Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

In order to accomplish a desired goal, first gather the right people in the right forum. Otherwise, grievous vexation will result.

I have something to accomplish. How will I accomplish it? Perhaps I need others to assist. Who? How? What forum?

It is easy to have too many people in the room. Lots of ideas are good, but too many ideas and scatter-brained ideas may be more harmful than beneficial. Sometimes focus is required.

It is easy to be in the wrong forum. Presentation meetings are not the place for deep thought and critical examination.

I often work in discovering concepts. That requires stating a concept, examining it, asking,

• What are (at least) three things wrong with this?
• Do those wrong things preclude the use of this concept?
• What do those wrong things point us to?
• How can we use them for better ideas?
• What is next?
• Where does this lead us?
• etc.

A room full of executives wanting three alternatives so they can decide right now is the wrong people in the wrong forum for the above.

Questions, questions, and more questions. Thinking, thinking, and more thinking. White boards, butcher paper, markers, pencil and paper and lots of erasers. Again, a board room full of executives is the wrong people in the wrong forum.

What am I trying to accomplish? Who are the right people for that? What is the right forum for that?

Questions and thought. Wait, back to the top. Who are the right people and the right forum to decide who are the right people and what is the right forum? Wait, more questions and more thought.

I should choose carefully and thoughtfully.

by Dwayne Phillips

I don’t want to jump into the next book-writing project at home. Or do I?

I just finished a writing project at home. Done, wrapped up, self-published on the places where my friends and relatives can by it for 99¢.

Sigh. I don’t want to jump into the first thing that pops into my mind for the next writing project at home. I need to think a while, right?

Wrong. Start on whatever excites me this morning. What happens if I think of something better next week. I will stop what I am doing and write that project instead. Simple.

But, but, but… Okay, there are risks involved and bad things can happen and I can fret about this forever.

Consider this: I will not throw away what I started. I will merely put away what I started.

This put away for now concept is really easy with today’s computers and files and all that. It really wasn’t that hard in the day of the typewriter, manila folder, and file cabinet.

Just do it. It will be alright.

by Dwayne Phillips

AI has moved from interesting to actual work. This is much like the arrival of VisiCalc, which changed the home computer from hobby to actual work.

I was still in college the first time I saw an Apple computer. It was so new and odd that the Apple II just sort of sat in the corner of one of those odd stores that we used to have a block off campus. There was some sort of space game rolling on the TV screen attacked to a box that had a keyboard on it. Oh well.

Some of the computer science students had collected enough money to buy one or two of these Apple computers. I recall that the really good programmers didn’t bother with the Apple. The hobbyists who tinkered with this and that and looked at circuit boards but got Cs and Ds in the programming classes loved these things. Great hobbies for the lesser inclined.

Then, VisiCalc arrived in late 1979. Accountants raved about how this electronic spreadsheet saved them hours and hours of tedious drudgery associated with their jobs. With their jobs? Yes, with their jobs. The accountants bought that funny machine with an Apple on it because that’s what came with VisiCalc.

VisiCalc changed the home computer from an odd thing hobbyists played with to a necessity for accountants and others who wanted to move ahead by being much more productive.

And now with have ChatGPT et al. Nine months ago, the different AI research departments of Google, Apple, Microsoft, and the other big tech were toiling away. They pre-published on arXiv and spoke at various conferences. The goal was to inch ahead of the other research labs on the standard benchmarks to achieve a new SOTA (state of the art) performance. Life was grand at these places. Good salaries. Independent work. Excellent facilities.

Then, almost by accident, some fella’s at OpenAI put ChatGPT on a website. Sign up for free and use this chat bot that held the world’s knowledge in it “memory banks” (an old term that us old folks used when we were much younger). Type a question just like you would ask a wise old person. Boom. There’s the answer. It would write an essay or an email or whatever you could imagine. The thing even wrote chunks of code in programming languages. Sure, it didn’t do everything, but it sure did a lot of things.

ChatGPT changed AI from an odd thing researchers played with to a necessity for everyone who wanted to move ahead by being much more productive.

AI had its VisiCalc moment. Right or wrong, for better or worse, expectations changed, and usage changed. It is no longer enough for AI researchers to work away in their labs to inch forward on standard benchmarks. We want a system that summarizes images and videos and tells us the meaning of the lyrics from Taylor Swift’s latest release and what she was wearing.

AI? Models? Benchmarks? The lesser inclined who are tinkering and not doing anything worthwhile can continue to tinker. The movers and shakers are spending $$$ on tools that move and shake them ahead.

by Dwayne Phillips

A simple equation provides some insight into how culture must change with the number of people in the group.

