David Eisert

This blog has moved

davideisert — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 16:50:41 +0000

If you come across this blog, you will undoubtedly notice that it hasn’t been updated in a while. That is because we moved. Checkout our posts at http://davideisert.com.

Balance

davideisert — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 03:01:12 +0000

I really wish I knew how to find a happier balance in life. It seems like I am constantly running from one thing to the next; never taking enough to relax and enjoy the most important things.

Jess and I finished school in December. We had been spending nearly every Saturday for 3 years in the classroom leaving only Sunday to keep things in order. We were really looking forward to gaining time back in 2010.

What happened?

Great things happened. I started a new job, Jess got a promotion, and we started dog training for both our dogs. Did I mention that our house is on the market, we have a friend with Leukemia we would really like to spend more time with, we have friends from Purdue we want to hang out with, and we would like to see our families every once in a while. Oh yeah! I almost forgot, I live in Bloomington 5 days a week and only have the weekends to spend time with Jess.

Now this is two posts that I have made it seem like I was complaining about my current situation. Trust me when I say that I am very grateful for everything that I have and for my current situation. What I am trying to stress is the need to balance everything in your life so whenever possible, you spend time with those who mean the most to you. Some will be disappointed in your decisions. At the end of the day, only you can determine what your priorities are. Balance on your terms. Balance the things that mean the most to you. Ultimately, it is you and those closest to you who determine those things.

What are you doing for you? What are you doing to try and appease someone else? Are you balanced?

Finding the motivation

davideisert — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 02:26:12 +0000

I am certainly having this feeling a lot these days. I am not going to lie, it is difficult to live in a hotel during the week when your wife and pets are at home. It feels like I am missing precious time with them. Before I proceed, let me set the record straight. We all make sacrifices. I do not regret where I am or what I am doing. I am having a blast but it isn’t all roses.

I have an opportunity to truly launch my career. I worked at Purdue right after graduation and stayed there for a little over 6 years. During my time at Purdue I had tremendous opportunities to be on the cutting edge of major University initiatives. I was trusted to make decision and earned a management position. That job wasn’t easy. I learned a lot. But I was all Purdue.

Now I am in a position where I am expected to advance my employer but also myself. I am encouraged if not required to make a name for myself. I have a tremendous friend/boss/mentor. I have the resources to do everything I need to do at my fingertips. The only thing standing in my way is me. So here is my commitment to myself.

Take advantage of the time in the evenings.
Focus on something I am passionate about.
Don’t make excuses.
Give something back.

So there it is. Seems simple enough.

Week 1

davideisert — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 22:00:51 +0000

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

#TeamPie

#TeamIcing

@bpanulla - http://bit.ly/br2JGQ
@highlyillogical – http://bit.ly/9lm58y
@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

davideisert — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 01:14:49 +0000

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

davideisert — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 01:51:03 +0000

“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

davideisert — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 01:38:40 +0000

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

davideisert — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 17:48:28 +0000

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

davideisert — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:47:52 +0000

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.Take Our Poll

Here we go…

davideisert — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:16:37 +0000

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.