My Blog is Better Than Yours
Let's assume for a minute that this is not necessarily true and two blogs are pretty much the same. Fairly well written, good subject matter and relevant to many people.
Why is it that some have a readership in the 10's of thousands and other are in the tens.
Sure some are better than others. Some are more thought provoking. But if we line up two apples or two oranges, why is one fruit sweeter than the other.
I think marketing has a lot to do with it.
Marketing is usually a long road. Sure sometimes it just takes off. Sometimes it's viral. […]
Hmmm, what am I good at?
In my last post I talked about choosing the tasks that need to be done really well as part of your time management process.
That begs the question, “What do I do well that adds the most value to the business?”
These are the things I should be spending the most time on, both developing and perfecting my skills and the things that I should make sure are done to the best of my abilities.
I decided to share some detail not to be seen as bragging but to make this post more real and relevant.
Based on my own experience, some personality tests I took, […]
Prioritize Greatness
Good time management suggests that you should prioritize your activities based on importance and urgency.
- Important items are those that things where you add the most value to your business (or employer).
- Urgent items are those that need to be done to satisfy a requirement but don't necessary create a lot of value.
Items that are important and urgent should be worked on first. Picking your kids up from day care before they close is probably both.
Time also changes urgency. As the deadline approaches, a task can become more urgent. The need to eat is like that, it can be put off […]
Abandon Me, It’s All About You
Let's face it. Deep down, sales are usually fairly selfish. You are selling your products or services to bring in revenue and profit. Sales drive your business.
Hopefully the transaction is mutually beneficial and the customer is getting something of value in the exchange. If not it might just be a one night stand.
When you are looking at your longer-term partnerships with either suppliers, competitors or customers it is very wise to start the conversation by looking at things from their perspective. I recently read a post by Stuart Crawford on giving back to your partners that got me to thinking about this […]
The Excitement of Product Launch Day
Back in 2003 we built a tool to help manage our business. At the time we thought that it was just something for us and that it wasn't good enough for the rest of the world. New employees kept telling us that it was one of the best tools they had seen for doing those things. But we were humble and didn't do anything with it other than use it internally.
Since then I have realized that many successful products have been launched with bare-bone features and mediocre capabilities… and excellent marketing. Sometimes products are sold before they are even built.
I […]
Agile Design – Up Front and Often
Sadly there is a misconception that performing any up front design in an agile project is a bad thing… pretty much forbidden because the opposite of agile is waterfall.
This misconception misses the whole point of building great software… use all the tools you have at your disposal in the most appropriate way and if something is not working fix it. Agile is not meant to be a rigid process… it’s meant to be an attitude of continuous improvement. (Caveat, when you are first learning anything, stick to the proven process as you don’t know enough yet to know what is important.)
Right from […]
The Next Invention – An Accident Waiting to Happen
I recently watched an episode of the "Nature of Things" hosted by David Suzuki.
The show was looking at the fact that there is an element of randomness to many great discoveries. In fact, many of the greatest discoveries of the past several hundred years were the direct result of an accident or oversight.
The inventors could have dismissed the anomaly and went back to the original premise. Instead, they were intrigued and either continued the investigation down the new path or found a use for the discovery that was way off the original goal.
The other aspect was looking at […]
The Wrong Thing Is Not As Smart
Today I was a little bit saddened. The place I have been going to for quite a while, the one that had great Reuben sandwiches, repeated a mistake they had previously rectified (see The Right Thing Is Smart).
Today my sandwich was overdone and the bread was hard and rubbery… the normal care and attention to details was not there. Now to be honest, the last few have not been that consistent.
Because I have been going there pretty regularly for several years I can’t help but feeling betrayed somehow, especially considering my previous experience. The owner/operator had to have known […]
Celebrate Your Accomplishments
It is very easy for a company or a management team to focus on the things that are being done wrong and dwell on the past. Sure you need to continuously look at improving things in your business and in your development teams. But you also need to focus on your successes.
Some of our recent accomplishments include:
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Obtaining Microsoft Gold Partner status for 2009
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Built a Silverlight application (adds to our WPF and web development skills) including components to make future Silverlight application easier to build.
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Worked on strengthening our partnership with another synergistic company
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Converted a Financial Planning Toolkit to .NET Framework 3.5 […]
Agile Development – The Magic Bullet
I recently read a post by James Shore (The Decline and Fall of Agile). It matches what I am seeing and hearing.
In the beginning, agile was considered leading edge. It was practiced by teams of fairly experienced developers and tended to have at least a few top developers on its successful teams. It was succeeding in the right environment.
Then along comes the mainstream.
Become agile and your projects are guaranteed to succeed. No more pesky Waterfall with its up front requirements and engineering. Use Scrum and write code as fast as you can and if the requirements change, […]