Crying for attention

After reading some articles on the net the first days this year I gave up the hope for the rest of the year that quality of news and articles get any better. The first days of the year began worse than ever with subject lines trying to get my attention and while reading the appropriate article I left the site disappointed and full of anger because the headlines where near completely exaggerated if not wrong (in the way that it either didn't match the article's content). I lost a lot of time reading completely unnecessary stuff....

The problem: Everything and everyone is trying to get your attention.
Companies, products, problems, groups, persons, ... - everything is crying for attention. Look here, look there, you must read, watch or have this and that.

The reason: You are a potential customer and you should be motivated to buy and consume products, services and information.
We are often annoyed by advertisments or by the behaviour of salesman when they are trying to catch our attention and get us as customers and often we see a company or a system as the annoying element. But there are people behind trying to earn money. It is the same as in a room where a group of people talk. The noise gets louder and louder because everybody needs to increase the volume to get heard. The advertising "volume" and amount increases with the time. But why can't we simply ignore all that stuff? - Because "Knowledge is Power"! Knowing the important things pushes you in a better situation in general. You have more control, save and earn more money, be happier - in general you be more successful having more of the important knowledge. This is the reason why we don't reduce information intake drastically. And the problem is that what shouts loudest is not always the most important.

The solution: Improve your ability to focus and the ability to ignore what does not matter.
Easy said, hard work to be implemented - and I can only give you some considerations that hopefully help you sorting the things out. So think of the following before starting your information intake:

• Is this really new to me?
  Often we read something that we already have considered to be this way. Reading what we ever thought to be this way is confirmation of our considerations and we love that. So ask yourself if you really need so much confirmation from outside about your own opinions or considerations.
  
  
• Can this have the potential to change my life?
  Think whether this book, article, advertisement has really the potential to change your life. Ask yourself consciously: Is it very probable that this information changes my life?
  
  
• Who could be behind pushing that information and what could be his intention?
  The same information can be provided in very different words and manners. It usually depends on the author and his intentions how information is prepared and manipulated. So the question about the author and his intention can be of relevance for the reliability/quality and the importance of the information.
  
  
• Watch your needs and then the market.
  Often information is brought to you to make you consume something you might not have known that you needed it. Don't watch products and find their importance for you, instead you should do it the other way round: Focus on your needs and search for solutions/products/services that could help you achieving your goals or improving your life quality.
  
  
• Information can be wrong!
  Don't rely too much on information in general. Just because some economy analyst is saying that economy is bad should not cause you to get in panic about loosing your job. Such an information can already be wrong because the parameters used for measuring economy could be theoretically a good indicator but mismatching practical experiences in the real world (See "The mismatch problem"). Especially information about the future should also be considered as "nice thoughts" only. And there are either authors knowingly producing wrong information to misslead you.
  
  
• You are always missing information.
  When searching for information (e.g. while comparing different products or services or when you worry about current politics or economic changes in progress) you should give up the desire to know everything. There is always some doubt remaining. This should not mean that you shouldn't search and read information. But after you collected a certain amount of knowledge about the issue, consider to stop when it doesn't make more sense getting more information.
  
  
• Rely on "common sense".
  Often relying on your intuition and common sense leads to a good decision without the need of reading a bulk of information. So the cost performance ratio is often much better if you just rely on common sense. So before you go to research for making a decision think if research is really convenient.
  
  
• Ignore articles with crazy titles.
  My experience is that those articles with the most crazy title do have the most unnecessary content. Maybe because without the crazy title nobody would read it. I am glad that those authors help me identifying unnecessary information by giving crazy titles. Here an example from today's science news (freely translated): "Mistaking apes are humanly" or another from an english IT news channel: "Buddha Machine Wall Plays Relaxing Ambient-Loops".
  

Before you start consuming:

• Search for hidden costs.
  When you read or hear about special offers then keep in mind that there are usually some hidden costs that are not mentioned in the advertisements. Advertisements usually exaggerate the efficiency as well as the economical factor of the product or service. And sometimes they are very hard on the limit to be a straight lie.
  
