Week 1

This is it, we have reached the end of week one. Time to check in and see who met the challenge and who failed.

#TeamCake

• @davideisert - http://bit.ly/bQsB2L
• @kevinoshea – http://bit.ly/bD0TVq
• @countingmytoes – (newly committed and will post shortly)

#TeamPie

• @nealcross – http://bit.ly/bBrqlu
• @stevier - http://tinyurl.com/ycnlqvn
• @Robin2Go - http://bit.ly/aiSHDw

#TeamIcing

• @bpanulla - http://bit.ly/br2JGQ
• @highlyillogical (newly committed and will post shortly)
• @kimberlyarnold (currently a spectator)

If you want to join NerdThunderdome you can. Tweet your alliance with your teams hash and then start posting. But be warned, failure to post will result in public humiliation and mockery.

Also, a special thank you to @jlknott for her support of our initiative.

The ultimate battle between pie, cake and ice cream

I have struggled to motivate myself to just post. I am always concerned about the quality of my posts and how they will be criticized. I don’t really understand why. I handle criticism well and can deal with being publicly mocked. So, I have challenge Neal Cross and Stevie Rocco to an ultimate posting battle. We will each post weekly. The one who neglects to post must consume what the other considers the best dessert.

My punishment:

Neal’s punishment:

Stevie’s punishment:

Others are encouraged to get into the game. Again, the main goal is to post once a week and overcome the barriers to just getting content out there. May the best dessert win.

The battle of good enough

“Stop doing what is comfortable and start doing what is right.”

I came up with that mantra approximately 8 months ago and it seems to be challenged on a daily basis. I rather enjoy the challenge because it helps foster the concept and reinforces the need for sticking to it. It is a rather simple phrase that is incredibly difficult to achieve. Too many times people are satisfied with their accomplishments. Now, before anyone goes off the handle about the need to celebrate accomplishments every once in a while, I believe there are always small victories in achieving the right answers and solutions. But those victories should not be seen as absolute accomplishments. They should be seen as one of many steps on a path to achieve greatness.

Good to Great by Jim Collins

This post is a result of a fascinating experience during my first day back to class. I am taking classes in leadership and strategic management. My leadership class has prescribed the book Good to Great. I have read this terrific work by Jim Collins five times. Each time I read it, I glean a new piece of information from it. Today I realized that Good to Great can be applied to every aspect of a persons life, not just business. My most recent application is to my executive masters education program. The program has bestowed a significant number of truly great instructors. Even so, there are instructors that fall into the not so great category. I met one of those instructors today. It made me realize that no matter how hard I reach for my goals, there are people and circumstances that are simply out of my control. As described in the book, it is important to get the right people on the bus, the right people in the right seats, and the wrong people off the bus.

That is exactly what I plan to do. There are people riding the bus I’m on who are in the wrong seats or don’t belong on the bus. I cannot control whether or not they are removed or moved, but I can control which bus I ride. It would be comfortable for me to site back for the next 13 classes and be satisfied with good enough. However, that is not the right thing to do. Over the next week, I will stand up for what’s right. I will begin to gather the right people on a bus and determine the best way to drive it to achieve a common goal. I am surrounded by the right people. They need to know that I am interested in going on a trip with them. We don’t know where this bus will take us but it will surely be a better place with the right people taking it there.

Keep in touch to know more about our adventures.

Why twitter

I started thinking about the people I connect with on twitter and why I keep going back for more. Recently TechCrunch.com released an article, “Why Teens Aren’t Using Twitter“. I agree with the article and want to add my own commentary. I don’t have any evidence surrounding the claims that I am about to make but I’m seeing more and more anecdotal evidence every day. I also make overarching generalizations that do not necessarily apply to everyone.

When we look at the network effect surrounding children, teenagers, and young adults, you see that their networks are very different from that of most working adults. Youth are learning from one another constantly. Each year, summer, sport, job, course and relationship is a mostly new experience. Their local networks are so diverse that they don’t necessarily need an outlet like twitter. They are content connecting at deeper levels with those around them. Facebook provides the opportunity to build lasting relationships and deeper connections.

