re: From Wall Street Analyst to Game Producer?

gwong — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 17:16:03 -0000

I totally agree, having been in manufacturing, telecoms, technology and gaming + financial services now. I have noticed that smart guys/girls spanning multiple industries, they can take a out of the box view/strategy..

problems is people tend to be narrow minded.
convergence is the future.

@GarethWong

Re: Strategy is the key

gwong — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 12:47:54 -0000

good post thanks.

I do go to spain (Madrid/barcelona) few times a year for mostly non Web2.0 business (finance/insurance/remote gaming/& networking with top CXOs)

my limited observation is that the 'culture' is very different.

there are still limited number of people walking around with ipod yet, and people are still enjoying chats at the jamon bar/pubs

and most importantly, they READ on the train, in shades (where ever you can find) etc. proof: http://flic.kr/p/6FDSUx

I don't spend enough time there to know what people in private lives in front of the computer, but I also know another fact that they are in fact not technophobic, as a lot of non spainish don't know, spain and portugal is one of the most advanced EU country which people transact not on pc/mobile/tv but via bank's ATM.

So, in short, adapt to the local culture/habits, Web2.0 will still be applicable but maybe not as we know it in rest of europe or even the world.

Re: TWITTER ANALYSIS: 40% of Tweets Are Pointless Babble

gwong — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 20:05:41 -0000

Of course this maybe true on the whole of twitter-verse..

however, given selective following, searches and 'private' feed, I would argue that the % of pointless babble [PB] could be dramatically decreased ..

plus of course by unfollowing the worst offender of PBers..

I would like to argue that the above comments are NOT pointless babble at all. ;)

@GarethWong

Re: Chris and Malcolm are both wrong

gwong — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 12:56:05 -0000

This is all very interesting, and indeed thought provoking.

Despite being in Tech/Telecom world, until Twitter, I never read any blogs, and this world and @FredWilson was not in my B2B business world at all. & we are multi-billion mobile telecoms infrastructure world.

Your post will inspire me to spend more time on writing more decent 'blog' (yes I have one reluctantly but never wrote much on it)

I personally not really see in the next year or so, joe blog/grandma will join this information cloud in our present meaning/structure.

there is a convergence going on.
but I think the ultimate success might exactly be another black swan (not that I am supportive of the argument of the book), which comes from an unexpected party/business world.

But I firmly believe it will encompass one, hopefully all of these key aspects:

1.) Trust (up to PGP type of security, [not wishy washy types of username & password available now] on ID, to transit to tagging, transit of information/data)
2.) Reverse of the value chain (not search, not listing, but in fact DRIVEN by aggregated customers (B2B/B2C) requirements
3.) 100% pervasive (not ONLY limited to early adopters, technologist, but plain old grandma who can read/write/use tv remote) and not only from connected Mac/PC/TV or iPhone.

The future might or might not be free but we will be happy to pay for a service that 'we' value for that moment in time (via whatever channel, be it TV/Mobile/ATM/even god forbid post office!).

@GarethWong