By Robert Gelinas

© 2009.  All Rights Reserved

Outcome-Based Business Models synchronize vendor and client goals, eliminate adversarial dynamics, and create the best opportunity for a true “win/win.”

Allies Not Adversaries

When Ross Perot left EDS/GM and founded Perot Systems, one of the first market segments his new company sought to serve with IT Outsourcing services was the data center operations of State Governments.  What was unique about his approach was that his pricing model wasn’t based upon traditional man-hour rates, headcount, flat project fees, etc.  Instead, he simply asked to be paid as a percentage of the current operational cost savings he created with his services.

In effect, if Perot could reduce an organization’s existing IT operating costs by, say 30%, and he took a percentage of that, then the net savings was still a good deal for the client—with no “breakeven point” that had to be achieved at some theoretical point in the distant future before appreciating the savings, plus the cost of the operation was coming from existing budgets, and therefore already funded.  Plus, the more Perot was able to save them, the more he made.

A scenario like this puts both the vendor and the client into a business model of mutually compatible and synergistic goals.  The client values the tangible and desirable goal of lowering their costs/expenses, whereas the vendor believes their value proposition could genuinely result in major new operational efficiencies.  But rather than the vendor telling the client that they have to pay X in order to receive benefit Y, i.e. direct cause and effect, in Perot’s case, instead they made X a factor of Y.  If Y (benefit produced), then X (payment).

This logic effectively takes off the table the notion that the client could potentially end up paying X cost but maybe not receiving Y benefit as promised, essentially having to bear all the risk of the relationship and financial investment alone.  But the synergy of this approach goes further, creating the opportunity that the vendor might even deliver results superior to Y, and thereby increase their own ROI (2X?), by virtue of the business model structured to be in the vendor’s best interests to do so.  More value delivered to the client means the greater the vendor’s reward.

Fees for service as a percentage of savings isn’t the only example of this principle.  In some instances, direct costs savings might not be a practical objective – e.g. where an incremental investment is what is required to achieve a greater business goal.  That doesn’t mean that an Outcome Based Business Model is precluded.

For example, what if the goal for the client is to generate a specific revenue goal; or to achieve a certain degree of Gross Margin, Net Operating Income (NOI), Profitability, or Earnings Per Share (EPS); or perhaps to bring a deliverable product or service to market by a specific target deadline that gives the client a competitive advantage in their own market.  What about an Annual Growth Rate (AGR) target?  All of these goals can have a compensation component for the vendor who is able to make them happen.

Shared Risk

The obvious downside to the above thinking is that there exists the potential to shift virtually all of the risk of success over to the vendor, away from the client.  If the proposition is purely – “We’ll guarantee your success, Mr. Client, and after we do, then you can pay us” – who wouldn’t want that deal?

Sure, there’s always the inherent risk of operational disruption arising from any significant change to an environment or process, but one would think that after some proper due diligence, if you are talking about a credible vendor relationship that you would consider using anyway, if all other considerations are equal, and the only difference is a pricing structure that puts all the performance obligations on the vendor with no advance financial risk to the client until the success has been achieved – that’s a very compelling business proposition.

To be clear: the extreme interpretation of this idea here is analogous to the home contractor who tells you that their labor and materials are free until the job is done, when you’re 100% happy, and then you pay.  Unfortunately, the only vendors/contractors who offer such “deals” are those who are supremely confident in what their work will produce, the carrying cost of the job is not cost-prohibitive, and the risk of the client not being happy when done is highly unlikely.

This approach may be reasonable for small-scale endeavors.  But what about large, enterprise-class undertakings that might be months or even years in scope, involving many fulltime personnel and resources, where the ability to defer vendor compensation to the very end isn’t a financially viable strategy? Is an Outcome-Based Business Model still an option?

Yes.

When You’re Lost, Buy a Map

Embarking on a year-long or more, six- or seven-figure project, or multiple overlapping projects long-term, and doing so starting from scratch with a brand new third-party vendor, can appear to be a very risky proposition in terms of having any reasonable assurance of long-term success—regardless of how well-reputed or experienced a vendor is that you may be considering using.  The vendor may do everything right themselves, but a client’s own organization may have idiosyncrasies and nuances that just don’t integrate well with outside parties that create stumbling blocks and potential risks.

Plus, as noted above, it might be completely unreasonable/unviable for any outside vendor to be willing to take on most or all of the financial risk of a major, long-term endeavor prior to the execution and production of all deliverables and results.

