Backyard Chickens and your Project Team
I live in Cobb County in northwest Atlanta, Georgia, USA. This morning I was entertained by a news report about a family living in my county. Joseph Pond is on a crusade to raise backyard chickens on his property. Currently, there is an ordinance that states you must have more than two acres of property [...]
A New Start
“Happy New Year!” It is a wonderful wish! Hope! Encouragement! This year could be the best ever! A positive outlook! What will help make the difference THIS year? Are we destined to repeat history, or are we positioned to learn from it and do better this time around? Many resolute decisions are made as [...]
12/21/2012
Today is the day. The Mayan prophecy of doomsday, the end of the world as we know it, a spiritual awakening, the lining up of the planets causing gravitational stress on our planet… Or just another day of news about fiscal cliffs and the stock market? Forecasts can be alarming or stress-relievers. In which [...]
Where to Begin?
I recently began managing a project for an Atlanta-based charity, 21st Century Leaders. Actually, the team is made up of very smart, very talented volunteers, so “coordinating” would be more accurate than “managing” in this case. Most of us have experienced that moment when a group of people looks to the project manager and asks [...]
Patients and Projects – both need an Advocate
I was recently staying overnight with a loved one in the hospital. She was recovering from an accident, on heavy pain meds, and not fully alert. We had 2 unusual instances occur that taught us a lesson. First, we had an encounter with an over-confident nurse who had more assurance in her abilities than she [...]
The Ghost of Frederick Taylor
Frederick Taylor gets a bad rap these days. As you’ll remember, he started the whole Scientific Management movement. Unfortunately, his conclusions are also credited with the onset of sweatshops and inhumane working conditions. Recently I was in a meeting where one person conjectured that it was Fredrick Taylor who was responsible for Foxconn, which has received [...]
Did all your candidates win?
I’ll bet not. Yesterday, I voted in my district for 17 candidates and 2 constitutional amendments. Out of 19 decision points or positions, I did not get everything that I wanted. The results were not 100% aligned with my requests. Not too shocking, is it? The same is true with our project teams. We don’t [...]
Headphones in the office
Headphones in the office…good idea or bad idea? This summer we had a development team working on a project to deliver InSite online courses on iPads, tablets, and other mobile devices. The team found it productive to collaborate in a conference room, as they stumbled across random Java calls, guzzled Mtn. Dew, cursed ill-conceived design [...]
The Good News About Bad News
During my last two years of college, I worked as a co-op with IBM. My boss, a straightforward and serious individual, cut straight out of a bolt of IBM-blue cloth, used to tell those of us in his department “bad news does not get better with age.” It took a while for that advice to [...]
Leading and Managing Volunteers
The more I manage and work with organizations, the more the subject of leadership becomes interesting to me. There is only so much an individual can accomplish, but leading a team or an organization multiplies that ability greatly. More than that, it fascinates me to watch strong leaders in action (particularly because they are few [...]
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