Years ago, the late author and consultant Jerry Weinberg told me of a little equation he used to note the shifts in culture in groups of people. The equation is 3^N. If that doesn’t translate to the browser or whatever you use to see this, the equation is 3 to the power of N.

Start N at 0, go up, and we have 1, 3, 9, 27, 81, 243, 729, 2,187 …

What works when I am working alone probably won’t work when there are 81 persons in the group.

Well, of course not. Who in the world would think otherwise? Well, it appears that many people think otherwise. Companies grow from half-a-dozen persons (3 to the 3rd power) to 6,000 or 10,000 (3 to the 9th or 10th power). Those companies flop and flail like fish out of water. There is no innovation, no progress, nothing resembling a startup. Instead, they are like a government bureaucracy abiding by the Iron Laws of such.

Well, of course not. No one would think they could run a 10,000-person company the way they run a three-person team. Still, when 3 becomes 10 and then 30, things fail badly. And the opposite is true as when 300 becomes 100; things fail badly.

Watch the numbers. Watch what we do everyday, i.e., our culture. I like to do what I like to do. We all like to do what we like. What works for everyone, however, probably isn’t what I like to do. As the number of people in our group changes, what we do should change as well.

This does not apply to general principles: (1) honesty, (2) integrity, (3) trust, etc. This is day-to-day details like the length and number of meetings and how we conduct meetings and how we keep one another informed of what is happening.

Let’s all consider this little equation and the principle. When the size of our group changes, we should change our culture.

by Dwayne Phillips

In which I consider one of the more quotable aspects of knowledge.

My dad used to tell me that knowledge was the one thing no one could take away from you. A search of the world’s knowledge, a.k.a., Google it for yourself, shows that many famous people are the origin of this quote. I will not research this to find the true origin. I’ll leave it with my dad.

Years later, another older and wiser man discussed this with me. He noted how some peoples of the world concentrated their efforts on valuable things that are small. If persecution erupted and the people had to flee their location, they could carry these valuable things with them because they were small. Examples include diamonds and other gems and jewelry and violins.

To accompany these small physical items was the knowledge of how to identify and use them. Here again, we come to knowledge.

People can take knowledge away from me. There are drugs and surgeries and such that damage the mind and remove knowledge. My dad knew of these as did many others who noted the permanence of knowledge. My dad also knew of other things that were permanent. That removed the unique or “one thing” quality of knowledge.

Still, knowledge is quite important. Ideas don’t just “go away.” I might not recall an idea at this moment, but it will come back to me at some later time when it would be life saving.

The source of knowledge? Well, education is the first answer. Many older and wiser persons have noted that “education” often stood in the way of their learning. I guess “learning” is more important than education. That is for scholars and educators to debate.

Another thing about knowledge that I learned from my dad and my grandchildren: it doesn’t cost anything to give away knowledge. That’s a good thing.

by Dwayne Phillips

Despite what I have noticed the past couple of years, declaring an emergency does not allow us to do whatever we want.

I’ve noticed something about folks and those emergency flashers on automobiles. If you turn on your emergency flashers, you can do anything you want.

• You can park next to a sign that reads, “FIRE ZONE, NO PARKING,” if you turn on your emergency flashers.
• You can drive on the Interstate at 40 miles per hour and straddle the center line blocking both lanes, if you turn on your emergency flashers.
• You can drive 50 miles per hour over the speed limit on the Interstate, if you turn on your emergency flashers.
• You can block a lane in the parking lot, leave your engine running, leave your driver’s door open, and go into a store for a few moments, if you turn on your emergency flashers.

Great things these emergency flashers, huh? All you have to do is tell the world, “I am having an emergency,” and you can do anything you want with your automobile.

I have seen similar practices in work settings. Tell everyone, “We are having an emergency,” and you can do anything you want. You can suspend all work. You can require everyone to work 24 hours straight. You can even spend more money than you have. All by simply doing the equivalent of turning on your emergency flashers at work.

Well, sorry folks. Simply stating, “I’m having what I consider to be an emergency,” doesn’t empower us to do whatever it is we want. The laws of nations and physics still apply. Other people still drive on our shared roads. Other people still need to use a FIRE ZONE to fight fires. Other people still only have so much money and we can’t exceed the budget or the speed limit or cross that center line for miles and miles.

There is some old saying like, “Poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part.” If you’re late to a soccer game, sorry, but you can’t park in a fire line while you walk into Starbucks and order a dozen specialty drinks that take half an hour to make. That is not an emergency for the rest of the world.