  
• Consider the total cost of ownership (TOC) of the product or service.
  Even free services can produce costs - not necessarily "just" money. Even if you consume free services maybe on the internet there is some maintenance effort coming along (regular password changes, dealing with several notification mails, keeping profile data up-to-date and so on).
  
  
• Will this make me more happy than just hanging around relaxing?
  Has this product or service really have the potential to make me more happy instead of just doing nothing? Doing nothing and just relax and enjoy the present moment can make very satisfied and happy. Don't underestimate this (see "In the present moment").
  
  
• What other activities are dropped when consuming this product or service?
  Consuming itself consumes time - time that can't be created from nothing. Instead your time and attention is moved from something else to the new point of interest. Choose consciously what to drop and if. Maybe buying and playing the new computer game drags your attention away from your family. Consider carefully if you really want that.
  

Related posts: The mismatch problem, Spam thoughts, Who cares?, Information overflow, In the present moment, Get focused with 3 questions, Total cost of commitment.

When to criticize

A number one tip for positivity that helped me already a lot during the first days of the new year:

Don't criticize when you don't have a solution at hand!
This means that you either should not come up with critics when you would know a solution but don't know a person who has time and the know-how to implement the solution! When you don't have a solution that can be implemented NOW, then probably things are currently in that awful state because no better solution available yet. Just search for a solution and solve the problem yourself or be patient and accept that the world is not perfect!

Further, you should keep in mind to never criticize a person as a whole - just criticize a specific behavior or a particular strategy!

Related posts: An eye for an eye, Spam critics, Positivity barricades, Success with optimism AND pessimism, There are no problems, How to be happy, The power of intention.

How to be happy

In order to GHE (Get Happiness Established) the decision to be happy is important but not sufficient. The decision is just the commitment but not the way from where you are to the desired goal.

First a very important rule: You will never be happy as long as you cannot be happy NOW. As long as you make your status of being happy dependent from anything in the future you are caught in the vicious cycle of wanting more and more. Apart from that you ride for a fall - life can easily throw a monkey wrench in your plans.

Second, an important note: On the way to perfect implementation of happiness there is a long time, a long way between - maybe your whole life. You should be glad of every small improvement.

So, here are my tips:

• Return to the present moment - more detailed help on returning to the present moment here:
  
  • "In the present moment" (earlier post)
  • "There is suffering" (earlier post)
  • "The Single Secret to Making 2009 Your Best Year Ever" (Zenhabits)
  • "A Time for Gratitude" (Zenhabits)
• Slow down
  Urging at full speed through your life prevents you from enjoying any single moment of your life and reduces quality of whatever you are doing or trying to create. See also slowdownnow.org.
• Imagine, that everything that happens just flows through you instead of "affecting" you.
• Imagine, that no suffering that you face can take control of you without your approval.
• Imagine, that nothing that happens can destroy you. Whatever happens, you will adapt.
  I remember an earlier post at this point, "What to learn from the Borg".

More tips on happiness (non-exhaustive list of important related posts on other blogs):

• "Happiness is a Decision" (The Positivity Blog)
• "How to Find Happiness the Easy Way" (The Positivity Blog)
• "How to Find Greater Happiness in Your Life: 5 Vital Steps" (The Positivity Blog)
• "How to Find Happiness: 7 Timeless Tips from the Last 2500 Years" (The Positivity Blog)
• "How to Live Life to the Max with Beginner’s Mind" (Zenhabits)
• "The Only Guide to Happiness You’ll Ever Need" (Zenhabits)

Related posts: In the present moment, There is suffering, What to learn from the Borg, Between GTD and GHE, Get focused with 3 questions, Highly happy people, All Done Status, Who cares?, Being positive, Urging to forge at full speed, No risk, no fun, When to criticize, Dynamic activity, Slowing down, Total cost of commitment, The power of intention, Being like a child, Living your opportunities, 2 major mistakes, Your situation does not suck.

Between GTD and GHE

While optimizing my life with GTD (and other) principles, I asked myself lately the questions introduced with my earlier post "Get focused with 3 questions". While the second one does not really makes sense when the main goal is to optimize time management, the other two make sense: "What for?" and "Who cares?"

