Team health measures

Roger on 30/11/2022

Each team should develop it’s own measures for what the team members think is important to them. But here are some ideas:

Goals

We’re clear on the goals we’re trying to achieve.

Impact

We understand how to achieve outcomes that we want.

Processes and practices

We have the right processes and practices to help us work effectively.

We have the right tools to be experts in what we do.

Collaboration

We know how to work together to get things done.

Learning

We share knowledge, and take time to learn new things.

We help each other understand what skills we lack, and look for opportunities to learn.

Challenge

We are challenged by the problems we tackle.

Fun

We enjoy our work, and enjoy working with each other.

Speed

We can deliver quickly and easily.

Risks

We know how the recognise risks and what to do about them.

Support

We know when, how and who to ask for help.

Metrics

We know how to measure our work and use it to improve.

Difference & diversity

We seek out, accept and appreciate different ways of thinking and being.

Skills

We have all the skills we need to do our work.

Baseline skills for modern knowledge work

Roger on 29/11/2022

Modern knowledge workers need certain skills to work effectively.

Planning

Scheduling work.

Communicating

Writing and diagramming clearly, choosing appropriate channels.

Analysing

Understanding data, drawing conclusions.

Decision-making

Prioritising, hypothesising, managing risks.

Problem-solving

Considering opportunities, understanding constraints, assigning resources.

Collaborating

Facilitating workshops, empowering team members, agreeing responsibilities.

Instructing

Learning skills and information, training others.

How charities create change

Roger on 28/11/2022

Charities are too ‘respectable’ to win change, by Janey Starling, is a really interesting article about the role charities play in creating change in society through campaigning and political influencing.

Campaigning might not be the best means for charities to create change anymore.

I’ve written before about how charities are stuck in the ‘squeezed middle’ between social movements and socially responsible businesses, meaning they need to justify their place in the for-good landscape. Perhaps the place of charities in the political landscape is changing too.

Starling talks about how charities should re-establish their place in the political landscape by confrontation, but charities don’t decide the rules of that game, they can only choose or not choose to play the game. Confrontation of the political system might not lead to a change in that system. Why would it? Has it ever?

So, how can charities create change? Perhaps by intervening in other systems.

Why we need to be continually learning

Roger on 27/11/2022

Drucker coined the phrase ‘knowledge worker’ in 1959. Later, he said that knowledge workers should “continue innovation as part of their work, their task and their responsibility”. He saw “innovation as the specific tool of entrepreneurs, the means by which they exploit change as an opportunity for a different business or a different service”.

Being innovative also implies the need for “continuous learning on the part of the knowledge worker,” “continuous teaching,” and prioritizing quality over quantity of output, activities which we can link with love of knowledge, love of learning, and tenacity.

Knowledge work demands continual learning. Without learning we aren’t in the position to create new knowledge that allows us and the organisations we work to keep pace with the changing world.

Copy and paste

Roger on 27/11/2022

Copy and paste is probably the most impactful productivity tool in the modern workplace.

This simple, elegant solution has prevented millions of hours of retyping, reduced errors and made writing and data entry on computers far more efficient. But not just efficient, actually usable. Imagine if it didn’t exist. Imagine if every time you wanted to move a piece of text from one application to another you had to retype it. Imagine how much more time you’d have spent throughout your life tapping away on a keyboard.

Copy and paste has been part of human/computer interaction for almost forty years. It was invented in 1973 by Larry Tesler along with Tim Mott. You probably haven’t heard of Tesler but he was one of the silicon valley mavericks of the seventies. A contemporary of Steve Jobs, a free-spirited anti-war counter culturist, a humble computer scientist who changed the world.

The key to Larry’s thinking behind copy and paste is the idea of modeless interaction. Modeless systems always have the same result from the same user input. That means, whether you copy and paste in a Google document, an Excel spreadsheet, or an Internet browser, you can expect it to always work in the same way. The simplicity, predictability and reliability of how people interact with computers owe a lot to this idea. It set the tone for every interaction we have with any computerised device, from laptops to phones, to supermarket checkouts and parking payment machines. We expect them all to interact with us in simple, predictable, reliable ways.

Not having to start from scratch every time, as a designer creating those interactions and as a user learning how to use a piece of technology, establishes strong foundations. It means always being able to build on what went before because what went before can be easily taken into a new context. Copy and paste is just one of those ratchet mechanisms It enables progress to occur, work to become more efficient, ideas to build and grow. It enabled far more than just copying and pasting.

Nowadays, copy and paste has almost become an insult, a suggestion that something lacks originality. And yet, Larry’s original thinking gave us a lot to copy, and good reasons for pasting.