Weeknotes 297
This week I did:
Remote working research
I took part in some user research interviews to understand how different teams are managing projects, especially with matrix teams. It was really interesting to see the variation and the commonalities, and pretty inspiring to hear how people have embraced ways of working that are new and challenging for them. I’ve been analysing the transcripts to identify the problems that we can help these teams solve, and thinking a lot more about magix teams (matrix teams using agile principles).
Problem solvers
This week’s Irregular Ideas newsletter was about recognising problems that require creative thinking from those where known solutions apply. I also received my first piece of feedback which helped me understand that if I talk about broad philosophical concepts without explaining them, readers won’t be able to understand what I’m trying to say.
I read:
The future of charities
Karl Wildings Unrestricted newsletter asks, “Who is thinking about the future of charities and civil society?”, and lists lots of organisations and thinkers who are looking at what the future might hold for charities and civil society.
All remote
Gitlab’s remote working resources are amazing. So many useful ideas and free training that charities could use as they work remotely (which of course, they should).
Proposed new and reworded classification codes (for charities)
The Charity Commission says “improving the ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘who’ classifications has been identified as a top priority within our wider programme of work to improve our data about charities”. Maybe it opens up the possibility for a cause-agnostic charity in the future.
Big tech hate
The center for countering digital hate works in an interesting space. I really their recognition that digital spaces form “an important new plane of human existence”, and online hate is a wicked problem that is qualitatively different to offline hate. Big tech platforms are designed to dehumanise their users, amplify extremist views and anonymise perpetrators. That isn’t a problem that can be solved with blunt tools like regulation, perhaps only tech can beat tech.
And I thought about:
Magix teams
I started the magix.teams website but haven’t actually put any of my thinking into semi-coherent words and onto the site. There’s a lot, from the RBV strategy that informs the rationale for magix teams to some of the emerging practices that I’d like to describe. And I’ve decided I perfer the term ‘high-confidence team’ to ‘high-performing team’. It feels like it refers to the charateristics of the team more than just the results they get so I’m going to include it as part of the definition/rationale for magix teams. Anyway, the next step is to get more content onto the website and then try to get some feedback to see if I’m making any sense.
Show, don’t tell. Experience, don’t show
Show, don’t tell is hard. It’s probably more effective for convincing someone of some things than just telling, but it’s hard to make what you show convey the specific message you intend. Experience, don’t show, is even harder, but might be an even more effective convincer. Want someone to learn how dangerous cycling on a road can be? Put them on a bike and send them down a busy road at night in the rain. They’ll be convinced. Tell, show, experience might be on a continuum of how compelling they make a message, but they don’t