by Dwayne Phillips Is this person who and what they claim? Is this person authentic? The term “authenticity” is being tossed about much recently. I once worked in a job where determining the authenticity of a person was important. I struggled to understand what that meant. Here is some of what I learned. Is this […]
Authenticity
March 30th, 2015 · No Comments
Tags: Authentic · Communication
Selling a Program, Keeping it Sold
March 9th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips To gain approval for an endeavor, you must “sell” it to those who decide such things. Then, as work progresses, you must continue to engage those who decide and keep the project “sold.” I hate this topic. That is because one of my worst experiences in my career was due to my […]
Tags: Change · Communication · Expectations · Management
People-Augmented Applications
February 26th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips Every now and then we remember that we can allow a person to help another person and that we have the technology to enable that. Be My Eyes is a combined application and service that helps sight-impaired people see things clearly. The impaired person points their smartphone at a thing and is […]
Tags: Communication · Consulting · Ideas · People
Us as the User Guide
February 16th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips Don’t look to the provider’s user manual; look to the rest of us. I don’t know why it has taken me so long to write about this topic. Almost everyone already knows this, but for the record… I ran into this situation again this week. I was learning how to use a […]
Tags: Communication · Consulting · Education · Ideas · Internet · Knowledge · Learning
Libel, Slander, and Deflate-Gate
February 12th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips It may come as a surprise to many, but laws against libel and slander still exist. I write this five days before the 2015 Super Bowl. The big topic of conversation in the football world is about under-inflated footballs (yes, western civilization has come to this). What surprises me (at least a […]
Tags: Communication · Writing
Too Many Words
February 9th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips Yet another reason for brevity: the more the words, the more the mistakes. There must be some statistic somewhere that shows the number of mistakes per 1,000 words that writers make (is it a mistake to end a sentence with the word “make?” Did I put my punctuation marks in the right […]
Tags: Brevity · Clarity · Communication · Writing
We Get One Chance
February 5th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips We each get one chance to share an idea with others. I cannot overemphasize the need to be ready for that chance. I have been working with a colleague for several years now. This colleague has an idea he wants to present to others. He has been talking about the one idea […]
Tags: Clarity · Communication · People
Tell Them it is Normal
January 29th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips Life is full of challenges and frustrations. Some of these are normal. When encountering normal with a person who has not encountered it before, explain to them that it is normal. I once tutored a young man through a frustrating process at work. In the middle of the pull-out-your-hair and smash-your-head-through-the-wall day, […]
Tags: Communication · Consulting · Education · Expectations · Learning
The Resource Manager
January 22nd, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips What else would a person manage other than resources? I continue to be unemployed. Hence, I look at a large quantity of help wanted ads. Some of the job titles are absurd. One that sticks with me is: Resource Manager What else would a person manage. Managers manage resources—the end. Resources include: […]
Tags: Communication · Employment · Management · People
They Can Read It at Home
January 15th, 2015 · No Comments
by Dwayne Phillips One thing teachers today have to realize is that the learners can read it all at home at their leisure. The title of this post will haunt educators of all types. It has haunted college professors for decades. They can read it at home So why “lecture?” I remember the TV show […]
Tags: Communication · Education · Knowledge · Learning