Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

Wikis - a reason to be thankful

All right - so you already know I am a fan of wikis. But I never thought I'd actually be thankful for them (and just in time for Thanksgiving here in the US). What happened?

After a long time trying to get my daughter to thoroughly clean up her room, the best we got was a room that had most of the clutter hidden. So you can imagin how surprised I was to find that she'd done an awesome job cleaning it last weekend. Not only was it clean, it was sparkling clean.

"Wow - what brought this on?" we asked.

"Oh, I learned how to clean my room on WikiHow," she replied. We went upstairs and she showed me the printout of the article she'd found on WikiHow on "How to clean your room." The article is very good (and I've seen its results).

She methodically followed the approach in the article, and by the end of the day her room looked great. They say people are often more willing to believe things just because they're on the internet - looks like that includes taking advice on cleaning your room.

She's been trying to get her younger sister to use the directions, too. It's not working - the internet may have magical powers, but they don't appear to work as well on 7 year olds.

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Renegades Rule

I've been on a traveling spree lately and, while it hasn't provided me with much time to post here, it has given me the chance to catch up on some of my reading. One of the books that I read is Christine Comaford-Lynch's "Rules for Renegades: How to Make More Money, Rock Your Career, and Revel in Your Individuality." I was familiar with Christine from back in the late 20th century when she was a columnist for computer magazines (that's my industry). I've always thought she was very smart.

I bought the book because I wanted to find out how Christine --who never finished high school-- became a major "name" in the software industry and fostered multiple successful business ventures and made some high-powered friends along the way. I found an enjoyable read, with some fun stories and some good, reusable tips.

In some ways, this book reminds me (at least a bit) of Tim Ferriss's "Four-Hour Workweek" because Christine takes some of the same approaches for gaining advantages by understanding the loopholes and technicalities that let you "put one over on the system." By doing this, she was able to be a player in the early days of Microsoft, get job interviews (and get hired) for jobs she probably wouldn't have otherwise even gotten invited to interview for, and many other impressive things.

In this book, you're taken through a journey of discovery which led Christine to 10 Rules for renegades. My favorites:

Rule 1: Everything's an Illusion, So Pick One That's Empowering

This is a variation on "fake it 'til you make it" or, as I always say: "take responsibility for your own well-being." Essentially, this is a primer about how to anchor your focus and beliefs in a way that always helps you move toward something better. Christine shares a quick & dirty technique for setting, focusing on (then adjusting and resetting) compelling goals in key areas of your life.

Rule 6: Learn to Love Networking

OK, so some people love to network. Some don't. I am not a natural networker and couldn't learn to love it until I wrapped it up in a set of tricks and techniques to make it more fun. IIn this Rule, I found some great tips in "Essentials for Networking," and these didn't feel like they required superhuman stamina like Keith Ferrazzi's in "Never Eat Alone." Christine's tips sound more like "Networking for Mere Mortals," which is what I need.

Rule 9: Resign as General Manager of the Universe

The subtitle of this Rule is "The Control Freak 12-Step Program" and it is about how to keep from burning yourself out, driving yourself crazy obsession about things beyond your control, and generally throwing your priorities out of whack. The best part of this Rule is the "The Semi-Annual Assessment" - it's a reminder to step away from the hole, stop digging, and figure out if you're getting where you really want to go.

There's something to learn in each of the 10 Rules in this book, and Christine's colorful stories make this an easy read. This book has elements of "woman triumphs over old boys' club," but if you view it only through that lens you are missing a lot - anybody who wants to consciously exert more control over their future will enjoy this book.

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Links of the week #9 (week 44/2007)

In the past, I've written about Wikis and how useful I've found them to be for collaboration in my company. In the olde days, only geeky types used Wikis. Now, there are a lot of positive changes that make wikis more accessible to the mainstream (you've experience a form of Wiki if you've used Wikipedia, for example).

