Working Up

Working Up in Project Management, Systems Engineering, Technology, and Writing

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Time to Write? Wrong Question

September 30th, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips When do you find time to write? Wrong question, at least the wrong question for me. This past week I was sharing something I was writing with another person. This person told me about how they have wanted for years to write something on a similar topic, but just couldn’t find the […]

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Tags: Adapting · Energy · Research · Time · Writing

Always Be Ready to Teach

August 19th, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Hiring new people? Want to them to know everything that people who already work here know? There is no easy answer, but there are some answers. When look at the Help Wanted ads, I frequently encounter employers who want to hire people who already work for them. The ads are easy to […]

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Tags: Adults · Learning · Reality · Teaching · Time · Work

Time to Write

May 16th, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Many people struggle to find that elusive “time to write.” Others struggle to find to do anything else but write. Some people try in vain to find that elusive “time to write.” Something else is always in the way. This happens; that happens, and the time to write is not there. Fatigue […]

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Tags: Choose · Communication · Concepts · Reading · Time · Writing

Typing and Interruptions

April 11th, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Reducing the time spent typing on the keyboards reduces the number of interruptions. There are new tools that reduce both. I can type fairly fast. At least I give myself credit for that. Like everyone else, I am interrupted while typing. I could estimate number of interruptions per hour or some rate […]

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Tags: Artificial Intelligence · Improvement · Mistakes · Technology · Time · Tools · Writing

Questions Without Answers Are the Easy Ones

March 28th, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Questions without answers are the easy ones to ask and discuss. I recently saw a movie about folks building bombs. Large parts of the movie were discussions among scientists and engineers about building devices that kill people, but also save lives by stopping the killing. Those discussions were easy, much easier than […]

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Tags: Competence · Group · Knowledge · Meetings · Questions · Time

The Landmark

March 18th, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Meet me at the big oak tree outside of town at dusk. They said something like that in the old Westerns. It makes sense to still do this. There was always a showdown or something in the old Westerns. The big oak tree a mile outside of town at dusk. How did […]

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Tags: Agreement · General Systems Thinking · Planning · Time · Urgent

Meta-Competence

February 22nd, 2024 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips Once again, thinking at one layer higher than usual may bring insights that prove effective. There is competence: someone is able to do something well. They know the topic, they know the skills, and they apply them all. The adjective “well” is used often and truthfully. Then there is meta-competence: this has […]

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Tags: Adapting · Choose · Competence · Management · Meta · Time

We Don’t Have Time

November 6th, 2023 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips The old saying about not having time to do it once still holds. Perhaps we will learn one day. There is an old saying about not having the time to do something right, but always having the time to do it over and over and over and… I’m not sure who said […]

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Tags: Choose · Communication · Expectations · Time · Work

Did My Words Make Sense?

September 4th, 2023 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips To write is to be misunderstood. Gosh, not very optimistic but it is realistic. We should constantly ask, “Did my words make sense?” “Never mind what it says, we know what we mean,” said an optimist about something we were reading. Yes, we did know what it meant. We read it half-a-dozen […]

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Tags: Change · Clarity · Communication · Improvement · Resources · Time · Writing

Words and Distant Lands

February 27th, 2023 · No Comments

by Dwayne Phillips People in distant lands use the same words differently. Time and generations create distant lands. I was fascinated by this story about younger folks putting things on TikTok et al. Then older folks who admit people to college and hire them for jobs noticed those things. The younger folks spoke in the […]

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Tags: Communication · Conversation · Culture · Humility · Language · Time