Optimizing my life is just a means to an end, it's just helpful principles - but helpful for what? Just for getting more done, just to fill up your life with more content so that you can think at the and that you had very much done in your life? - That sounds silly for me because in more or less years we are all forgotten. There are only a very few people who manage it to be remembered even a long time after their death (like Gandhi or Einstein). And I believe that their main goal was to serve the world instead of being remembered.

However, I came to the conclusion that from now on I will focus more on happiness than on optimizing my life as I was already facing the fact that GTD somehow got ended in itself with no higher goal in mind (any more).

So to have another 3-character abbreviation (nowadays nothing can live without a cool abbreviation ;-) ), I decided to name it GHE - Getting Happiness Established. First I was thinking of GHD, but "Getting Happiness Done" does not seem to fit here. ;-)

Working on GHE brings up sense for GTD again because there is a lot of things that is far from being fun (at least sometimes) - toilet and kitchen cleaning, buy food, ironing, change diapers - just to mention a few. There can also be problems or tasks in your office that are far from being fun but must get done, simply to keep your life "up and running". It is not always possible to do a work that perfectly fits your (current) desires but you need work to pay your bills. Otherwise the situation of singing happily under the warm shower in your well heated flat while outside cold winter wind blows cannot be established.

Not everything can be turned into fun - or in other words, happiness cannot always be established - talking from the practical view and not from the theoretical. In those situations or times where you have difficulties to get happiness established then use GTD principles to get rid of those tasks or situations ASAP (yet another abbreviation - standing for As Soon As Possible).

If your life sucks completely then use GTD principles to win just a few minutes or an hour for your personal use to do or feel something that makes you happy. A few minutes of happiness can be worth a lot of suffering.

I do read much about happiness is just a decision. I think returning to the present moment is an important required step after you decided to be happy. And with some exercise you might even be happy while getting rid of unwanted tasks using GTD (and related) principles.

Related posts: Get focused with 3 questions, Highly happy people, All Done Status, Who cares?, In the present moment, How to be happy, Between short and long term goals, The main purpose, How to rebuff somebody, 2 major mistakes, Your situation does not suck.

Learning from spaghetti sauce

On the weekend I watched a video talk given by Malcolm Gladwell - "Learning from spaghetti sauce". Although the video is from 2006 I have found it yet. Anyway there are two interesting points in there:

He says that

1. People do not want what they like (or at least they can't explain).
   
   
2. You should not try to find the one perfect product (spaghetti sauce, Cola, Coffee) - instead you should take into consideration the diversity of people and create several different solutions to serve different groups of people.

I am still not sure whether this can be applied to all businesses, but I am quite sure that it can be applied to more businesses than just the food business.

The more generic lessons that I learn from it anyway:

1. People may have difficulties explaining their desires or needs.
   This might be a reason why in bidding or project documents requirements are often specified only in a very vague way. So don't stop asking to clear the situation and do tests with prototypes of your product or service during the project phases.
   
   
2. You can't create the killer product or killer service. Create a good solution for a specific problem.
   Prefer to provide a good service to a specific group of people over the desire to get everybody satisfied.

Related posts: Focus by direction, direction over goals, Principles over rules.

High quality needs time.

I have spent Christmas together with the family of my wife in Turin and I ate a special Panettone (it's a typical type of cake) there which contained a special type of high quality, very sweet tangerine. The description that came along with the Panettone said that this particular species of tangerine was the result of a spontaneous freak of nature. Without any attempt of breeding, nature itself created that particular fruit. And guess what: That high quality tangerine created by mother nature takes longer to complete maturation.

Mother nature prooves the concept: You need to invest enough time to get high quality!

Related posts: Why investing enough time rules, Parkinson's law and quality, The productivity trap, Minimum effort.

Review frequency

I am already expecting the first posts on other blogs about new year posts basically about habits and new year resolutions. The new year is often taken as opportunity to implement big changes.

The problem: New year resolutions only last a short while.
Often we do plan big changes for the new year and try to convince ourselves that everything will turn out better then. Unfortunately often we fall back to our old habits.

The reason: Too much planned and missing persistence
We can only change a very few things from one day to the other. And there are either attributes of our character we might never be able to change. In most cases to get ourselves changed, it is hard work. Frequently review, re-check, re-analysis and retry is needed - and persistence. So if you do not implement frequently recurring actions to improve your personal development, you will hardly succeed.

