I love Star Trek, especially The Next Generation. This was the series that was televised during my childhood, and I was hooked. Captain Picard is such a model leader. Some of you may have wondered why I never wrote “Leadership Lessons from Jean-Luc Picard.” The reason I haven’t is because someone already did. It’s a great work, and I felt no need to duplicate or improve upon it. Check it out here. Across the various Star Trek series, the crew…
I’ve made it to 100. I’ve been at this for two years now, writing weekly musings on technology leadership issues. On this milestone article, I believe it’s worth reflecting on why I am doing this and how it’s going. Why I like to write. My normal day-job requires a lot of in-person interaction, which I enjoy, but it taps my energy. Writing this blog forces me to draw inward periodically to focus my thinking and form ideas. It’s restorative for…
I love the world of the X-Men. There are two groups of people on the planet: normal humans, and mutants. Mutants have superpowers. The fact that they have superpowers means they are treated like freaks and are therefore outcast from society. Most withdraw completely, or find creative ways to hide their differences and blend in. Technology geeks have some similarities. It’s usually quite obvious that they don’t quite fit in with the business crowd. They also have technical superpowers. Of…
Happy Star Wars Day. May the 4th be with you! Boba Fett is one of the coolest characters in Star Wars. He’s mysterious. He’s independent. He has his own unique style. Best of all, he’s a bounty hunter. That profession may give you the impression that Boba Fett is a not very nice, but to the contrary, he is actually a very caring individual. Case-in-point, Darth Vader wanted to test his carbonite freezer to make sure it was safe for…
Geeks are the smart ones. It’s the one thing we have. All other strengths we may lack. We may not be good looking, athletic, or sociable, but we have really huge brains. Our intellect is our asset. We develop it, use it, show it off, and work miracles with it every day. Yes, our minds make us a bit awkward and weird, but that’s okay. Being normal is boring. There is, however, a down side to having a big noggin….
In 1987, Mel Brooks released Spaceballs as a parody of Star Wars and other science fiction of that era. As much as I consider myself a Star Wars geek, I’ve probably watched Spaceballs more than the movies it parodies. It’s so quotable, and somehow, it never gets old. I was recently considering a common IT problem and for some reason, Spaceballs scenes kept coming to mind. IT is all about speed. More CPU, more bandwidth, faster project execution, tightened SLAs, on-demand provisioning,…
A while back, my boss advised me to think of my job in thirds. Here’s how he broke it down: One third of your job is to run your function. One third of your job is to influence the company. One third of your job is to influence the industry. This is both very cool, and very challenging. I totally agree with all three categories. They are all very important. The radical part is the proportion. Many would break this…
Recently, I jumped into a debate on LinkedIn about the use of personal technology in meetings. Here’s the exact post that grabbed my attention: I agree with most of this, and I’m actually a huge fan of Simon Sinek (the originator of the post). I recently wrote a positive blog about his teaching. My hang up is #2: “Encourage notetaking on paper instead of computers.” Here was my response: “Why pencil and paper and not stone tablets and chisels? Leading…
My real title is Director of IT Development & Operations. That sounds pretty cool, right? Well, I have another job too. It’s pretty unofficial, but it’s real. I’m the company’s A/V (Audio/Video) guy. Here’s what happens nearly every single day: I show up to a meeting as an attendee. The presenter starts getting setup. The presenter starts struggling with WiFi, the display, Skype, WebEx, the speakerphone, cables, adapters, or something. The presenter starts to sweat. Other attendees start casually gazing…
Companies that accumulate too much financial debt suffer significant consequences. They are often unable to respond to market opportunities because they are over-leveraged. They are also at-risk for making significant structural changes just to stay afloat. Most large companies manage their finances appropriately to avoid these consequences. However, these same companies are often prone to accumulating large amounts of technical debt. What is technical debt? Technical debt is what happens when we focus on features and functionality, and ignore non-functional…
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