In all likelihood, the client has some idea of what they wish to achieve, even if the roadmap to achieving it working in concert with an outside party isn’t fully understood.  The client may, indeed, have some idea of what it would take if they did it all themselves, hired and deployed all of their own resources, obtained all the requisite tools and implemented all the necessary best-practice processes, etc.  But knowing those facts is what likely prompted the client to seek out third-party help in the first place – i.e. in an effort to reduce costs, accelerate time frames, and produce a stronger result.  But the exact parameters of what it would take for a third party to achieve the client’s goals in terms of time and money and operational process are completely unknown.  And even if these variables were fully known, i.e. coming in the form of a traditional bid, a budgetary figure and target deadline does nothing to mitigate any of those risks and concerns associated with assuring long-term success.

So how can this dilemma be resolved?  Enter the expert Business Analyst.

All the pertinent variables in the “master equation” in terms of what needs to be accomplished and what it will take to do it successfully can be quantified.  Moreover, the business drivers that served as the catalyst for initiating and approving the project(s) themselves can be identified and quantified – i.e. in terms of the goal of increasing revenues and/or productivity, producing better margins, lowering operating costs, generating higher EPS, etc.  All of that data can then be synthesized into a Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) / Return on Investment (ROI) model.

That TCO/ROI Model can then serve as the foundation for an incremental Project Plan, broken down into phases/milestones, whereby “Success” can then be defined and quantified, not in terms of a single end result, but in terms of sequential achievements that a vendor can then potentially viably shoulder, taking on a measure of that risk and/or make an investment with sufficient confidence that their own operating costs are neither cost prohibitive nor is the outcome of the incremental deliverable uncertain.

For the client’s benefit, the production of this Gap Analysis, TCO/ROI Model, and Project(s) Development Roadmap is a relatively small investment in terms of both time and money – which is an investment that needs to be undertaken regardless of who ends up doing some or all of the work. That’s Key to understand.

Thus, the risk mitigation strategy becomes simple and clear:

1)     A client should first invest in a Development Roadmap, predicated upon objective and highly quantitative Business Analysis within the context of Client Defined Business Objectives

2)     The Roadmap then provides the Basis/Foundation for Incremental Win/Win Outcome-Based Business Model Transactions, with Shared Risk and Investment

3)     Vendor Integration and Partnering can then be evaluated moving forward based upon Pilot/Test projects to establish effective communication and collaboration processes, and the trust and confidence necessary to proceed with the execution of the full Development Plan

The Best of All Worlds

Outcome-Based Business Models, with shared risk and investment, is the most financially advantageous and lowest risk scenario for a Client-Vendor relationship – for both parties.  It is possible to enjoy such a business model, even in the context of large-scale business objectives if approached with the proper strategy and an incremental and evolutionary development process.

Robert Gelinas is the President and CEO of JPE Inc. Consulting (www.jpeincconsulting.com). He has spent over 20 years in the IT industry as a senior executive and sales and marketing leader, having built many national and international Enterprise IT sales and marketing organizations.  He has both an extensive Fortune 500 background as well as a wealth of successful Start-Up experience. He is also a published novelist, writer, publisher (www.archebooks.com) and frequent public speaker on both IT marketing and the writing and publishing industry.

In order for organizations to recognize sustainable success, an acute orchestration of various management elements has to occur. That’s management’s job, right? Whether you’re looking at an organization’s strategy, their capability for innovation, or how they regulate quality control or customer service; one thing is certain – regardless of whether you’re a Fortune 200 enterprise or a local municipality, an organization’s effort at attaining triumph has to be well planned and soundly executed.  Fairly standard biz stuff.

GM’s misery is not necessarily a result of the economic climate that has stagnated over the past 12 months. One can argue that ideas for strategy, innovation, or operational efficiency absent from GM’s white board several years ago led to their recent demise. Yet, within the same industry revenues from Toyota’s own Prius hybrid automobile skyrocketed as gasoline crept over $4.75 a gallon.

 If the Prius came out in 2005, then design and ideas for innovation had to be established when – 2003? 2002? That means that conceptually, management had to be kicking the idea around the water cooler sometime in, oooohhhh, 2001’ish? Their success didn’t happen over night, nor was it coincidence. In essence, pivotal design and innovation occurring years ago led to Toyota’s current leadership in the hybrid automobile market.  

