Bron,
I find that "most" of my friends are not as fond of
Google Chrome
Gmail
Google Calendar
Google Docs
In various discussions, where I ask them why or
why not, I find that the answer seems to be that
lots of people never really learn to operate more
than a bare minimum of the tools they have.
I can say the same about the three most popular
Microsoft tools as well (Word, Excel, Powerpoint).
Here's an explanation of a Gmail feature:
It's about giving extra powers to Gmail to handle
various Links.
Meanwhile, the "wrench" in Chrome hides a whole
bunch of features that are quite useful. The Calendar
tool lets you have multiple calendars, but you have
to choose to do so. Gmail lets you organize your
mail into folders, but many people don't bother.
With Docs and Calendars, the sharing is flexible
but only if you use it.
With Word and Excel, lots of features go unused
by many people, and lots of people never consider
using Powerpoint at all.
Anyway, I think we can all benefit from taking the
time to learn about the tools we have when we are
thinking about tools we'd like to have. Quite often
we'll have that helpful tools have been there already.
Bron replies
Oh I totally fall into the category of not-knowing how to do stuff then getting hung behind the task. I do like to pick a tool and drill into it to where I can adapt it to my needs. Sometimes that works and sometimes not.
The biggest thing I want to submit today to our triad relates to something I read over the holiday break a year ago. I found it on Joe Millers bookshelf. "Getting Real", by a fascinating development team out of chicago called, "37 Signals".
The thrust of the book was a quasi-mandate that everything needs to be simplified, that products and processes need to have the opposite of scope-creep.. They need nearly-entire unbundling.
The book has several examples of how teams are crippled by analysis and specs. The idea appealed to me immediately.
The examples were about webpages and applications. The message was simple: do less analysis, use the tool for yourself, when you encounter a stopping point, fix it. No more no less.
This doesn't do justice to what I read. I'm hoping the 37 Signals team is famous enough that you are already familiar with how their MO swims upstream from the way mainstream sw dynasties tend to operate today.
Do you know about them and their approach? They have a lot of interesting messages like, "people who write well make the best employees". I tell you its good stuff! If you're unfamiliar, I'd be grateful if you could find a copy.
I'd love to automatically send my favorite reference materials but I'm quite limited in my ability to do even tiny amounts of that.
I still think that there a ripe world out there that wants to connect to each other purely based on what they read. You guys think you could build something that linkedIN would want to acquire?
Keith/Bron - About Calendars - 3/17/12
The biggest thing I want to submit today to our triad relates to something I read over the holiday break a year ago. I found it on Joe Millers bookshelf. "Getting Real", by a fascinating development team out of chicago called, "37 Signals".
The thrust of the book was a quasi-mandate that everything needs to be simplified, that products and processes need to have the opposite of scope-creep.. They need nearly-entire unbundling.
The book has several examples of how teams are crippled by analysis and specs. The idea appealed to me immediately.
The examples were about webpages and applications. The message was simple: do less analysis, use the tool for yourself, when you encounter a stopping point, fix it. No more no less.
This doesn't do justice to what I read. I'm hoping the 37 Signals team is famous enough that you are already familiar with how their MO swims upstream from the way mainstream sw dynasties tend to operate today.
Do you know about them and their approach? They have a lot of interesting messages like, "people who write well make the best employees". I tell you its good stuff! If you're unfamiliar, I'd be grateful if you could find a copy.
I'd love to automatically send my favorite reference materials but I'm quite limited in my ability to do even tiny amounts of that.
I still think that there a ripe world out there that wants to connect to each other purely based on what they read. You guys think you could build something that linkedIN would want to acquire?
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T
Keith/Bron - About Calendars - 3/17/12
Bron,
I have not run into 37 signals, but I do believe
in simplicity. I agree that good employees
write well, and I'll add that they should speak
well. I read an article recently that said there
are really only three relevant employee interview
questions:
1) Can you do this job?
2) Would you love this job?
3) Will our people be able to tolerate you?
| |||
Bron,
I see from http://37signals.com/
what they have to say.