And the thing about, “WE ALL have to work 24 hours straight to make up for my errors in estimation,” sorry, doesn’t work either.

Let’s all do a little better.

by Dwayne Phillips

We were once told, “Don’t bring me a problem without a solution.” I hope most of us have ignored that.

There was a time when I was repeatedly told at work, “Don’t bring me a problem without a solution.”

The idea was that bosses had enough to do already and didn’t need any more problems from little folks like me. If there was a problem, I was supposed to think and think and think up a solution so that I could tell the boss, “This is what is wrong. This is what we should do.” If I didn’t have a remedy, I should not mention the problem.

It was a great idea. Well, it wasn’t a great idea. The counter example was if there was someone in the hallway and their heart stopped beating and their breathing stopped as well, I wasn’t to tell anyone unless I knew exactly how to revive them. You can see the fallacy here.

“That’s an exaggeration,” was the answer.

Still, someone became a boss because they knew some things that the rest of us didn’t. Right? Therefore, the boss knew how to solve problems that the rest of us didn’t. Right? Well, perhaps I was just naïve.

I am happy to report that I haven’t heard this problem-with-solution-only phrase in many years. Perhaps it has faded away to that place where stupid ideas should fade.

If you have a problem and don’t have a solution, raise your hand anyways. We can all do better.

by Dwayne Phillips

It is rare that we can understand something from one and only one perspective. We need to walk around the other sides to gain other perspectives.

There is a method of describing something called the DoD Architecture Framework or DoDAF. Sometimes DoDAF is quite useful, but sometimes persons misuse it and … well great headaches ensue.

One of the concepts of DoDAF is that it isn’t practical or possible to describe a system with one picture. The system appears different given a different perspective or occupation. Users see the system one way; engineers see it another way; marketing sees it another way, etc.

Therefore, describing the system requires a set of diagrams. The diagrams are created from different perspectives or points of view. To create these diagrams requires walking around the system. Draw it from the front, the back, the right, the left, the top, etc.

We understand the three dimensions of objects, but given a system, there are many more dimensions. I haven’t mentioned the money dimension yet. I haven’t mentioned the time dimension yet. And the list of what I haven’t mentioned goes on and on.

Walk around the system. Consider how it appears from different perspectives. Think. Appreciate. Think some more.

by Dwayne Phillips

We tend to want complex things. Too simple shows that we didn’t work hard, right? No, that is usually wrong.

It happened again at work this week…

Someone wanted a couple of sentences that summarized a project. The project had been running for ten years and is a success. Lots of people use the system (“lots of” meaning far beyond the number required to call it a success).

I worked and worked and worked and created two precise, concrete, and specific sentences.

The persons wanting the sentences kicked it back. “Too simple, not ‘glitzy’ enough.”

Oh well, I’ve never worked on Madison Avenue. I’ve never been promoted to the highest levels of whatever it is that has highest levels. What do I know? I treasure brevity and clarity. Perhaps I’m just not cut out for this type of thing.

I recall that when I submitted my dissertation for a PhD many years ago that one of the professors commented, “The writing is too easy to understand.” Well, I haven’t improved much since then.

by Dwayne Phillips

Some of the worst mistakes I make are my mistakes about my mistakes and the corrections of my mistakes. Confused? Most of us are.

We all make mistakes. Sorry to write that, but it is true. Then we make meta mistakes. These are mistakes about our mistakes and the corrections of our mistakes.

“Well,” I like to say after recognizing a big boo boo (slang for “stupid mistake”), “I was tired on that day and didn’t understand what someone told me and they didn’t explain it well and it was last month and nothing bad happened and you know, let bygones by bygones and water under the bridge and please, no one hold me accountable for my stupid mistake, please.”

Enough excuses. I was mistaken. Will I compound that mistake with a meta mistake? Will I correct the mistake? Will my correction be mistaken as well?

Of course we can dwell in the past too much. Of course we can fall into analysis paralysis. And of course, we can ignore what we did and what we did in reaction to what we did.

I recommend thinking. That is often painful, but usually beneficial. Excusing a mistake and moving along as if it never happened… Ooooops, that’s an excuse. See how easy it is? The mistake didn’t happen, I MADE A MISTAKE; I WAS MISTAKEN. I cannot move along as if I was not mistaken. I must admit MY MISTAKE, count the costs, and do tasks to recover from MY MISTAKE.

Otherwise, my meta mistake just makes everything worse.