Five for Friday – May 31, 2024

Back for another week of random things you may or may not have discovered on your own.

  • I’ve been re-reading The One Thing, by Keller and Papasan. Either it’s better the second time, or the timing is just better. You would think a book on getting things done by prioritizing and focusing would run out of steam, but it is absolutely full of wonderful nuggets.
  • For reasons I’m sure I can only blame on curiosity, I played with Penrose a bit this week. I struggle sometimes to make the visuals that will help me tell the story I want, and now – with a little bit of work, I can make just about anything. I’m not sure yet if the effort is worth the output, but I’m going to keep it around for a while.
  • Some really practical advice on something I’ve done quite a lot in my career. How To Present to an Audience Who Knows More Than You
  • I enjoyed this article on 10x Followership (from the 10x manager). A lot of great points that too many leaders forget
  • Forgot to mention last week, but I spent a chunk of time in New York City this month, and fit in this off-broadway show at the Twenty Sided Tavern and it was incredible. It was a combination of story telling, improv, audience interaction, and all the oddness of Dungeons and Dragons. Worth checking out.

Have a great weekend!

Similar Posts

  • Learning From the Past

    My last post (from what I’m told) ruffled some feathers in my old team. I actually find that odd given how well known the types of actions I mentioned are among that team. I live my life as if everything is a learning experience. I mean that – everything. I don’t regret my time on Teams for…

  • In the Middle

    Should you automate everything, or nothing? Should you test everything, or nothing? How about leadership – should you dictate every detail of what your team should do, or give them no guidance at all. The answer for all of these questions – as you’d expect, is “somewhere in the middle”. In my experience, most people…

  • This week’s conference

    Every year, Microsoft’s Engineering Excellence group holds an internal conference – five days of talks, panels, booths and receptions (in other words, it’s just like any other conference, except only Microsoftees are invited). This is the first year since 2004 where I’ve been at the conference and not in the EE group. You’d think that…

  • The angryweasel guide to safe backups

    Warning – not software quality related, but perhaps even more important information follows. I am diligent about backups (and paranoid about losing files)…and frugal, so dumping my backup strategy here for those who may be like minded. First thing to be paranoid about is work in progress. If it’s code or text based, put it…

  • So Long, Tester Center

      Earlier today, Ron posted the following about the Microsoft Tester Center: So Long, Tester Center. There’s nothing I can say that Ron didn’t say – it was a fun effort – just hard to do without any full time support (and as our individual jobs got more complex and demanding). The good news, is…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.