Working adults on the other hand have completely different agendas. We want to meet people who share similar experiences and interests to us. We have firm beliefs and enjoy surrounding ourselves with people who share those beliefs. When adults settle in to “office” jobs, they settle in with a fairly small and far less diverse group of people. When that happens, we need an outlet. Historically that outlet has been clubs, organizations, and neighborhoods. However, with Twitter, it is now much easier to connect with “your people” from all over the world. You know the type of people you want to connect with and search tools make those people easy to find. Twitter allows you to research who that person is before you choose to follow him or her. Experienced users of Twitter are not complete strangers. The history of their posts will tell you everything you want to know about them and more. It is the adult way of efficiently making friends.

So is Twitter more of an adult tool than a youth tool? Today, I would say yes and I think that is a good thing. Youth need to experience their surroundings. They need to learn from those around them to help formulate their long term life lessons. That being said, I think Twitter has the potential to connect youth with different cultures, communities and a diverse group of friends and acquaintances. But just like video games and TV are not substitutions for going out and experiencing the world, Twitter is not a replacement for going out and meeting new people in real life.

An increase in support

Have you ever been in a conversation with someone about changing or adding services that are provided by you or your organization? One of the questions that almost always comes up is that of support. It costs money to support anything and anything that is done right needs support. People have come up with hundreds if not thousands of creative ways to curtail the rising cost of support. Even still, when a new product is mentioned there is always someone in the room who is concerned about support. Now, I am not trying to bash the poor person who always brings up the support question (one of the best people to  have in meetings) but I do want to attack the argument a little. I’ll start by showing one of the most well known support videos on the web.

Quick economics lesson. When success is measured based on market share or market penetration there is at least some idea of the number of potential customers in the market. Basic economics would tell us that the end goal for any organization would be to serve 100% of the market. Taking this into account, it is safe to assume that as you increase the number of users for a service the cost of supporting that service increases.

Now that we have the economics lesson out of the way we can complicate things. Most organizations support more than one service. The difficulty lies in determining how many and which types of services to provide. The more services you provide, the more complicated support channels can become. Looking at the “Medieval Helpdesk” let’s assume that the two products, scrolls and books, are being considered by a single organization. Which product do you support? Do you support both? Supporting books will surely increase your support costs. However, there is tremendous potential for increasing market share with the introduction of the book.

I know a lot of people say that good tools don’t need a lot of support. I agree with that but they still need some support. Where am I going with this you ask. Well, remember the person in the meeting that asks the question about increasing support costs, how would you have answered the question if it were raised in a meeting about scrolls and books? Substitute scrolls and books for products that you work with. Is it more important to hold on to services that keep support costs low (scrolls) or expand out to newer services which will increase support costs while also increasing market share (books)?

The cost of tech

The phenomenon has been happening for years but it has recently gained significant traction. Universities have started requiring that students arrive on campuses across the United States with the same technology in hand.

Links

This makes complete sense at a business and administrative level. The fewer variables, the lower the costs. But is this an approach that is “best” for Universities? Universities are supposed to be “institutions of higher learning”. But what happens when the entire institution is boxed in by technology? I frequently debate the pros and cons of various mobile devices from BlackBerry to iPhone, Palm Pre to Google Android. Each debate ends the same way; each device has its own merits. Technological diversity allows innovative exploration. My recommendation for Universities trying to solve the problem of too many devices without a common supported framework is to provide minimum technical requirements for attending classes. This allows students to decide what their device of choice is while providing a framework for faculty and staff to build around. Diversity should thrive in all aspects of the University setting, including technology.

Here we go…

This blog is intended for my daily musings about creative ideas that pop into my head. You may agree with some of the things I say, while finding other things irrational. I respect others opinions so if you have a question or a comment please don’t hesitate to speak up.