The solution: Continuous planning of your personal development.
Only when working continuously on your personal development - not only once a year - then you can achieve sustained success in changing the habits you like to. This means hard work on a regular base with recurring review and retry as well as periodic analysis of the current situation more often that just once in a year.

Often advertisements promise us instant success but reality continuously shows that there is no magic pill for success or how to change bad habits. So you need to roll up your sleeves and do the hard work yourself. That's the bad news, but the good is: When continuously working on your personal development (continuously but not exaggerated) you will see improvement with lasting effects.

Related posts: About habits, New year...

Information and experience

Today I read two different newspapers in the morning. One mentioned that prices rise and the other said that they fall. I am already used to hear one day that economy gets better and the other day that it gets worse but reading two opposite news at the same day is an extreme that let me think of the quality of messages and articles in the news in general.

Thinking of the last months or especially yet before christmas I would say that (here in Austria)

• some things (especially food) got more expensive in the last months,
• electric devices got cheaper,
• mobile phones got again cheaper, also the charges but they tend to urge you to make contracts for the next two years instead of one as in the past (maybe they expect prices to fall within the next two years),
  
• Services got more expensive,
  

so far my impression.

And here is the difference between information and experience. Especially general statements, predictions, conclusions and assumptions have a good chance to be wrong.

So always have a higher trust in your personal opinion than in outside information when it comes to act.

Related posts: Hot air, Decision planning, Crappy guesswork, The value of experience.

Economy forecast

Today I read the article "Truth Will Out" at Slow Leadership to which I fully agree.

The article talks about lay-offs - on the way home I heard again in the radio of a big company planning to lay-off many employees.

I hardly think that this is a good general practice. Although I understand that economy has grown enormous during the last years so it seems clear that there must be coming a regression also to reduce everything to "normal". Big companies are like dinosaurs, they get slow and sedated in their movements. But when there is crisis the first thing is that they cut off their legs.

I have seen several companies where staff has been reduced and then they had to buy external know-how or invest more money in long searches to find again matching employees (certainly paying less and hence getting less quality).

From the article mentioned above:

Losing market share is typically a sign of one of three things: your product costs too much, your quality is too low, or your offering is out-of-date.

The problem: Your product costs too much (in relation to it's quality).
The reason: The company has grown too much and the administration overhead is bigger than the amount of workers actually creating the product or providing the service; production runs in outdated manners.
The solution: Optimizing the organization (GTD) and be creative for new ways to provide the same quality or service.

The problem: Your quality is too low.
The reason: Usually because product costs are reduced by using lesser and cheaper employees and cheaper ingredients for the product which means employees do have more stress getting less money being less motivated. What a wonder that the outcome is of low quality...
The solution: Quality costs money as do good, motivated workers do. Sorry, that's the truth.

The problem: The offering is out-of-date.
The reason: Poor flexibility and missing investment in research and development. In bad years budget for research and development is often cut down as well as investment for new infrastructure. Oh wonder, that then productivity is reduced and others perform better on the market.
The solution: Especially in bad times research and development is the most important thing to do - as well as investment into new technologies. In addition to that companies need the courage not following the masses and instead putting effort in doing something different.

Instead of being innovative and showing a serious interest in their customers the companies (their management) do

• throw away every piece of value (employees, real estates or other properties) they have (in some sort of panic),
• reduce their offers,
• reduce quality and service,
• charge their customers for every finger they move,
• follow the masses.

So there is no wonder that the spiral of bad economy continues...

Related posts: Masked rot, Hot air, Crash course, Minimum effort.

No risk, no fun

No risk, no fun - people sometimes say that and I always found that a stupid phrase. I must revise my opinion but the point is that this phrase must be seen in a different light than most people do.

When people tell "no risk, no fun", they usually mean that when you start doing something you will not have fun if you are not going to risk something.

If we look at our life, in many cases it is full of attempts to assure our environment and ourselves. We pay for insurances for the car, for fire, for retirement - and even for "life insurances" (what a stupid name - but I think the name was chosen to attract more people).