In any given industry, it’s not uncommon to observe organizations catapulting themselves into the forefront while their respective competitors drop to the back of the line. Or hearing about how a prominent yet rather green manufacturer propels itself into a leadership position of market share, while other seasoned players see theirs diminish.  Whatever led to the organization’s outcome did not necessarily transpire that month, that quarter, or maybe even that same year. Managerial developments occurring in the past subsequently translated into recognized outcomes of the present.  Yet at the end of every quarter, the media predominately focuses on the quarterly financial performance of organizations as opposed to correlating performance outcomes with managerial actions – or in-actions.  Not very revealing.     

Strategy is a (long-term) road-map equivalent to creating instructions for a traveler looking to journey between Boston and Beijing. It encompasses understanding where you want the road-map to go and being able to determine elements such as differentiation, core competencies, image, and business opportunity relating to defined goals. Knowing that the market will constantly change at a rapidly dynamic pace, one can quickly calculate that this is not an easy task. A key challenge will be how to project future characteristics and attributes of market & industry conditions so that you cross the finish line with success.  Forecasting those conditions and then incorporating them into a corporate roadmap seems to be a missing ingredient with many organizations.

Here it is. We started.
From now, we’re moving from a tool that is usable but not so good as Owasp need to the next major release planned for June 2010.

To improve visibility and communication between the community, I will publish a montly report about the decisions take, what we done and which kind of help we need.

This is the first update.
In this slideshow we will discuss where do we start, the major goals to achieve and an improvement roadmap.

Check this out.

It’s apparent (in most cases) that effective organizational leadership and subsequent organizational performance starts at the very top – CEO, Owner, Chairman, President, or any other title that defines the one who’s driving the bus.  Not that the one in power always has a significant title, but if the individual at the top of the chart is weak, more often than not you’ll find weak organizational performance. If the top dog is non-strategic, then it’s not uncommon to find a tactically oriented organization – sales driven as opposed to marketing driven as an example. The subject of leadership speaks to several different areas of attributes, characteristics, and dispositions and what better place to assess leadership at the top relative to organizational performance than sports. If one were to take a glance at a small sampling of sports franchises, a validation can be established as to how organizational performance is directly correlated to leadership at the top. 

Take a look at the NFL franchise Washington Redskins since Daniel Snyder took over the helm of ownership from Jack Kent Cooke several years ago.   The team’s on field performance reflects a losing record since Snyder took over as owner of the Redskins and the 2009 season stands at a pathetic 2 – 6 (Nov 12, 09).

Snyder has been criticized by the media for his overwhelming greed and lack of consideration for respective shareholders – fans and customers.  However, although his integrity and point of fairness and compassion has been challenged, the Redskins financial performance has reportedly been very strong, mainly by leveraging the strong Washington Redskins brand.  There’s no way this can be a sustainable model for success. The dichotomy of financial performance and product (on field) performance under the Snyder regime is a derivative of the leadership style that is at the top of the organization.  From Washington D.C., if you drive north on I-95 for about 60 minutes, you’ll find the owner of the MLB franchise Baltimore Orioles, Peter Angelos. Earlier this past summer, Sports Illustrated rated Peter Angelos as one of the worst owners of sports franchises. Yikes!  Guess what you find when you look at the performance of the team over the past decade? The Orioles record for the past decade has been dismal at best, and a sustainable one at that.    

However, if you look at the sports franchise of Tiger Woods – and he is a sports franchise worth over $1B US – one can see a contrasting style of leadership.  With records – monetarily and trophies – set in stone for future generations to marvel at, winning and financial performance are one in the same with Tiger Woods.  He’s intelligent, articulate, and constantly demonstrating his profound passion for winning. His ability to build community, manage diversity, and cooperate with various groups internal and external to the franchise speaks volumes to Tiger’s strong leadership capabilities. 

Robert K. Kraft is another strong, unpretentious, and successful leader who is owner of the NFL franchise New England Patriots.  Unlike the Washington Redskins, the record of the New England Patriots since Kraft took ownership of the organization is unprecedented in sports franchise history.  Under his leadership, the team appeared in four super bowls and won three and has made the playoffs in nine of the thirteen years that Mr. Kraft has owned the team.  He is known for his creativity for delivering value, decisiveness, and attention toward the stakeholder’s interest.  His concern for the community has consistently been reported on by the media as he and his wife have given millions upon millions to various charitable organizations.  

