Don’t compete on features

Nice quote from @peldi, thanks to my friend @capotribu:

Best quote from @balsamiq talk tonight: "sooner or later others will have your same features. Don't compete on features"—
Marco Abis (@capotribu) April 17, 2012

PierG

Inspiration for .. inspiration

I loathe deadlines, but this quote makes me appreciate them a little bit more and reminds me to set a deadline for all the things I really want to get done

via “The Ultimate Inspiration Is The Deadline”.

PierG

Sweet memories

Sweet memories of Passo Sella between Val Gardena and Val di Fassa

PierG

Expose yourself to what you don’t understand

As I wrote in my post Insulate Yourself  I want to explain a little bit more the item in the Invent More post, quoting Seth Godin.

Today we talk about: “Expose yourself to art you don’t yet understand”.
The two key factors in this sentence are ‘art’ and ‘understand’.

‘Art’ has to deal with the right side of the brain. Our culture is based on making us exploit the left part of our brain: the analytic side, the one who deals with language, with tasks, with checklists, with homework, with tests, … For some of us it’s an easy trip (the left-brained ones), for some it’s tougher (the right-brained).

To have a better balance we should start exploiting more the right side of our brain: the more visual side, the more intuitive and holistic one.

Also the ‘understand’ side int he sentence has a similar meaning:

• we are usually frightened by what we don’t know. Fear of change comes from here. That’s why you better face the unknown;
• it’s not guaranteed that you can solve problems using the same info, patterns, context that generate them. That’s why you better face the unknown.

So this simple action “expose yourself to art you don’t yet understand” to me is a small step that can make you start the process of exploring  alternatives with the final goal to enrich you, your family, your life.

Happy hunting,

PierG

Feels like a computer science museum

For the next generation of knowledge workers, entering the workplace often feels like entering a computer science museum – Coming to Terms with the Consumerization of IT – HBR

I don’t want to be the IT that causes this! And the road to success is tough and the solutions are to be found while the problems are there: clear and heavy.

We have to start thinking in a different way if we want to succeed starting from the presuppositions behind our choices!

PierG

Do I have to say his name?

Courtesy of Danny Clinch - http://www.brucespringsteen.net

I remember very well one of the ways in which Bruce was used to introduce the E Street Band. When it was the time of Clarence, he used to ask “do I have to say his name? Do I have to speak his name?” … no there was no need to say “big man Clarence Clemons on saxophone!!!!”

Some years after the premature death of Danny Federici, another member of the legendary E Street Band passed away … and this is a huge loss: Clarence Clemons who died after complications from his stroke of last Sunday, June 12th.

Bruce Springsteen said of Clarence: Clarence lived a wonderful life. He carried within him a love of people that made them love him. He created a wondrous and extended family. He loved the saxophone, loved our fans and gave everything he had every night he stepped on stage. His loss is immeasurable and we are honored and thankful to have known him and had the opportunity to stand beside him for nearly forty years. He was my great friend, my partner, and with Clarence at my side, my band and I were able to tell a story far deeper than those simply contained in our music. His life, his memory, and his love will live on in that story and in our band.

Ciao big man!

PierG

Do you want to be agile or predictable?

Pretty provocative title to this post but it sometimes seems like these to things cannot fit together.

Have a look at Jim Highsmith post Balancing Adaptivity and Predictability for interesting thought about the topic:

In presentations I often ask the question, “How many of you have been on Agile teams and were asked to be agile, adaptive, flexible—but also asked to conform to the plan?” Mostly I get snickers and mild laughter at the question because most have experienced it. – continue

PierG

San Francisco from my hotel

PierG

Learning is not Knowledge Transfer

Thanks to Sergio Bogazzi (you can follow him on Twitter), I discovered the beautiful video you see below,

It explain how we tag learning experiences (and not only those moments) with an emotional part that the author of the video calls “Affective Context”: this is way we tend to remember from school odd or good teachers / moments or friends more than what we were supposed to learn . I love the sentence:

Learning is not Knowledge Transfer

Some of these ideas can be found also in the work of John Medina, and in his books Brain Rules and Brain Rules for Babies.

Effective learning is a matter of communication (that’s why e-learning sucks) and then of  ”gut”, but also management is a matter of communication so how could you use this “Affective Context” for being a better manager, coach, leader?

PierG

The definition of DONE … is not DONE

When we talk about the definition of DONE, the agile community almost completely (wow! ) agree on the fact that it should be as broad as possible. People are different and what is DONE for you (say having written code and built with no errors) can be different from what is for me (say the code has been shipped and the user is actually using it).
This concept is true for different businesses too.

Rework and delays are killers for delivery and trust. How many time have you found that what you though it was DONE, it was “DONE in the sense that I’ve finished but that and that has to be DONE before the user can have it”?

So the idea is to put everything you can, every step, in the definition of DONE and extend it deeply toward your users.

But sometimes this is not enough: as MktgMeetsIt writes in a comment to my post The Spiral of Distrust:

“there is an emotional component here”

The Dev Team and the Users may have different expectations on that ‘DONE stuff’:

• For the Dev Team it’s surely the result of their work, for the Users it’s the beginning of a new working experience.
• For the Dev Team it might have been very tough from a tech point of view, while for the Users it might be a minor change.
• The Dev Team is willing to get feedback and learn, while the Users might want to be left alone to understand and speed up their processes.

So this last emotional phase probably should be faced in some way and treated as part of the process to gain maximum benefit.

What’s your thought?

PierG