Managers often say that it's not their fault that they're so busy, and they are often right. [read more] [Tony Bowden: Understanding Nothing]
4:02:34 PM    

Every individual has a unique Pressure/Performance Curve, though all the curves have the same general curve. [read more] [Tony Bowden: Understanding Nothing]
4:02:26 PM    

Over the life of a software system, the internal quality of the code is more important than the external quality in determining its controllability. [read more] [Tony Bowden: Understanding Nothing]
4:02:19 PM    

wow, so much has happened in these few weeks. I e .... wow, so much has happened in these few weeks. I entered the year with such focus, but it slowly slipped away as I got busier and had less time to devote to devotions and meditation on God's abundant goodness. Actually, i think i'm changing to X A N G A. Community is everything and blogger just ain't cutting it. Follow the train of thought... -> www.xanga.com/phillystyle [Joel's Blog]

Looks like a nice community, Joel, but apparently you can't get in without a membership. Can you set up an RSS feed for me?
2:44:24 PM    

For this reason, I encourage Mike to keep blogging. For this reason, and another as well: The only way I can think of to do away with the need to seem perfect is to acknowledge and accept imperfection, in the self and in others. Not paper it over. Not delete it. Not pretend it didn’t happen. Acknowledge, accept—and work to fix, whenever possible.

This is what I mean by “personal transparency,” a topic that has sat in my blogclog for months now. It’s important to me, both personally and professionally. I want people to read my blog, learn about me and the way I think and act and the values I try to hold to, understand the kinds of errors I make and what I do to correct them.

I want prospective employers to ask themselves whether they can cope with what I say and how I say it. If not—better they know now and not hire me than learn later and have to pitch screaming fits and toss pink slips around. I want friends to explain to me where their boundaries are so I know not to cross them, rather than pretending I’m not capable of such a thing (or worse, that they don’t have any boundaries).

Most of all, I want to be forgiven when I screw up, which I do. How can a perfect façade admit wrongdoing? How can it apologize, if it cannot even admit wrongdoing? How can it hope for forgiveness, if it cannot even apologize?

Jesus heard that they had thrown out [the man who had been blind], and when he found him, he said, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?"
"Who is he, sir?" the man asked. "Tell me so that I may believe in him."
Jesus said, "You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you."
Then the man said, "Lord, I believe," and he worshiped him.
Jesus said, "For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind."
Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, "What? Are we blind too?"
Jesus said, "If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.

2:30:54 PM    

Serving Up the Best Writer's Site. Serving Up the Best Site. ... [meryl's notes]

Congratulations, Meryl!
2:14:11 PM    

Rewarding and recognizing knowledge sharing. This is an interesting article on [Rewards and Recognition in Knowledge Management] from the AQPC. In it the APQC President Carla O'Dell is quoted as saying :

"What has been interesting in the 30 years of research is that as you increase extrinsic motivation, you can drive out intrinsic reward. For example, if you give people $20 every time they come to a community of practice event and then stop giving them that, they are going to be upset. Be cautious about attaching extrinsic rewards to behavior you want to persist over time."

Speaking personally I am very much against extrinsic motivation to reward or encourage knowledge sharing. Its like saying 'this is not really part of your job' or worse 'this is a distasteful part of your job' and so we are we going to reward you separately to do it.

This is totally the wrong message to be giving and can only undermine knowledge sharing in the long term. Knowledge sharing is a fundamental and integral part of every knowledge workers job - not so different to breathing! Why the hell should you single out the key essence of a knowledge workers job - to mind what they are really getting paid for and reward them separately for it. It is just plain crazy.

Disincentives need to be removed and knowledge sharing needs evangelizing and supporting. Recognition is also important. But to my mind the prime way forward is to encourage people to talk openly with each other and to think about knowledge sharing for themselves. You may also need to facilitate such conversations.

This is in the hope (yes hope - you cannot mandate it) that they will come to understand that knowledge sharing is actually not only in the organizations interest but also their own.

If intelligent people who are intrinsically motivated to do a good job of work cannot see the value of knowledge sharing then maybe there is really no value in it for them or the organization but I very much doubt that!

Later in the day Sunday: Serendipity! Even [more] on this subject in an item on 'Knowledge sharing and leadership' in Jim McGee's blog. I love the [article] by Alfie Cohn - if you have any lingering doubts about the stupidity of rewarding knowledge sharing then read this article!

Also a number of other good links here on the subject e.g. the work of Hazel Hall. I have an article on Knowledge Sharing that is taking a long time in gestation but I must remember to come back here when I find time again to work on it! [Gurteen Knowledge-Log]

This was a good morning for klog-related posts.
7:14:16 AM    

ThirdAgers.

Pretty gloomy weather in New England today but things brightened up when I got a call from my good friend Mary Furlong. It started out as a brief chat as we do from time to time just to update each other on happenings and points of view. It is always a privilege to hear Mary's view of things. There is nobody on the planet who knows more "third agers" than Mary. She is a leading authority on technology and aging and is founder and chairman of ThirdAge Inc. Before founding ThirdAge in 1996, Mary founded SeniorNet, a nonprofit membership organization dedicated to educating older adults about computer technology. She served as president of SeniorNet for 10 years. Our conversation caused me to dig out the chapter in my book, Net Attitude, where I had some things to say about "seniors". (more)

[John Patrick's Weblog]

Note the references (in the title-linked article) to "retirement communities" (one is below).

As the next generation of the Internet evolves as the new medium it will enable members of this highly skilled workforce to come back to work part time from their retirement communities via telecommuting.

If we can, we will...
7:04:57 AM