When evaluating leadership styles of Tiger Woods and Robert K. Kraft, it’s easy to determine that; strong leadership = winning = strong financial performance.  And regardless if you’re running a sports franchise, a retail store, a school system, or a technology manufacturing firm, it’s all about winning.  Most leaders have the desire to win, but do they really have leadership aptitude or capability to steer the ship in a direction that recognizes positive outcomes and results. It takes courage to establish a strategy, self discipline not to succumb to arrogance, and inherent sincerity to be concerned with respective stakeholders.  Product innovation, sales capacity, or operational efficiencies won’t get you to the promise land of winning without strong leadership at the top.

The draft SEC Roadmap to IFRS has been issued and commented upon. Now it is time for the SEC to get to work on making its plans for IFRS clear. Based on recent comments by Chairman Shapiro and Chief Accountant Kroeker, they appear to be moving toward providing clarity on IFRS.

Specifically, SEC Chairman Schapiro revisited the IFRS issue on Sept. 18 when she stated, “I expect we will speak a little later this fall about what our expectations are with respect to IFRS”. She also said “it would be ideal if we can have a single set of high-quality accounting standards that worked globally.” SEC Chief Accountant James Kroeker bolstered her remarks on October 30 at a premier US Conference on International Financial Reporting Standards. During his speech and responding to questions afterward he commented that “There will be follow-up on the roadmap this fall.” Asked to define the word “fall,” he noted that “fall ends on Dec. 21”.

SEC’s Strategic Plan For Fiscal Years 2010–2015

In its strategic In June 2009, the U.S. Department of the Treasury published key objectives for reform of the financial regulatory system. (Financial Regulatory Reform: A New Foundation) Among other things, these reforms focus on raising international regulatory standards and cooperation, including working toward improvement of accounting standards in the wake of the credit crisis and the development of a single set of high-quality global accounting standards.

G20 Leaders

Chief Accountant Kroeker’s remarks contained similar themes as a recent G20 Leadership meeting where the G20 leaders called on international accounting bodies to “redouble their efforts to achieve a single set of high quality, global accounting standards within the context of their independent standard setting process, and complete their convergence project by June 2011.” They also commented that the “International Accounting Standards Board’s (IASB) institutional framework should further enhance the involvement of various stakeholders.”

Whatever you think about IFRS, the future seems sure. The world wants a single set on high quality, global accounting standards and IFRS will be that standard (it already is for the rest of the world).

Prepare Now

What can you do to prepare? Here are a few ideas for your consideration.

• Stay IFRS aware
• Stay aware of SEC action on IFRS
• Learn about the FASB and IASB Convergence efforts
• Analyze the effects of stable, converged IFRS standards on your organization and follow progress on standards still being converged
• Conduct an IFRS impact assessment
• Begin to develop a Judgment Framework that can formalize your processes for making business judgments and accounting standard application judgments.
• Identify internal and external talent that can assist in the transition to IFRS
• Develop a high level plan for transitioning to IFRS
• Begin to identify potential impacts to accounting, tax, technology and other business processes.
• Look for ways to normalize global accounting policies, practices and procedures to reduce the cost of global financial and regulatory reporting. Consider utilizing technologies like XBRL

Are you ready to report results under IFRS?

In an earlier post, I outlined the four key ingredients for agile software reuse. One of which is the reuse roadmap. In this post I want to share an example roadmap and illustrate how they tie into other business and IT objectives. The idea is to start at the ad-hoc state (where there is little or no reuse) and move to truly utilizing systematic reuse across multiple projects.

Phase 1-Ad-hoc - In this initial phase there is little or no awareness of reusable assets, and there is very little customer integration expertise. Consumers have low awareness of what assets are available. Systematic reuse efforts not considered and there is a lack of alignment between project deliverables, reuse strategy, and business objectives. Applications within the same domain do not share assets i.e. there is a lot of duplicate code.

View Reuse Roadmap

Phase 2-Aware - In the second phase, legacy capabilities and processes are mined for building assets. Agile practices are minimally aligned to the reuse strategy. Consumers seek reusable assets for applications in the domain and rudimentary product lines take shape. Communication about reusable assets have improved and awareness is increasing.

Phase 3-Ready – In this phase, asset inventory expands task, entity, and utility capabilities. User stories are analyzed within a product line context and additional assets are built iteratively. Agile practices specifically code reviews, refactoring, iteration planning, and pair programming used to identify and refine assets in a continuous fashion. Consumers increasingly use reusable assets to build applications and start to co-create assets. Additionally, assets are used across multiple applications in the domain. A few business process flows start to leverage reusable assets.

