Getting into a Cognicity Groove

Cognicity Groove

The second week of Cognicity at Canary Wharf has followed two main themes.  The first has been a settling into a groove aspect.   Especially from the perspective of gaining a better handle on exactly what we are going to show off in 11 weeks; as well as finding your way to your desk from the tube without gazing into the many stores that tempt you in with their wares!    The second theme has been on better understanding the many competing aims the challenge is throwing at us.   With a superb workshop on being a Lean Startup that will help shape what the end result from KnowNow will be.

 Are we Lean?

Thank fully, after the Lean workshop I was able to categorically say, Yes. KnowNow is a lean start up.   Lean Start Up is a term coined by Eric Reiss.  Lean is an approach and a mind set.  Lean is about being able to respond quickly to failure or a bad decision made.  It is about delivering a minimum viable product.  It is about responding constantly to change.   KnowNow’s approach and mindset follows this discipline.  KnowNow is definitely LEAN!  From a Cognicity perspective this is important because for Canary Wharf to evolve into a smart space, it will have to adopt a LEAN approach & mindset too.    So we will have both parties being LEAN & KEEN!

MVP

An MVP is your Minimum Viable Product.   Entering into Cognicity KnowNow is presenting a range of options for the start of the kn-i journey we would like Canary Wharf to embark on.   However, where we need guidance is on choosing the option that will give us all the best possible impact from day one and an ongoing sustainable business.  That is just one aspect of the MVP.  Another is to realise with the help of community at Canary Wharf (who will be the first users of kn-i), and ask them what do they really think of our innovative app.   Will it be liked as much as we think it will?   In short we have to be prepared to fail.   To bank what is good and cut out and improve what is bad.  Do this iteratively and repeat, repeat, repeat.

kn-i Trust screen showing how kn-i will use your data

So in the spirit of asking for rapid feedback I share with you here a screenshot which shows off what we believe is a unique & innovative method of handling personal data.   Making you in control of the service you receive based on the amount of data that kn-i gets to use.    In short if kn-i has lots of access to your profile, then kn-i can offer a great service.   KnowNow will always be clear as to how much value you as a kn-i user have accrued from using kn-i.   On the flip side, KnowNow will always be clear too on how much kn-i has earned from your data too.   kn-i users should always earn more value than kn-i earns from them.   This has to be the fair quid-pro-quo.     The end KnowNow is seeking to achieve here is TRUST.   Hence why the screen that controls your data is called Trust.   What do you think?  Like it?

Whats Next

Week 3 of Cognicity beckons.  KnowNow will be a focusing on architecture.   This starts with what the end demo will be and the success criteria we need to achieve.  After all, this is a competition!    This is an important phase as it will identify where the data is we need to use.  What we are going to do with this data to turn it into valuable information and who we are going to be working with to ensure kn-i at Cognicity will be a success.

Thanks for reading, Chris