Working Up

Working Up in Project Management, Systems Engineering, Technology, and Writing

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The Majority and the Individual

January 8th, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Yet another statement about what happens in meetings shows itself to be something to toss away. For some reason, meetings tend to have many statements that are supposed to be proven by time and such but are nothing but folly. I have written about some of these before such as “silence means […]

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Tags: Accountability · Competence · Following · Group · Judgment · Knowledge · Management · Meetings · Synergy

Inability

January 1st, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Sometimes we meet someone who lacks the ability to do something. How do we react? As I write this post, I am having one of those weeks when I have the inability to do something simple. For some reason, I woke one day this week with a sore left knee. The next […]

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Tags: Competence · Help · Humility · Injury · Judgment · Patience · Thank you

Two Essentials for Employees

November 20th, 2023 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips There are two essentials for an employee. Given the job market, it appears that the great majority of employers don’t understand these essentials. I have been on both sides of the hiring and being hired world. I find two and only two essentials: Okay, that’s it. Next? The trouble is, it is […]

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Tags: Ethics · Jobs · Judgment · Multitasking · Remote Work · Testing · Work

The Systems Engineering Test

December 9th, 2021 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Should we be using systems engineering on this project? Here is a simple test. I think systems engineering is useful and brings many benefits. That is why I wrote a short book on the topic. The book is free here. Should we be using systems engineering on this project? Here is The […]

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Tags: Decide · General Systems Thinking · Judgment · Systems · Testing

The Tidal Decision-Making Technique

April 12th, 2021 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Sometimes decisions just sort of drift in and out with the tides. The tide comes in; the tide goes out. Sometimes we find something that drifted in with the tide and remains on the beach. The next day, the next cycle or two of tides, and that something is gone. It was […]

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Tags: Choose · Decide · Judgment · Lifecycle · Management

The Uninvested Assistant

March 18th, 2021 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips When problems occur in complex online presentations, those involved struggle to fix the problems. They are invested in the presentation. That investment inhibits thinking. Always bring along an uninvested assistant. I have participated in countless ZoomerTeamer meetings in the past year. Some were simpleā€”a daily chat with a small team of colleagues. […]

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Tags: Breathe · Fear · Judgment · Problems · Thinking

The Judgment of the (expert?) Judgers

February 7th, 2019 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips The expertise of the expert judgers is never in question. That is because they are usually wrong. Nevertheless, they never stop judging. Microsoft recently announced that they are ending support for the Microsoft Windows Phone operating system. The what? Does anyone remember that? Does any one have one of those phones that […]

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Tags: Judgment

AI and Jobs

January 24th, 2019 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips AI, as we have it today, is a software tool. Like all software tools, it should aid persons in their jobs, not replace persons. We have all these artificial intelligence programs everywhere. At least some persons claim such. What we have are software tools. The software can find some images that maybe […]

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Tags: Help · Jobs · Judgment · Systems

A Tale of Two Facebooks

December 27th, 2018 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Success can lead to failure. Sometimes great success can lead to great failure. See, e.g., Facebook. There must be two social media companies out there named “Facebook.” There is this social media site called Facebook that many of my friends and relatives use. They show photos of the kids and the new […]

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Tags: Adults · Failure · Judgment · Success

Performers, Predictors, and Punishment

February 23rd, 2015 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips When a performer doesn’t perform as predicted, the predictor is in the wrong. Too bad that we usually fail to recognize that. I write this the week after all the big tech companies posted their quarterly financial reports. Some companies didn’t perform as expected, i.e., as predicted. The result was that the […]

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Tags: Competence · Estimation · Expectations · Judgment