{"id":4908,"date":"2019-06-20T23:16:58","date_gmt":"2019-06-20T21:16:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/?p=4908"},"modified":"2019-06-20T23:16:58","modified_gmt":"2019-06-20T21:16:58","slug":"coffee-with-tom-wells","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/","title":{"rendered":"Coffee with Tom Wells \u2013 Chief Disruption Officer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>How does a technology company, known for innovation and creativity, remain true to its ethos, whilst offering reliable and consistent service? This is not a new quandary. Business history lies littered with the carcases of organisations that might have begun the journey as creators and leaders but at some point, failed to transition, or to keep up with an ever-evolving environment.<br \/>\nKodak, Nokia and Blackberry are a few examples.<\/p>\n<p>In order to understand this further, I had a coffee with Tom Wells, director at Synthesis Software Technologies, a company that I have come to know and have written about prior.<br \/>\nTom is passionate about change and becomes easily frustrated by those who impose limits on themselves. \u201cWe so often create our own boundaries,\u201d he explains. \u201cWhat might have begun as the most creative companies often become \u2018machine operators\u2018. It makes no sense.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Tom, one of the ways to avoid this, is to establish a company ethos that celebrates the individual. That sounds great, but with a business to run, sales targets to meet, with deliverables, managing staff and everything else that is required to run a company, how does one do this? Tom suggests a few different ways.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Mentoring programs; underscoring the value of personal growth.<\/li>\n<li>Financial awareness programs for employees and their partners.<\/li>\n<li>Team meetings \u2013 at least a day a month out of the work environment to socialise with peers.<\/li>\n<li>Creative \u201chackathon\u201d sessions. This is the \u201ccreative writing\u201d equivalent of a technology company.<\/li>\n<li>The placement on the value of creativity over process and practice.<\/li>\n<li>Creation of an environment that is comfortable with working in the unknown.<\/li>\n<li>The removal of negativity and replacing with critical thinking.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For Tom, this approach is not purely about the work environment. He believes that it is critical to understand that the world is evolving and that with the exponential rate of change that we have become used to, it is unlikely that his children will have the luxury of becoming \u201ca\u201d something. It might be frightening in some ways, but it is also very exciting.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe cannot allow ourselves to build frameworks or structures that limit our thinking and our vision for the future. It\u2019s not as simple as it sounds, as we always need to balance efficiency with creativity. It\u2019s a very fine balance.\u201d Tom believes that a good way to look at this is to approach a company as we would approach the education of our children. Everything is a balance between not curtailing creativity, but also raising people who are practical, efficient and are able to achieve success.<\/p>\n<p>The benefit of this approach to Synthesis clients is that they are not viewed as corporations but as entities that have personalities and requirements that are unique. \u201cSo often, we consider this space \u2013 particularly \u2018cloud\u2019 to be cold and impersonal. This couldn\u2019t be further from the truth. It is exactly the opposite. It is deeply personal and nuanced. I believe that that is what Synthesis has to offer that others might not.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Coffee ends with Tom dashing off to his next meeting. He is energised and excited by what the day holds and there is not a minute to be wasted.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At Synthesis we are aware that personalization needs personality. That is why we nurture an environment of creativity and innovation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":4919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"ptype":[11],"sectors":[],"class_list":["post-4908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-conversation","ptype-articles"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.0 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Coffee with Tom Wells \u2013 Chief Disruption Officer - Synthesis<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read: &#039;Coffee with Tom Wells \u2013 Chief Disruption Officer&#039; and more on the Synthesis blog for insights on the latest in the Tech and Software development industry.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Coffee with Tom Wells \u2013 Chief Disruption Officer\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Read: &#039;Coffee with Tom Wells \u2013 Chief Disruption Officer&#039; and more on the Synthesis blog for insights on the latest in the Tech and Software development industry.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Synthesis\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-06-20T21:16:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/coffee-with-tom-wells.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Howard Feldman\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Howard Feldman\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Howard Feldman\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/#\/schema\/person\/64e3454a50e96803d32dae5aa3d76490\"},\"headline\":\"Coffee with Tom Wells \u2013 Chief Disruption Officer\",\"datePublished\":\"2019-06-20T21:16:58+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/\"},\"wordCount\":541,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/coffee-with-tom-wells.png\",\"articleSection\":[\"Conversations\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.synthesis.co.za\/coffee-with-tom-wells\/\",\"name\":\"Coffee with Tom Wells \u2013 Chief Disruption Officer - 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