Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips A blink-of-an-eye expert can walk into a situation and point to disastrous mistakes in the blink of an eye. My wife knows kitchens and what happens in kitchens. She can walk in a kitchen full of people cooking something, and if they are doing something wasteful, she can point to it immediately. […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Facebook puts a data center near the arctic circle. The natural cold air will cool the computers. Why is this news? Why is this hailed as a brilliant “green” action? It was December of 1980. We had a small room with a dozen racks of heat-producing equipment that needed to be cooled. […]

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by Dwayne Phillips How to cross the barrier of the blank sheet of paper. I love a blank sheet of paper. I know a lot of people who don’t. I was in a meeting once where people were given blank sheets of paper and literally revolted. They wanted some type of template to focus their […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Smart and caring people do stupid things. I do stupid things. I advocate going out and finding these stupid things. Knowing they exist helps to prevent and plan for them. There is a lot of stupid out there in the world. Otherwise smart and caring people doing things that are just plain […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Some people are undependable. Most of the time, I can choose to work with them or not. My choice can tell me much about myself. I know people who fit the title of this post. If they tell me they will be someplace at nine o’clock, I am almost certain they will […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Staying in other people’s houses shows what I miss from my own. I am in Louisiana for a week visiting with family. There are items that I have in my house in Reston that are not in the houses I am staying. I understand that these are personal preferences, and that everyone […]

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by Dwayne Phillips We don’t accept every new gadget that comes from the mind of an engineer. New uses need to be demonstrated for new technologies to take hold. Either that or new generations come along with different values. New technology comes every day. We immediately accept it into our lives without a thought of […]

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by Dwayne Phillips I perform better when I feel better. I can decide to feel better thereby improve my performance. Have you ever had the opportunity to (safely) crash someone else’s car? To spin the tires? To do a 180-degree spin? I had the good fortune to do that about 30 years ago. It was […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Written rules and regulations restrict us. They also allow us to forget about some hazards and concentrate freely on the problem at hand. Restrictions can permit freedom. The trick is to learn where the areas of freedom exist and how to use them. A colleague was contrasting the type of people who […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Most computer programmers and builders of systems see ourselves as being helpful to the people who use the things we build. Beware, as most users of the things we build see us as interfering in their lives. This situation applies to must people in the world who see themselves as helpful (consider, […]

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