Phase 4-Systematic – This is when your systematic reuse program starts to really reap rewards. Asset inventory expands to include additional capabilities in your domain. Assets are used to automate many more business processes and they provide variability mechanisms to meet business needs. User stories and iteration planning are well aligned with reuse strategy which facilitate iterative reusable asset development. Additionally, several assets built by refactoring legacy capabilities and communication about reusable assets are available. Finally, consumers are actively engaged in asset co-creation, retrieval, and consumption and supported by a mature integration function.

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Bus Pirate firmware v3 will be released in the near future. Are there any minor tweaks or moderate feature additions that you’d like to see in V3? It’s probably too late for major additions like a new protocol, but we’d like to know if there’s any popular updates we can schedule for the big v3 release. The issue tracker might give you some ideas.

Beyond v3, are there any major new features you’d like? I2C and improved SPI snoopers are a popular request, they’ll probably be added to the new binary mode for better speed and performance. CAN and OBD-II protocols are also frequently requested.

New changes could effect the “virality” of app distribution within the platform, and in turn potentially slow the spread of social games on Facebook.

Articles and extensive analysis from:

ReadWriteWeb

WebProNews

Gaebler.com

VentureBeat

Wall Street Journal (blog)

TechCrunch TechCrunch UPDATE HERE

EConsultancy

eWeek

Most Magnetized Object in the Universe (artist concept) by Goddard Photo and Video

Stop Putting Up with Energy Drains | Intent.com.

This list is just perfect to help me keep my negativity in check.  I am not sure that I could have broken it down the way Dr. Deb Brown managed to in her blog on Intent.com so I am grateful to have it now.  She suggests evaluating the following five things to minimize the amount of energy we channel to negativity.

1. Clutter. One life coach begins her work with every client by focusing on “de-cluttering” their life: overflowing closets, junk drawers that barely close, stacks of papers or laundry, a garage that looks like a tornado swept through it, etc. If your desk is already a disaster area when you first sit down in the morning, your energy is already being drained before you’ve even begun. De-clutter!

2. Procrastination. You know that thing in your house, office, or car that needs repair? The one you think about every day? How about the project, task, or appointment that you keep postponing, sighing loudly every time you think of it? Procrastination is a huge energy drain, and could lead to greater problems. For example, putting off the repair of a leaky roof can not only result in damage to your home during a major storm, but it could also strain your relationship with whomever lives in the house with you! Don’t put it off another day – carve out the time to get it done!

3. Control issues. How often do you waste your energy trying to control situations or people that are totally outside your control or influence? And how often do you waste your energy complaining or worrying about situations where you do have some control or influence, but haven’t taken action yet? By learning to control what you can, and letting go of what you cannot, you free yourself from this energy drain!

4. Negative people. Attitude is contagious. Even if you’re having a good day and generally feeling OK about life in general, a group of negative people can quickly drag you down. Gravitate toward positive, uplifting people in your life – and be one in return!

5. Comparing yourself to others. When you see others as more talented, smarter, more attractive, or somehow better than you are, your energy is being drained constantly. Stop comparing and simply be content with who you are and what you have! “Sunflowers aren’t better than violets.”

This is such a perfect quote.  I suppose this idea can be applied to spiritual or self-help books we read.  Reading these books may make us feel like we have gained some spiritual fulfillment that allows us a glimpse of the truth, but it’s in the practice itself that lies the truth.

The teaching is merely a vehicle to explain the truth. Don’t mistake it for the truth itself.
The teaching is like the raft that carries you to the other shore. The raft is needed, but the raft is not the other shore. An intelligent person would not carry the raft on his head once he reaches the other shore. Use my teaching to help you get to the other shore but do not hang onto it as your property. You must be able to let it go.

Buddha

This article from Yoga+ Magazine provides an intricate look at the mind through yogic scriptures and it’s relation to the mind body connection.  By understanding the terrain of the mind one can easily connect to the higher self.

Mastering Your Mind

By developing a yogic understanding of your mental terrain, you can begin the journey to your highest Self.

By Rolf Sovik Mana eva manusyanam karanam baandhamoksayoh
The mind indeed is the cause of one’s bondage and one’s liberation.
—Amritabindu Upanishad (verse 2)

Yogic scriptures describe the mind as an inner instrument. It stockpiles our memories, manifests our hopes and desires, and manages our daily activities. Yet despite the central role it plays in our lives, we rarely think about the mind itself. Few of us could even easily define what we mean by “the mind.”