Here are a few Wiki options I know a lot about, and the links to get there if you really wanna wiki:

TWiki

TWiki is billed as an "enterprise wiki" and is the Wiki tool that has been in use in my company for the last 6 years or so. It is very flexible and stable, can be customized and is very scalable. However, you must install, administer, and maintain the platform yourself. This is better suited for organizations with a more technical user community and a dedicated (at least part time) Wiki administrator.

pbWiki

pbWiki is a Wiki "platform" including the software and service to get going on a Wiki without installing the software yourself. They have a free version of their Wiki platform geared toward individuals, students, and educators. From their home page, you can sign up for a free account or try out a demo Wiki they've published.

pbWiki also has a small business-centric version of their Wiki platform, with some setup and manageability improvements and more robust permissions management. This costs money, but the price seems reasonable for business collaboration. Here are some videos discussing their new features:

Wiki using Microsoft Sharepoint

Sharepoint has always been a group collaboration tool, but it can be a little (a lot?) clunky to learn. Microsoft has incorporated Wiki features into Sharepoint 2007 to get into this meme. Read more about Sharepoint Wikis here. We're just getting into this in our company, as a way for less technical users to collaborate.

Other options abound

The resources I mentioned are just scratching the surface, and were selected because they are the ones I've been personally exposed to. If you know of other options that you love, please add them into the comments on this post along with your brief review (even a thumbs up/thumbs down or short list of pros and cons).
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ruggengraat

I've just returned from a week in Japan where I was speaking at a conference on JSOX (Japanese Sarbanes-Oxley). While I was there, I visited with a bunch of customers, prospects, and partners. My goal in these meetings was to develop a more tangible understanding of some of the business drivers in the market so my company can provide a stronger solution in Japan.

In the course of these meetings, I was extremely impressed by one partner I met with - not just by what they do, but by how they have built their company. When we started the meeting, they wanted to begin by explaining their company philosophy to me - before we talked any "real" business.

They explained that, though they operate in a very technical market space, they don't hire specifically for technical skills or expertise. I was intrigued - "What do you look for when you hire, then?" Their answer: "We hire first for integrity and core values. We can teach technical skills, but we cannot teach integrity and ethics. Our customers trust us with their IT infrastructure, including things that have sensitive data on them - and we must be trustworthy. If we start with employees with high moral character, we can help them learn the skills they need."

I asked for a copy of their mission and values - which they really apply in their business (I saw some great examples of this even in my short visit with their President/Founder and members of his team). I'd like to share them with you - maybe they'll inspire you, as they do me:

Embracing a global philosophy

Here is an excerpt from the English version of their company brochure:

"All of us at [the company] firmly believe that having the strength 'to safeguard things that don't change' and 'to strive to see the things that cannot be seen' is essential, and that improving oneself is a daily challenge.

With that in mind, our philosophy is:

  • Cherish the immutable.
  • Enjoy in moderation.
  • Value the people around us.
  • Observe propriety.
  • Be attentive when communicating.
  • Persevere to the best of our abilities.
  • Apply imagination and creativity in forming ideas.
  • Share knowledge and experience.
  • Have an altruistic heart.
  • Appreciate opportunity and use a critical eye in analysis."

Very inspring.

Their results

I don't think it's an accident that this is a rapidly growing, profitable company (they've tripled in the last couple of years). And I imagine they have a very loyal employee base (they were training about 30 newly minted university grads in one of their training rooms when I was there - all hired for core values).

I think they are headed for greatness - and I think we can learn a lot from this approach. Another interesting benefit of this approach: the space they operate in has traditionally had a scarce hiring pool in Japan, but their method should be very insulated from that scarcity since they can create their own workforce on demand. Way cool.

Oh - and the significance of the title of this post? The notion that this company understands that you "can't teach integrity" reminded me of an observation I once heard from a basketball coach. He talked about how certain, uncoachable attributes made it easier to succeed in basketball. In his example, he said he could help players improve in just about any skill, but he could never coach height.

