Old-school Collaboration Tools That Rock

May 16, 2010 — andrewnim

For many of us who live and work on the web, playing with the latest and greatest new tools just comes with the territory. I find this constant tool jumping fun and exhilarating; however, not everyone that we need to work with wants to have to learn a new tool in order to collaborate with us online. Sometimes simple “old school” tools, like IRC and mailing lists, can work just as well as, if not better than, the new tools. If nothing else, people are comfortable with tools that they know and have used many times before.

My full-time corporate gig is as a community manager for an open-source developer community. The community mainly comprises no-nonsense, no-frills people who love some old school tools. The fancy graphical environments in the latest and greatest collaboration web apps just get in the way of power user developers who know every trick in the book to get the most out of tools like IRC and mailing lists. Keep in mind that open source communities tend to have people — from corporate developers to passionate enthusiasts — collaborating across the globe in every time zone to develop software that we use every day. They know a thing or two about collaboration, and they use the tools that work. I had stepped away from hardcore developer communities for a couple of years when I was consulting, and in coming back to these established tools, I’m rediscovering why they are so useful for collaboration.

IRC / Group Chat

The best thing about IRC or Group Chat is that you can set up a place for your team or your project where people can drop in and out to ask questions or just have conversations with other people working on similar projects. It’s kind of like the water cooler, if you want to get even more old school, where people gather to talk about both work and social topics. Because it’s real-time chat, you can get quick feedback even when you don’t know exactly who to talk to because you are reaching out to a group of people with similar interests or similar jobs.

Lately, we’ve also been holding quite a few scheduled meetings in IRC, and it is a great way to get a lot accomplished very quickly. By scheduling it, you make sure that you have the right people available and anyone can participate as long as they can get some type of internet connection. We also make the logs available, and we use MeetBot to capture minutes of the meeting. This allows people to miss the meeting, but still see a full, unfiltered record of the meeting in the logs along with a summary of the meeting from MeetBot if they just want the highlights.

Mailing Lists

By mailing lists I mean both traditional mailing lists, like LISTSERV, or more recent additions like Google Groups. The fact that I love mailing lists is a bit odd, since I hate email. Part of what I love about mailing lists is the control that you have over how you receive the information. Most lists allow you to get every email immediately, or in a daily digest depending on how you prefer to interact with the list, and many of them allow you to turn the email off entirely when you go out on vacation. That way, your email doesn’t pile up, but you can skim through the online archives when you get back to catch up on the big news. Regular email just doesn’t have that flexibility.

The reality is that everyone uses email, and mailing lists are a great way to collaborate with a group of people without accidentally leaving anyone out of the loop. It’s too easy to forget to copy every person on the team when communicating with a group of people. The online archives are also a great way for new members to learn about the project and get a sense for the history of the group, and it gives you a place where you can always look back at the conversations when you forget some important detail.

Don’t get me wrong, I like the new tools, too. I get a tremendous amount of value out of tools like Twitter and the newer collaboration suites that have social networking and plenty of bells and whistles built-in. However, sometimes you just need something quick and cheap that just works. Just because a technology is old doesn’t mean it can’t rock.

What are your favorite “old school” collaboration tools?

via webworkerdaily.com

I have talked about finding the best fit, technology wise many times on Point Concept and agree with Dawn’s comments here.

Posted via web from Point Concept

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The winding workflow

April 19, 2010 — andrewnim

I have been thinking a lot about distraction and workflow of late. You may have noticed, its got me posting again. If you visit any freelance web site there are pages and pages donated to the ever sought after perfect workflow. The ultimate task management system. Its a bit of a holy grail for some. Others seem to get it early and keep it. My wonderful hard put upon wife has one called “write it down” she puts her tasks on a piece of paper and crosses them off. eventually a new piece is started and anything outstanding carries across. It is simple and it works for her. It does not work for me, because I need my work items in my work space which is firmly on the email/ messaging side. Paper just becomes disconnected.

I have spoken before about allowing people a great deal of flexibility to use systems which work for them and allow them to collaborate fully with the team. Its not easy to achieve and because of that all too many organisations dont seek to do so, imposing a system which suites the top and then blaming everyone down the chain for somehow failing to achieve.