For meditators, a working knowledge of our mental terrain is like a map. It allows us to see where we are going in meditation and shows us how to get there. Fortunately, yoga philosophy provides a map of the mind that complements the practice of meditation. It opens the door to a new way of seeing human affairs and helps us solve the puzzle of who we are. Let’s have a look, with a view to what this map reveals about the mind in meditation.

The Landscape of the MindTo gather experience, the mind must be connected to a body. It is through the channels of the senses and the sense organs (the eyes, ears, hands, feet, etc.) that the mind receives impressions from outside, and acts on the outer world. Mind and body are thus a subtly integrated team.

Even though the mind’s functions are seamless, yogis nonetheless identify four distinct realms of activity. The first is the everyday conscious mind, manas. Next is the subtle and quiet witness of experience, buddhi. Third is the sense of individuality or self-identity, ahamkara. Finally, the mind serves as the reservoir for storing habits and latent impressions (samskaras), deposited in the unconscious mind, chitta.

The Everyday Mind
The everyday mind, manas, is often called the “lower” mind or the “mundane” mind. Manas serves as the screen of consciousness, blending sense impressions of the outer world with experiences already stored in the mind. Through the operations of manas, we see that a feathery creature has a rust-colored belly, hear it begin singing early in the morning, and remember its name: robin.Manas is also sometimes called the “indecisive” mind because it is a good collector and displayer of information but a poor decision maker. It can choose a vacation destination, select the best available dates for travel, plan the route, and calculate the costs of the entire trip. But it will be unable to decide whether or not to go. It cannot come to a conclusion. For that, we will need to employ buddhi, the part of the mind that helps us determine the value of our actions.

Take a few moments to identify the functioning of manas within yourself. Read these brief instructions, then pause and take in your immediate environment.

• See the world presented to you on the screen of your awareness.
• Hear the sounds of your surroundings as they reach you through your ears.
• Notice how sensations of touch, taste, and smell are also completely integrated into your consciousness on this multidimensional screen of awareness.
• Notice how quickly you identify the objects around you (by naming them or simply recognizing them), thus constructing a coherent environment.

It is important to be aware that the mental screen not only registers impressions from outside, it colors them as well. Memories of past encounters with the world, and images of future ones, shape the present. You shy away from buzzing bees, but cuddle up to fluffy kittens. The image of sailing seems inviting, but “don’t forget the sunscreen!” your manas tells you. Both desires and memories are constantly shaping the content of our thoughts.

The Silent Witness
Given the many activities of manas, the everyday mind, we might imagine it to be the mind’s chief operating officer. It is the scene of constant hustle and bustle, passing without interruption through periods of waking, dreaming, and dreamless sleep. But its activity is a mask of sorts, one that conceals a deeper dimension of life. Meditators learn to see behind this mask of frenetic activity, and discover a natural tranquility of mind that is far more compelling.Indeed, the activities of manas are often described as a kind of sleep. They focus on sensory experience, on the fulfillment of instinctual urges, and on the pursuit of everyday pleasures. Yet they sleep to the deeper experiences of life. Thus, a voice calls to us from within, saying, “Wake up! Return to yourself!” That is the aim of meditation and the goal of the spiritual journey. But how is it accomplished?

For meditators, the first step is to give the lower mind a stable focus. Usually that focus is the breath or a mantra. This is the beginning of the process of resting your attention. As you do this, the busy senses—including the sense of imagination—follow along. They are quieted and relaxed. Thus, by giving the mind a focal point, you calm the activities of manas.

As manas quiets and calms, you begin to wake up. You develop an awareness of yourself as a silent witness—a center of consciousness from which other mental activities can be quietly observed. You become aware of your own awareness.

The function of mind capable of this kind of awakening is the buddhi. The term comes from the Sanskrit verb budh, meaning “to wake up.” Interestingly, this is just what happens in meditation. A quiet shift in consciousness occurs, calming the emotional distractedness of the manas and awakening a calmer, steadier mind.

The verb from which buddhi is derived has other meanings as well, each related to the nature of the mind in meditation. It means, for example, “to return to consciousness,” that is, to restore awareness of one’s deeper self, as well as “to attend,” to gather awareness rather than to let the mind be distracted.