We take risks by driving fast but then we drive cars with installed airbags to reduce the risk - to have the good feeling without taking the risk. In fact we want to have fun without taking the risk! I think you can have fun without taking particular risks!

There are several risks within whatever you do and several risks to loose whatever you have built or created. Usually we try to eliminate the highest risks to reduce our worries and anxiety. When we feel secure then we can relax and enjoy what we are doing.

The point or problem is: If do not know about the fact that whatever you are trying to enjoy can be temporary joy only then you will not valuate the situation accordingly.

Example: Two days ago I was going get my son to sleep. He was lying on my belly and for a while I hoped that he will fall asleep soon because then I can put him in his bed and do a lot of other things that I wanted to do. Then I realized that time will run fast and he will grow up and what if he gets very ill and dies? I decided to fully enjoy it lying there on the couch with soft music in the background and feeling my son there on my belly relaxed and breathing calmly. There was no risk at that particular moment - it was a very relaxed time and I could enjoy it.

It is not the risky situation that gives you fun!

But: Know about the transience of situations and things so you will set the priorities accordingly and enjoy every good thing that is NOW.

Related posts: Get focused with 3 questions, In the present moment.

Get focused with 3 Questions

In the last days I was angry in the end of the working day because I wasn't able to use the available time efficiently and somehow I felt continuously out of balance and focus.

This morning while walking to the train station by accident three questions came up and suddenly I felt better.

The questions that I do now ask myself while doing something or when about to do something:

1. What for?
   What is the purpose of my doing? What is the desired outcome? Why do I want or why should I do this?
2. What's dropped?
   What's cost of the action? What else do I miss in favor of this action?
3. Who cares?
   Who are the people being affected by my decision? Who are the people interested in my work and doing? Who can gain something from my action or from the desired outcome?

Related posts: Who cares?, In the present moment, Crying for attention, Between short and long term goals, Know better and act on it, The productivity trap, 2 major mistakes, The value of rest and review, Considerations on decisions.

Scotty, beam me up...

...there is no intelligent life on this planet.

Some time ago I read an article at Zen Habits - "Want to Save the World? I'll Tell You How". It invites you to do less to save the world.

Jonathan Mead links in his article to another one - "Plastic Soup" at Oskar Lewis weblog.

Although I do not think that really every piece of plastic produced is still around - it is a huge amount. That article is shocking and there it says also:

"This planet is being destroyed by the the 'most intelligent being on
it'. I think we need to re-define intelligence."

Indeed, I fully agree to that. It is so automatically that humans think that they are more intelligent than all the animals only because they don't understand them. Maybe the the most other animals learned to integrate well with the nature and that's their most important intelligence. Also human learned that there are different types of intelligence. I think humans do focus too much on one or two types of intelligence. What is the big difference of the humans? - They have arms to "use" their intelligence to massive extension.

Again I cannot avoid thinking of the dinosaurs as I already mentioned in the previous article "Information Overflow":

What, if in those times it was just increasing the probability to survive if the creature was a little bigger? - I imagine that a rush in size could cause exhausting of the world resources and hence to the extinction of the dinosaurs. - I don't have any scientific proof for this theory. The phrase "size matters" can have two meanings here... ;-)

I think we also have to redefine how we measure economy and a lot of other core elements of our life. In many realms I think we do have a "mismatch problem".

My biggest respect goes to all the animals who learned to well integrate into the nature forming a harmonic whole. Maybe the single individual animals or races do not know, but that doesn't matter. What matters is the result!

Related posts: Information Overflow, The mismatch problem, Detect the weak point, The main purpose, The resource problem.

One-Way Ticket

While moving through your life you face several opportunities and in every situation you have a lot of choices. Often you want to leave choices open as long as possible.

Comparing a situation with a room you may see many open doors but you don't know what will happen when you go through. Those doors may be labeled and colored in a very attracting way and you feel hard to choose.

What then happens often is that you want to just do a few steps through at least the most attracting doors, lurking at what is in there (for you). You want to keep the opportunity to take another door. When you look back in the room you were in, you want the other doors to be kept open.