You might find this recent article interesting:
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/
Bron replies
That is completely righteous I really appreciate it. I have not heard a more-elegant thought template in a year's time. I will keep that awesome perspective for a long time. What 37-signals type methodology brings back to teams with analysis paralysis.. Is a banner I could carry for a lifetime, and also benefit from personally in the process. As applied to the hiring function, I am moved by the mere mention of an organization with the stones and skill to embody such a practical 3-stroke play on hiring. Brilliant. That is what I'd add to the record of this matter.
- - -
I've got a lot more thought and related material around this theme that I would add to conversation, but would not choose to add to "the record".. Because its more raw in nature, is not as well organized, and only reinforces the agreement which already exists.
- - -
So here is the extraneous bonus material. Basically, what pinches my paradox is this: that practical simplicity could be quickly integrated into a group-ethos, for short and long-term betterment.. but.. Does it shock anyone that I'm imagining over 50 different blockers ruining the application of this idea and not even knowing it? Every one of them is trying to build a name for themselves in the "Me First (American Way). Group dynamics are so messy! More and more I understand why secrecy pervades.
I probably have too much emotion around this. Now I'm seeing 25 more people who want to fire me for even implying that the previous thought on hiring is "not right". And I don't even live in China.
2 specific stories from this month, that demonstrate completely un-illuminated thought around the management of a small team.. One guy is a sales manager whose main goal in providing a CRM system - is complete orwellian handling of his team's sales data. It's not, "I'd like my team to responsibly handle a larger territory and give our clients a better experience". It's, "I need the ability to steal accounts from my employees and fire them without their previous knowledge.
Yes salesforce.com allows that, no I'm not interested in helping the guy, yes ill do it anyway.
Another is a data manager who couldn't tell you what he's looking for, doesn't actually distinguish between human traits and professional experience - but is easily ready to fire his hire in 2-3 months if they "are not right for the job".
I found them both - offensive! They both think they have their own interest in play. I found this so odd that I started imagining vampires keeping their pray alive for long-term feeding but not considering a release of their victim back to freedom.
As a consultant I have improved in the handling of my own disappointment around management misfires, though my own disappointment compounds in different ways. Maybe they are just reptiles, not vampires.
Its still overly dramatic thought, I know.
Joe sent an interesting fastcompany link about knowing who hates you in order to know who loves you. Kinda helps me not feel bad about sparring with the myopics of the world, even though they are said to be "just acting in their own perceived self-interest".
The sanitized response might be to suggest things like, "employment does not need to be such a one-way street", "a good boss is more enabler than pitchfork", "let's remember the goal here is success right?", and/or "is that a strategy for being at the top of a team you're proud of?"
What I wanted to say, is that "it would be difficult in the long term to attract and maintain top tier talent without a strategy that is based more on the plan for how the helpers can be successful, and less of a plan to harvest the human capital of people who've been made into losers prior to the beginning of the competition." I find it imprudent to speak of "long term" with most of the people I encounter in my roles.
It wouldn't make my blood boil if short-sighted behavior only affected the person doing it. As the old bumper sticker says, "stupidity should be more painful to self than others".
It would be great if the best parts of what I could offer along these lines- could somehow be leveraged in a viable way. What I find instead is that it scares the livin shit out of the people its intended to help, and that I often end up going down for it no matter what I say. And not because I'm a vocal hothead, (not at all the case, despite my emphatic prose in protected circles).
When people move against me along these lines, I'm typically the last one to know about it.
- - -
In short, I find that while I belong in places that already ascribe to "getting real" type strategies, -I struggle to find and affiliate with them to the extent that it becomes a viable long-term way of life and/or leads to larger-scope accomplishment. I sort-of think and hope that as I get older I'll be cooler with my own disappointment, better with tactically diplomatic expression, but also come to be a person from whom my coworkers expect that type of influence and disposition.
Bron,
- - -
I've got a lot more thought and related material around this theme that I would add to conversation, but would not choose to add to "the record".. Because its more raw in nature, is not as well organized, and only reinforces the agreement which already exists.
- - -
So here is the extraneous bonus material. Basically, what pinches my paradox is this: that practical simplicity could be quickly integrated into a group-ethos, for short and long-term betterment.. but.. Does it shock anyone that I'm imagining over 50 different blockers ruining the application of this idea and not even knowing it? Every one of them is trying to build a name for themselves in the "Me First (American Way). Group dynamics are so messy! More and more I understand why secrecy pervades.