A simple experiment will help you sense this. Close your eyes and feel the flow of your breathing, following these basic instructions:

• Stay with the breath for a few minutes until you find you can relax the effort you are making, resting your mind on the pleasant sensations of exhaling and inhaling.
• Begin to notice in a very simple way that you are not the breather. You are awareness, witnessing the sensations of the breath.
• You will not sense buddhi by anything it does, but by its quiet presence. You, as buddhi, are silent, restful awareness.
• Continue resting your mind by watching the breath. When manas is calmed, and attention rested in this way, it is possible to go beyond the lower mind, to see its activities, and yet to know yourself as the inner witness of these activities.

The journey does not end here. During meditation, distractions arise that alert us to the many layers of experience stored in chitta, the unconscious mind. Buddhi examines these impressions—both in the form of thoughts and feelings, and later as the habits and behaviors of everyday life. In this process, buddhi observes and registers a thought (“Vacation!”), forms an understanding of its significance (“It’s been years!”), and makes a decision. That decision will either be foolish if it is based on attachment (“I’m going no matter what!”) or wise if it is based on an assessment of real needs (“It will provide a much-needed rest”). Buddhi is the decision maker, and as it awakens, it learns to make decisions wisely.

But while an awakening of the buddhi can help us in daily life, the goal of meditation is not simply to make us better decision makers or to enable us to gather more life experience. The awakening of the buddhi helps us turn back into ourselves. It shows us how to recapture awareness of the inner Self, the source of our conscious awareness.

This is a process that unfolds slowly and gradually, but it is not uncharted territory. Start by quieting yourself, learn to observe the passing activities of your lower mind, and awaken your buddhi, the inner witness. In the next issue we’ll talk more about how to address the unconscious mind (chitta) and manage self-identity (ahamkara) in meditation. But for now, begin to recognize the terrain of your mind when you sit to meditate. There is no landscape on earth more beautiful or more compelling.

Bach’s Wake-Up Call

The theme of spiritual life as a kind of awakening is a metaphor found in every culture and tradition. You might enjoy listening to music by the great German composer Johann Sebastian Bach, who chose the theme of awakening for a cantata he composed in 1731. Inspired by the Gospel of Matthew 25:1–13, it opens with the words, “Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme” (Sleepers awake! The Voice calls to us). Listen to the piece at yogaplus.org/bach.

Rolf Sovik, PsyD, is the author of Moving Inward: The Journey to Meditation. He is the president of the Himalayan Institute, and serves as the director of the Institute’s branch center in Buffalo, New York.

Fall 2009

Yoga+ Magazine

It appears that Arizona was the epicenter for all things solar Thursday.  The U.S. House of Representatives passed the “Solar Technology Roadmap Act” which is sponsored by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords representing Arizona’s eight district. This action by Congress occurred just one hour after the “Outlook for the Solar Market” presentation during the IPC Executive Industry Summit in Scottsdale, AZ. Not only that, the IPC Solar Standards Committee is currently working on standards for the poly-silicon photovoltaic (solar) industry, specifically the assembly of solar panels.  Is this just a coincidence or is something else happening regarding solar technology?

If the Solar Technology Roadmap Act is enacted in to law, the bill (H.R. 3585) would create an updatable federal strategic roadmap to advance solar energy technologies through prioritized research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) activities. Some of the areas mentioned in the bill are solar technology, photovoltaics, concentrating solar power, solar hot water, solar space heating and cooling, solar lighting, solar manufacturing, integration of solar technology in buildings, and other areas. More information on the H.R. 3585 can be found here.

We want to hear what you have to say. What are your thoughts? Please leave a comment on this blog.

It’s been an exciting week at Mike HQ this week. Announcements for the Beta have gone out on the ServerSide and the JavaLobby. We’ve also had a few enquiries and, of course, sign-ups! People are now building their projects on our platform! It’s a very exciting time for us. We hope our beta users enjoy using the platform and we’re really looking forward to the feedback.

Maven2 support is a feature a number of people have asked us about.  It is something we are working on and we’ll keep you posted as to when we will add it to the Beta programme. It’s a key feature for the platform.

We’ve also started work on the Mike registration and account management application, agreeing the screen-flows, designs and functionality. This should give users a seamless registration process and the ability to add and remove users from their Mike account. We’ve also been extending the coverage of our Selenium tests for Mike and adding them to our nightly build cycle.

Have a good weekend!