But the truth is, that the doors are not static, they do open and close dynamically. Depending on the situations doors may open and close slower or faster. I do think for instance for business strategies doors are opening and closing in weekly or monthly rhythms while during an emergency in the hospital it might be seconds. So you are not in static rooms, you are on a dynamic journey hoping on and off trains or planes.

Once you decided hoping on a train it does not make sense to jump off in the wildness between two stations. And you cannot expect that returning to the last station you will find the same opportunities you faced before.

And you cannot tell what would have happened if you would have taken another door or train because situations change and you may never face the same set of opportunities again. On the other hand when you move on you might arrive at points where you also would have arrived taking other paths. However, you never can really be sure how it would have been taking other routes.

What to learn is:

1. Evaluate the opportunities (have a look which doors are open) and take yourself the appropriate time (depending on the speed the doors are opening and closing).
2. Take a decision
3. Don't waste time in trying to figure out if it wouldn't have been better taking another door/train/route because you cannot reproduce older situations.

Life is a one-way ticket!

Choo choo train
Tuckin' down the track
Gotta travel on it
Never comin' back
...

Related posts: Decision planning, Direction over goals, 2 major mistakes, Getting older.

Hurry home ... no more running

The problem: The rush to get to our goals and/or to earn a lot of money.
When we are setting goals (often too late) we want to achieve them in an instant with zero effort. That's often because we already feel tired and burned out from earlier rushes to previous goals. Or - when we see the opportunity to make big money - we are willing to make some bigger effort because we hope for the rest after the big win. So we hurry from one goal to the next.

The reason: We want to get home and rest.
I see the word "home" here standing not only for a home apartment or house where you live but also for "the save point" in general. "My home is my castle", a figure of speech says. We are tired from being chained to the oars. We want to rest. And therefore we are hurrying. We are hurrying because we think that when we get a "home run" we have more time to rest. But do we really feel safe there and can we really relax? Or do we start thinking of more things that put our safety in danger?

The solution: Give up desire for complete safety, the desire for retirement and rest at the opportunity.
There are only few cases where people invent something very great and make a lot of money and then don't need to work any more. And in those cases there either can happen unexpected events that ruin everything that has been "earned" (talking about wars or financial crisis for instance). In most cases you have to work your whole life to maintain your life style. Some did reduce their demands and need to work less but anyway there is some continuous work (even if only a few) needed. And I don't think that everybody who got rich, did plan it.

The next time you get in a rush to just achieve that only last big goal until you finally can rest, think if you can really find the rest then. Instead just do your daily portion of work and take a rest when there is opportunity even if not everything has been done yet.

Related posts: Urging to forge at full speed, In the present moment, Reduce the stress factors, Productivity spiral, All Done status.

The state of mind matters

I am used to work under pressure - only in rare cases this pressure is obviously produced by desparated customers. Mostly I feel the pressure because of the empathy I have developed for the customer so I can imagine how unpleasant it is facing some wired problem while trying to do some other productive and important work. Hours are easily lost by technical problems. In other many cases it is the expectations of others and the desire of being honored and respected that drive me into pressure so. In exaggerated words: "I want to be the hero that can get everything done in miracles." The sad truth is: Unfortunately even if you do miracles it will often not be honored and only expectations grow. Or in the worst case: People think that before the miracles you were doing nothing and just sitting around being bored.

The big bad side effect that everybody will notice when you get more and more done is that you will leave the impression to others being the hectic, fast-paced always on the run guy. People will simply begin to feel bad when you are around.

Just think a moment what people you prefer to meet. When do you feel good together with other people?

In my case people with a calm voice that carefully listen without urging me, allowing also moments of silence giving space that thoughts and feelings can flourish. People who seem somehow in meditation, fully present and relaxed do improve the general quality of the situation. It is the breeding ground for good communication and hence also a breeding ground for a successful meeting. Being on speed comes with the potential danger that you behave like the bull in the china shop. You can destroy the relationship with friends as well as with (potential) customers that way - or also with your boss. Being on speed is not always getting you to the goal fast!

Related posts: In the present moment, Urging to forge at full speed, Getting older.

Too much

You can continuously improve productivity to gain free time slices. But the free time usually quickly gets filled up again. Or as it was in my case: You improve productivity to somehow get everything done that is your duty or "has become your duty" (due to rationalizations or external events) and has created very long to-do lists that always grow bigger and bigger instead of getting cleared out.

