by Dwayne Phillips Some persons know what they want, but they don’t have the resources to tell me. Perhaps they don’t know what they want. Perhaps they have many other reasons for passing me to another person. Perhaps I should just stay away. Do you want to know what I want? Talk to Mr. ABC. […]
Entries from October 2021
The Document is a Person
October 28th, 2021 · No Comments
Tags: Communication · Excuses · Listening · Management
Emergency Operations Centers
October 25th, 2021 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips Most “Emergency Operations Centers” function to show that the emergency operations center has electricity. Does that describe yours? A recent serious weather event caused me to interact with an Emergency Operations Center or EOC. The website for that place proclaimed quite proudly how it was built to withstand such serious weather events. […]
Tags: Accountability · Communication · Emergency · Purpose · Systems
The Dark Ages at a Personal Level
October 21st, 2021 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips There are tools that help me remember the things I need to remember. They prevent a fall into the Dark Ages. Define Dark Ages: it isn’t that we forget how to do something, it is that we forget than we once could do that. Personal Dark Ages: it isn’t that I can’t […]
Tags: Competence · Information · Journal · Process · Remember · Tools
Writing about Writing (and everything else)
October 18th, 2021 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips When you do something, someone will ask you how. Sometimes the explanation works, often it doesn’t. It seems that once I wrote a book or two and a few dozen magazine articles, I was approached by persons who wanted to write a book or two and a few dozen articles. They wanted […]
Tags: Consulting · Expertise · Listening · Success · Writing
Rules We Cannot Enforce
October 14th, 2021 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips We make rules. Why? Sometimes it is petty and to serve our ego. Pause and think (two pretty good rules about rules). We make a rule for or over or against the persons we know or our work colleagues. We cannot enforce that rule over all the persons who are supposed to […]
Tags: Adults · Purpose · Respect · Trust · Work
Fat Finger the Database (misadventures in data entry)
October 11th, 2021 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips Data entry, one of the lower-paid professions, is prone to errors, and some can be fatal. During the aftermath of the recent Hurricane Ida, a person close to me needed an essential service. By “essential” I mean if the service did not arrive, someone would die. I repeatedly called the service provider. […]
Tags: Competence · Customer · Error · General Systems Thinking · Learning · Mistakes · People · Testing
Do that Tomorrow, Too
October 7th, 2021 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips A phrase to add to every assignment or action item or anything that goes on a “to do” list. Years ago, author and consultant Jerry Weinberg gave an assignment to attendees of his writing seminar. It was something like: Think of what you should write today. Write that. Do that tomorrow, too. […]
Tags: Change · Decide · Experiment · Growth · Planning · Self · Simple
No-Cost Learning
October 4th, 2021 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips I find it unfortunate, but no-cost learning doesn’t exist. I guess this goes back to the concept of if it is worth something, it is worth something. No-cost learning? Boy, I sure do want that! Free online courses have a price tag of $0. They do, however, require time, energy, and other […]