I Gotta Ask Why ?

Business Case to Ponder

Your customer uses your product but they didn't take your recommendations on proper equipment needed to use your product in their process, now they are having quality issues and yelling at you to fix it.  Your name is being drug in the mud and you did everything you could, do you pull the product to save the use of another you sell to this company or keep moving forward?

Seedwiki as Choice

All-in-all things are looking good in the new wiki area.  Seedwiki was easy to set-up and has enough features that even new people to wiki's are having good luck at using it.  The good thing is that everyone is excited about it but I don't see a ton of activity.  I take any chance I can to talk about it and how they might use the wiki.

Googlism, Microsoftism; Company Culture and Philosophy

Each company on this planet has a culture, an 'ism' that becomes the road map and voice of those who would guide the company.  Scott Berkun posted an interesting topic on his blog that made me think more on culture; "Google’s 10 rules compared to Microsoft".

Wiki's, Corporate Memory, Confluence, Redux

First off, if you aren't savy enough to have a CS degree apparently the makers of Confluence think you shouldn't bother.

OpenOffice....It's Free?...But Does It Work??

I had a friend ask me the other day, "Kris, how did you get so knowledgeable about all this computer stuff?" and the answer is I must have ADD (no disrespect to those affected) but mostly I just like to play with things.

My new toy, not to replace my research on "Corporate Memory" or "How do I get this wiki thing as an intranet for my company"; is OpenOffice.

Recap: Overload and the interrupt-driven lifestyle

Whoa...it was just brought to my attention that my citation for this post didn't make it.  Nor did half the entry.  So, my appologies to 43 Folders for not posting where this information came from and that it's not mine just a regurgitation of what prompted me to try in my own life.  Original post: http://www.43folders.com/2005/10/18/overload-recap/

Oh and thanks to Nick @ NRG78.com for helping me catch it, here is his post http://nrg78.com/ipw-web/b2/index.php?m=200510#116.

~Kris

Link: Recap: Overload and the interrupt-driven lifestyle.

Clive's excellent article from Sunday's New York Times Magazine (previously) has brought us a lot of new folks looking for ways to adapt to the overloaded, always-on, interrupt-driven world in which most of us are living. So, I've bubbled up a few older entries on these topics that you might find useful:

• Five fast email productivity tips - Five no-brainers that I've seen help a lot of folks. #1: Set your email program's auto check to no more often than once per hour. That's right, Mr. Indispensable, you heard me: one hour.
• Harnessing your interstitial time - Capitalize on change by planning small and watching for unexpected bits of time that you can liberate and put to good use. What tasks can fit through the narrow windows of time that are available to you?
• Impressive paper-based project management workflow - This fascinating "kanban"-inspired system includes built-in stops to ensure 1) we only work on

Productivity...whew!

Productivity, it's been on my mind lately; how do I get more productive in what I do, how do I keep my team productive, and what the hell is the definition of productivity?  More importantly, how to I measure productivity vs. just being busy; in myself and for sure in my team as I lead them.

I can tell when I am spinning my wheels and not being productive, I get frustrated and feel the pressure a bit. 

So I did some research to answer my questions and I found out that the body of research on being productive is either in the camp of BS or physical manufacturing.  Productivity in manufacturing I get and the BS I read about is full of surface crap that never sticks or means much.  Then I came across Scott Berkun's essay on Work vs. Progress and I really started to think.  Below is my summary take on what was key and what it would sound like for me to use this idea.

How can you tell the difference between work and progress?

• Progress is subjective
• The Subjectiveness of progress is in the eye of the leader who should be steering others towards the end and communicating what that end and path look like.
• Poor leaders will have teams that work really hard in a direction that does not end in a good product.
• Leaders who properly plan and define the process will give the tools needed for teams to determine if they are wasting time.
• Plan the work and set out the goals
• What does it look like when you are done.
• It is the leader's job to constantly relfect back to the individual how they are contributing to the goal
• "In every meeting, discussion and e-mail the   leader must reinforce, remind, cajole, and motivate people’s work towards   whatever the collective goals are, flagging work that is questionable and activities   that are unnecessary. The leader has the best perspective on the entire project   and he must share that view as often as possible. He is in the best position to   see when people are going the wrong way, or worse, disrupting other’s progress   towards the goals. And if he communicates what he sees clearly enough, even if   he doesn’t have all the answers, other people will ingest and apply that   view themselves, adjusting their work to maximize progress."

Great! But how do you measure work being produced??

• You could go with the usual; number of phone calls made, number of articles written, number of billable hours produced, etc. but....you would be only measuring activity or the work and not the productivity.

Why go any further I've figured it out, the key is to simply follow the 80/20 principle and do the 20% that gets you 80% of the way.  So long as the 80% is being guided and reflective of the original goals you would have set had you been a good leader.

So....get back to work you slacker!!

~Kris

Update on Confluence

I remember what it was, price. I figured that I could create what we need using free tools on the net. Confluence for 25 users is a yearly cost of $1,200, which isn't much and if you look at it as a system to store and retrieve (although much more it is!) documents. Bottomline: I liked the demo, it fit my needs and would fit the needs of many an organization yet the cost didn't help me to buy. Most likely when it comes down to "how much time do I have?" I will look at spending the cash to use at my corporation.

Wiki's for the Corporation

I just came across a few people who are thinking like I am that a wiki could be a great way to oranize the "Corporate Memory" that is needed but hard to wrangle.  I agree with what NRG78 is saying in this blog:

• "Corporate Memory" is there and must be managed yet it's hard
• Wiki's may be the answer as they are developed (I'm thinking of adding a TiddlyWik to my internal work server because personally its a great productivity tool)

NRG78 mentiones Confluence which is an enterprise wiki solution to do just what is being talked about.  Now, I've played with Confluence and I'm going to have to look back but there was a reason why I started to look for the "wiki-in-a-single-web-page'' solution.

Point is, YES, wiki's could be a good solution to throwing the straps on "Corporate Memory".  I guess the answer is more research and trying it out.

~Kris

Need an orkut Invitation

If anyone out there would like to add me as a friend I have GMail invitations to trade. :)

~Kris