Well, it must be stated: Too much is too much!

If you are facing continuously more and more work, more and more tasks to be done then the simple crude but unattractive answer is: You are doing too much!

And here we are at the very difficult situation that you have to decide what to drop.

Before deciding keep in mind that a lot of general commitments for jobs, tasks or projects come along with a lot of tiny (administration) tasks that one usually doesn't get aware so easily. Samples:

• Just one or more short phone calls.
• Archiving of paper (or files) that gets produced along with the tasks.
• Reading of mails, documentation (or blog posts ;-) ).
  

KISS

Today two short posts were planned instead of a single longer one. And then I remembered a post at The Positivity Blog: Would You Like To Be a Guest Blogger?

It says that a guest post has to be at least 800 words. So I first felt it could be bad quality by writing only a short post. But thinking of it and remembering several things I learned I will stick to my original plan and the reason is the KISS-Principle - as nothing should be "implemented" (in the widest possible meaning) with more than necessary (but even not with less).

What does the K.I.S.S. principle mean? Here are several interpretations:

• Keep it simple, stupid.
• Keep it simple and stupid.
• Keep it small and simple.
• Keep it sweet and simple.
• Keep it simple and straightforward.
• Keep it short and simple.
• Keep it simple and smart.
• Keep it strictly simple.
• Keep it speckless and sane.
• Keep it sober and significant.

Related post: Who cares?

Masked rot

The problem: Inability to extract the important information from the complete information input stream.
When you are in meetings, in shops, in discussion with vendors or even at job interviews there you are often confronted with new abbreviations, new spicy good sounding words and a lot of filler words. It is epidemic that people get more and more vague in their form of expressions.

The reason: People are masking the rot to get their things or stories sold.
People need to mask the disadvantages of their stuff or the strategies they want to sell you. The vague stuff they want to sell often they bought under vague circumstances themselves. - Yes I am talking also about stock market and the financial crises, but not only. ;-)

As many do cover and mask the stuff to hide probable risks there is also a lack of information which multiplies on the way from a producer to the final buyer. I experience this for instance if I am asking for more detailed information while analyzing the disadvantages before buying something. Many times the (re-)seller has only a very poor idea of what they are selling.

On the other hand there are those who know more details and had bad experiences with angry customers who returned to the shop because they were so disappointed. Those (re-)sellers really try everything to not give any definite answer - especially in IT. They fear the moment you come back and tell them something like "You told me that it works this way".

The solution: Identify the smoke and mirrors and stick to concrete clear information.
The only chance to survive all those false fronts is to analyze the situations to dissolve illusions and to insist in your requests for concrete and clear statements, in detail:

• Ask yourself for possible interests of the people you are dealing with.
  In general the others talking about their interests they seem like Mother Teresa, but usually they are not. They are working to achieve their very own egoistic goals. Guessing their goals can uncover smoke and mirrors.
  
  
• Do unemotional analysis.
  Especially when somebody wants to sell you something the person wants to push your "wish" buttons and create demand within you - demand you might never have had before. Drop your emotions and especially your expectations also. Then analyze the situation, the product or the offered service.
  
  
• Search for the disadvantages.
  There is always at least one disadvantage. There is no product, no service - nothing - that has only advantages. Why? Because of the simple truth that you can't have everything at once - there is no magic pill. If you get told that there is no disadvantage you can be sure that the person is masking rot (or isn't either aware of the disadvantages). Try to ask for the disadvantages.
  
  
• Ask for concrete explanation of all the fancy words that people are using that you don't know.
  People often use abbreviations and buzzwords to appear as a specialist and they count on the other people's desire not being the stupid. Many that don't know the meaning of particular words are too shy to ask. So those people using these words can hide behind them. If you ask for explanation of the fancy words (even if you already heard 3 other explanations) the other people get annoyed and they reduce usage and get more simple and clear in their speaking. A justification of that behavior asking for explanation is that often people use fancy words without really knowing what they mean. If you ask for explanation (and insist of a little more detailed explanation) those often can be unveiled.
  