I probably have too much emotion around this. Now I'm seeing 25 more people who want to fire me for even implying that the previous thought on hiring is "not right". And I don't even live in China.
2 specific stories from this month, that demonstrate completely un-illuminated thought around the management of a small team.. One guy is a sales manager whose main goal in providing a CRM system - is complete orwellian handling of his team's sales data. It's not, "I'd like my team to responsibly handle a larger territory and give our clients a better experience". It's, "I need the ability to steal accounts from my employees and fire them without their previous knowledge.
Yes salesforce.com allows that, no I'm not interested in helping the guy, yes ill do it anyway.
Another is a data manager who couldn't tell you what he's looking for, doesn't actually distinguish between human traits and professional experience - but is easily ready to fire his hire in 2-3 months if they "are not right for the job".
I found them both - offensive! They both think they have their own interest in play. I found this so odd that I started imagining vampires keeping their pray alive for long-term feeding but not considering a release of their victim back to freedom.
As a consultant I have improved in the handling of my own disappointment around management misfires, though my own disappointment compounds in different ways. Maybe they are just reptiles, not vampires.
Its still overly dramatic thought, I know.
Joe sent an interesting fastcompany link about knowing who hates you in order to know who loves you. Kinda helps me not feel bad about sparring with the myopics of the world, even though they are said to be "just acting in their own perceived self-interest".
The sanitized response might be to suggest things like, "employment does not need to be such a one-way street", "a good boss is more enabler than pitchfork", "let's remember the goal here is success right?", and/or "is that a strategy for being at the top of a team you're proud of?"
What I wanted to say, is that "it would be difficult in the long term to attract and maintain top tier talent without a strategy that is based more on the plan for how the helpers can be successful, and less of a plan to harvest the human capital of people who've been made into losers prior to the beginning of the competition." I find it imprudent to speak of "long term" with most of the people I encounter in my roles.
It wouldn't make my blood boil if short-sighted behavior only affected the person doing it. As the old bumper sticker says, "stupidity should be more painful to self than others".
It would be great if the best parts of what I could offer along these lines- could somehow be leveraged in a viable way. What I find instead is that it scares the livin shit out of the people its intended to help, and that I often end up going down for it no matter what I say. And not because I'm a vocal hothead, (not at all the case, despite my emphatic prose in protected circles).
When people move against me along these lines, I'm typically the last one to know about it.
- - -
In short, I find that while I belong in places that already ascribe to "getting real" type strategies, -I struggle to find and affiliate with them to the extent that it becomes a viable long-term way of life and/or leads to larger-scope accomplishment. I sort-of think and hope that as I get older I'll be cooler with my own disappointment, better with tactically diplomatic expression, but also come to be a person from whom my coworkers expect that type of influence and disposition.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T
Bron,
Here's where I read about the three interview questions:
The "Call for Transparency in Job Interviews" referenced there is
a video worth watching.
> My hope is that you would either contribute insight
> or solutions to those things, or mirror me by bringing
> forth your own topics of interest, or perhaps questions
> which others could address. You may not need the
> calendar but I most certainly do!
My interest is much less about the calendar, and much
more about the priorities of competing activities leading
towards competing goals. So, in my mind, you want to
prioritize the goals, & then prioritize the activities leading
towards those goals.
I would very much like an "app" that would do all this.
It would let you specify goals. Then you would specify
activities tied to goals. Finally it would tell you in some
sort of color coded fashion what you "really ought" to be
doing next. The calendar would get contorted by this.
Jarvis - 3/18/12
Bron’s calendar needs approach the President of the United States. I have been told that the full calendar schedules his bathroom breaks. I worked for a guy who lived by the Microsoft Outlook calendar. If I had an idea he liked he asked me to schedule a meeting for it. I had to use my outside knowledge of the people and rooms most needed and/or hardest to schedule. Optional people were told in the inviting email that they were optional. Occasionally by boss’s boss would preempt the room just before the meeting.
I think of scheduling a meeting like packing the trunk of a car for a trip. The biggest and/or most essential things are placed first. Sometimes it has to be repacked when some next thing doesn’t fit.
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