Logging into the Transaction Center

MyTransactionCenter can be localised to customer demand

The employee account panel, showing his current balance and previous transactions

An easy wizard to assist employees in making business payments, deposits and, of cource, withdraw their earnings at the end of the month

The "My Profile" window where employees can check their organisational status and roles

More often that not I’m beginning to see people use the word “economic” in the context of shortsighted, unsustainable and unecological.

Can there really be a conflict between our endeavour for prosperity and the wellbeing of our planet and children?

Or is it the ineptness of some of our policy makers and business leaders at economic thinking that has given the purpose of this highly reasonable science a bad name?

Tonight I sat down and drafted the modules of a computer system for internal monetary transactions.

Theoretically, you can get your transaction company going with a simple paper register. Transactions can certainly be administrated the old-fashioned way, using pen and paper. I suppose that for initial adoption experiments on a small scale this might actually be a good idea. Computers, however, have a number of advantages and anyone who is serious about implementing the Transaction Company concept cannot really ignore them.

The following diagram outlines an IT system for internal transactions. I arranged the functionality into modules, so that a company can start with a minimal system and extend it according to its needs. Those of you who are familiar with IT would recognise a system based on a common multi-tier architecture.

At the bottom, coloured in blue, is the server. It has two components:

• A database to store the transactional accounts of the employees and a register of all transactions — pending and completed
• Software that defines the corporate rules of internal transacting, along with other related business logic

At the top we have a set of six client modules that connect to the server. They should be more or less independent from one another and a company can use one or more of them, according to its requirements:

• A desktop client: this, together with the server, comprises the minimal software system. It allows employees to log onto their transactional accounts, check their balance, and send and receive money. The client can be implemented using standard web technology, so that people can access the system through a web browser
• A set of three modules useful to larger companies (e.g. 50+ employees) and/or to businesses spread over multiple locations:
  • A market forum that allows employees to post, search and negotiate/bid for projects. Users may also have the ability to browse the transactional histories of their colleagues and to collect comments/rating points from their transaction partners (like the stars on eBay). The substance of the market forum would not differ much from the social networking sites on the Internet.
  • A module to visualise the network of transactions across the enterprise: with varying granularity (e.g. individual or departmental level), aspects such as connection structure, money flow and value creation. The idea of this tool is to assist decision making, so that managers/employees can spot profitable/active areas and direct their attention there.
  • A banking interface to allow the transactional accounts to be hosted with a financial institution. Employees may then earn an interest rate on their balance or be provided with access to credit facilities. I think this could turn into an interesting new service for banks.
• A set of two modules to ease transacting and make it more pervasive across the enterprise:
  • An interface to allow transactions to be automated. This could be a useful feature in manufacturing to make automatic payments when a part on the production line passes from one stage to the next
  • A mobile interface that employees can use to make transactions using their smartphones.

Last night I came across an article by John Hagel in his blog Edge Perspectives where he classifies business innovation into three hierarchical levels - product innovation, process innovation and institutional innovation. He presents a strong case for the importance of the institutional level, noting that it is fundamental and therefore constrains the success of the other two above it.

I drew a pyramid to illustrate this important hierarchy.

Fig . 1. Business innovation is stacked into three different levels. Each level of innovation is constrained by the capabilities of the one below it.

To sum up, product innovation cannot be better than the underlying processes permit, and similarly, the capability to create innovative processes is limited by the organisation of the underlying institution.

At the end of his article, John points out “the single most wealth creating innovation over the past several centuries”. According to him, this is the development of the limited liability joint stock company. Is The Transaction Company going to become the next big institutional innovation?