  
• Ignore fillers and brilliant labels.
  There is so much stuff that does not affect the quality of the product or service. Vague filler words that everybody is using (buzzwords) or particular labels that scream out to stand for quality are some of that stuff. Memorize only the information that really matters.

Related post: Information overflow., Create consensus.

Urging to forge at full speed

The problem: You feel pressure to get things done and be successful.
In our civilization speed is a fast growing hype. Either people are producing pressure on their own or get pressure from outside - or both. Speed is fun, speed is sexy, time is money - use it or loose it. Being on speed is the default mode for many people. Speed is everywhere in our life, from speed reading to speed dating.

The reason: Fear of going to rack and ruin, fear of (personal) economical crash.
Our anxiety to fall behind, being not interesting any more, being not attractive any more for the job market or for social groups and friends, drives us to full speed.

The solution: Slow down and either stop to get a distant and detached - more realistic - view.
Just stop, step back and look around to get a more complete view of the situation and world (as a painter steps back to see his painting from the distance checking the general impression the painting offers).

Take a serious look at the whole. Try living on full speed for a while and then remember your days when you were younger and had plenty of time to build a Lego house for instance. And try retreating for something you want to do with a bigger piece of time (writing a nice computer program, self development, ...). You will experience that

• it is not enough doing things right, it is also important to do the right things,
• there is a big difference in quality of output if you had enough time achieving it,
• you feel healthier and feel more being an integrated part of the world (hence being happier),
• others feel more comfortable and relaxed, staying with you,
• you notice more details of the world around you which can be the source of creativity.

Being at full speed all the time inexorably leads to a crash. It narrows your view and your options. You will react in panic and do aimless quick shots rather than taking coordinated and target-oriented decisions and actions. This will create a spiral producing more fear and panic and more quick shots.

For many, being on full speed for many is a distraction from dealing with major questions or problems in life. So the paradox situation can be that one who is on full speed is a procrastinator in reality.

Here are some related videos:

• Carl Honore: Slowing down in a world built for speed (19:14)
  
• Eckhart Tolle - “Can I be the Space for this?” - Part I (03:15)
• Eckhart Tolle - “Can I be the Space for this?” - Part II (05:53)

Unfortunately being slow is tagged with being stupid and unmotivated. Slow is not always good, but slow can be good. Discover the tortoise mode - don't be on speed as a default mode!

When will I learn to slow down...

Related posts: The state of mind matters, In the present moment, You can't urge the river flowing, Why investing enough time rules, Parkinson's law and quality, Reduce the stress factors, Productivity spiral, Dynamic activity, Hurry home ... no more running, How to be happy, Slowing down, Minimum effort, Getting older.

The mismatch problem

Lately I saw this video - by accident - because the title was a completely different one and in the video the speaker - Malcolm Gladwell - mentions that the original topic was planned differently.

He talks about something that he calls the "mismatch problem".

Basically in a nutshell he explains that the way we measure things and the parameters we think to be important for a particular job often do have nothing to do with what really matters. The way we measure performance of people through tests, graduations, certificates often does not bring the expected results. Instead the number of people that would do a good job is reduced by filtering all those out with bad marks and such who are missing particular graduations. Malcolm shows a few examples where even the opposite can be seen: That those people who have the worst testing results and graduations are the best performers.

He recommends not to rely on standardized testing routines and instead prefer looking on how people are making it on the job in the real world.

I already had similar thoughts many times. In particular I remember support calls where people emphasized their academic titles when calling and had the worst understanding of how the software works. My experience is that an academic title is no guarantee that the person behind is an intelligent and productive person. On the other hand there are persons without an academic title who are really smart, creative and good performers. Don't get me wrong, there are very good academics also. I only want to point out, that a title or a certificate is no guarantee for quality.

I think that in many, many cases our analysis, testing and labeling of things, people or events happening are affected by the mismatch problem in the way that the interpretation we are attaching to our impressions is hardly ever fitting the reality. Even history of science is full of mistakes and misinterpretation of results.

Sometimes it is better to rely on the gut feeling instead of doing scientific tests, polls and statistics.

Related posts: In the present moment, Detect the weak point, Crappy guesswork.