Four tools to bridge from Raw Productivity to Sustainable Results
I've noticed a definite trend in the "best practices" wing of the Productivity building; it goes by many names and takes on a few different forms, but the idea is rooted in a few simple concepts: Focus on the Critical Few: Multitasking does not work - plan for doing three things per day, and allocate your time accordingly Done is Better than Perfect: Learn to recognize "good enough", perfection is the enemy of progress. Ignore Details Early On: Get a skeleton out…
Introducing Collaboration Tools? Three Required Personas for Success
When introducing collaboration tools to an organization - creating the corporate intranet, defining project sites in Sharepoint, etc. - there are multiple skills you must master - well, at least get better at. You need to capture the ideas and communicate the data such that your target reader understands what you are trying to convey - but you also have to help them locate it in the first place. Three personas you'll need to adopt, three sets of skills to…
How to Draw an Owl
On Documentation One recent afternoon I found myself in deep conversation with potential consulting partners, holding out for a difficult requirement: "Excellent Documentation". That's a tough one to quantify, let alone describe; why hold out for something at once critical and ineffable? Doesn't every project talk about the importance of providing documentation, yet rarely deliver it? Don't most people flip past the pages of detailed work process, going right to the keyboard to bang away, expecting tool tips and intuitive…
Capturing Knowledge, and Making it Transferable
Capturing Knowledge, and Making in Findable
Capturing Knowledge: A “New” Critical Requirement for Business Projects
A Hierarchy of Information Requirements
Lost Weekend: Troubleshooting a MySQL Installation
Spurred on by Blogger's decision to stop supporting FTP for publishing blogs, I have finally started the long process to implement a WordPress blog - hosted by myself, not Wordpress.com. To be fair, I am making this longer than it necessarily needs to be, but I am continuing my efforts to maintain a comprehensive Admin guide for all of my development efforts - configuring servers, installing software, etc. Needless to say, this adds overhead and time, but it's worth the…