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Learn a 5-Step Weekly Review: You’ll love it.

As I mentioned in "My GTD Odyssey"), I've been using aspects of "Total Workday Control" to augment my personal Getting Things Done playbook.


Short recap


I was challenged by context lists alone so I used TWC's task processing method to assign dates to my tasks so they'd show up on my "dashboard" (example in the graphic at right) every day to remind me what I wanted on my candidate tasks list for the day. This means I run through holdover tasks every morning and either:



  1. change their date to today's if I still want to consider them for today
  2. change their date to a future date if I want to have them pop up in the future
  3. remove the date so they go back to my Master Task list so I can reconsider them at my next weekly review

This system works great for me, and quite a few others who've taken it on.


Speed dating in Outlook


OK, now on to the speed dating aspect. One of the things about using this technique is that you need to enter lots of dates every day. I share an office with a guy named Gene, who uses a similar methodology to mine and he was complaining about how tedious it was to select dates in Outlook using their drop-down calendar.


I've been using a much easier method to assign dates. Gene thought it was useful, so I figured I'd share it here. Rather than typing the full date, or using the dropdown list, let's look at some other options.

In any date field in Outlook (tasks, calendar, reminders, you name it), the following shortcuts will work (all of these are based on Outlook 2003 - Outlook 2007 may have even added a few). Note that you don't have to worry about capitalization, and it understands that "2" and "two" have the same meaning.





































What you can typeWhat Outlook will do with it
Enter a number in a date field (like "12")Outlook will convert this to the next "day 12 of the month" - if the 12th has already passed in the current month, this will change it to the 12th of the following month.
TodayConverts to today's date. You can also type "now" to get the same effect.
TomorrowConverts to tomorrow's date. You can also type "day" to get the same effect.
Relative dates

Outlook understands quite a bit here. You can type things like the following, and Outlook will do the translation:



  • Thursday
  • Next Thursday
  • Day after tomorrow
  • 2 weeks
  • 2 months
  • Next year
  • 2 years

You can also use this to fill in dates in the past like "yesterday" and "last Thursday"


You can get fancy, too - type "One week before valentines day" to set a handy reminder to get a gift for someone.

Day and month name shortcuts

While you can type "Next Thursday" as in the previous example, you can also type the day and month abbreviations:



  • Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat, Sun
  • Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
Holiday names (like "Christmas" or "Valentine's Day")Outlook will fill in the correct day for the holiday. It doesn't know that many, and this is more a novelty in my opinion. Others it knows include Halloween, Independence Day, and New Years Day. There may be more, but I haven't discovered them.
Time unit abbreviations
  • "mo" == month
  • "y" == year
  • "d" == day
  • "w" == week
    • Calendar math expressions

    If you want to do something a certain number of days before or after a date, you can use simple math expressions to tell Outlook when to schedule things. Some examples:



    • "tomorrow + 2 weeks" or "tomorrow 2 weeks" translates to two weeks from tomorrow
    • "Christmas 2d" will schedule something 2 days after Christmas

    Note - Outlook likes the plus sign, but doesn't like the minus sign, because it is too confusing for dates (12/24 and 12-24 are the same to Outlook). You have to use "One week before..." or "3 days before..." kinds of language like that described above in "Relative dates"

    Time unit abbreviations

    • "mo" == month
    • "y" == year
    • "d" == day
    • "w" == week
    Holiday names (like "Christmas" or "Valentine's Day")Outlook will fill in the correct day for the holiday. It doesn't know that many, and this is more a novelty in my opinion. Others it knows include Halloween, Independence Day, and New Years Day. There may be more, but I haven't discovered them.


    Those are the ones I know about - do you know others? As you can see, some of these take longer to type than enter the date ("7/4" is much easier than "Independence Day"), but some of them like "today" or "2w" can save lots of time when scheduling activities, tasks, or other things requiring dates in Outlook.