Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips Choose to learn. We all pay the tuition, but we may not all get the education. I guess many school teachers and government employees and just plain folks never say this to themselves. I always did, but perhaps that explained my mediocre career in government service. I was too inquisitive, too exploratory, […]

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by Dwayne Phillips It can be disappointing to admit, but if we want significant change, we must bring it about slowly. Significant change—the kind that brings big benefit over a big period of time—occurs slowly. Those two adjectives concerning change—significant and slow—appear inseparable. I don’t like that. When I have a great idea for a […]

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by Dwayne Phillips We work in the real world; not in one where what we wish is true. Sometimes we simply need to teach a little. A: I told these people what to do…and AARGH (pained expression interrupts speech). B: How did you teach them how to do that? A: What? What do you mean? […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Sometimes we recognize our failures. Then—for some strange reason—we attempt something that will fail an order of magnitude more. We have failed to manage our $1 maintenance budget. Let’s correct this by starting a $10 development budget. We have failed to communicate in daily operations. Let’s correct this by starting a large […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Another person who had a major influence in my life has passed away. Author and consultant Jerry Weinberg passed away recently. I had the privilege of reading a dozen or so books written by Jerry. I had the privilege of attending several seminars Jerry led. I learned much from Jerry. Jerry learned […]

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by Dwayne Phillips If I cannot explain something with brevity and clarity, I am not ready to explain it. Gosh, that summary is a killer. I am ready to explain something. I have this earth-changing wonderful great super-duper (note the lack of brevity and clarity) idea that the world needs to hear and implement just […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Part 2 of 2 blogs on writing about…of course I write about what don’t I know. How else would I ever learn anything? This one doesn’t make as much sense as part 1 did. How can I write about something that I don’t know. Well… First, I learn. Second, I write. Or […]

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by Dwayne Phillips How do you do something everyday for ten years? You do it everyday (for ten years). Every morning, with very few exceptions, I sit and view the news on the Internet. I make notes in a weblog. See here and here. Recently, I noted that I had done this for ten years. […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Another instance of “don’t judge a book by its cover” slaps me in the face. I bought my wife an Android tablet for Christmas. If you know my wife, you will need a couple of minutes to regain your composure and resume breathing. Okay, we continue. I, being the smart computing person […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Nothing is so cruel as to learn that the system we built doesn’t do what we thought it would. We are good, smart, caring people. We work diligently to build good systems that serve others. We test. We really test—no kidding, no fooling around. We really test. Then one day, someone walks […]

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