When I served in the British Army I was lucky enough to be in a unit which valued individuality yes it did. I was once told by a senior officer that in respect of equipment we could wear what we wanted as long as we could do the job. He understood that a lot of the kit the army gave us was actually sub standard and made it hard for us to do the job. He knew there was better equipment and methods available and that given the chance we would grab them. We did. Our performance was better because we where comfortable and dry.

So if the army can allow its soldiers leeway to create their working conditions and their work flow as long as they can do the job, why cant a business?

Some would say its about control, like the CEO who micro manages or the Manager who is scared a subordinate may do a better job. I say its worse, its  a lack of value.  When you restrict your employees and do not allow them to take ownership you show how little you value them. When you do not value them you cannot then complain that they are disengaged from the job at hand.

If you value them, you trust them and that means you know that they have different ways of doing things but that it will get done. In time they will work out how to ensure they work together as a team. That may take some nudging and guidance, which is what managing is really about, not bossing.

So you can have a winding work flow where they try to get around your system or a smooth one where you work with theirs and direct them to achieve your outcome.

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End of year stock take

December 17, 2009 — andrewnim

There are plenty of sources which are busy providing end of year advice and check lists for things you need to do over the next few weeks in preparation for the new year. I have one much simpler piece of advice.

Relax enjoy the year end.

What? shock horror, did he say that?

Yes I did, now is a time to concentrate on family, customers, and staff. Now is a time to end the year on a good note. It is not the time to try and plan strategic goals and sales targets for next year. That should have been done last month, or better yet in the new year when those plans are a reality. If you try to do it now,  you are increasing your work load and will not truly be concentrating. You will make plans which have detail missing. Now is a good time to gather the reports you will need in January. You will make plans and then go off to enjoy Christmas, when you come back the plans will have faded and not seem quit so vital. This means that when you start the new year you will fall back into the pattern of dealing with the immediacy of the moment. Not actually working to your plan.

So wrap up what need to be done, spend time talking to clients and customers. Spend time with your staff. But most importantly take a break and spend time with friends and family.

You will find your self refreshed and full of ideas for new opportunities. Now is the time to sit down with you people and do some serious planning. Planning which will kick off the spirit of the year, planning which will be much more effective because you are concentrating on it. Set your goal of where you want to be next Christmas. Stick it up where every one can see it and create the plan to remind people and your self of the priorities. Plan in ways to avoid getting pulled into ruts and directions which don’t fit the plan. Review in an honest manner what were the good and bad points of the past year. What worked, what did not.

Break the planning into sessions over a day.

First: review, general discussion,

Second: lay down the outcomes for the planning, lead the discussion,

Third: make the plan,

Fourth, review, tidy and put it on the wall.

For the rest of the year, spend time once a week to review the plan and make sure you are keeping to it. But don’t be scared to change it if the situation needs it. But do be sure to understand and explain why you are making the change. Be sure it is a strategic change and not just a side alley.

So now that we have that all figured out,

Merry Christmas to all.

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Seth Speaks about engaging innovators

December 2, 2009 — andrewnim

Interesting and useful list from Seth Godin

It is a great list below are a few items which jumped out at me,

  • Simplify the problem relentlessly, and be prepared to accept an elegant solution that satisfies the simplest problem you can describe.Hire the right person. Don’t ask a mason to paint your house.
  • Part of your job is to find someone who is already in the sweet spot you’re looking for, or someone who is eager and able to get there.
  • Pay as much as you need to solve the problem, which might be more than you want to. If you pay less than that, you’ll end up wasting all your money. Why would a great innovator work cheap?
  • Cede all issues of irrelevant personal taste to the innovator. I don’t care if you hate the curves on the new logo. Just because you write the check doesn’t mean your personal aesthetic sense is relevant.

That last one is great, don’t tell the person you hire how to do the job you hired them for.

But you should read the full list over at Seth’s

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The emperors new content

November 30, 2009 — andrewnim

I attended a launch party for a new search application the other day. Pingar is an enterprise search platform or should I say research platform. I was totally wowed by the method they have used to produce the results. Pingar is aimed at the enterprise and specifically Sharepoint users at present and it is here that one of its unique strengths lays. Pingar does not produce a list of a zillion links for you to follow. It goes inside the resulting documents and extracts the relevant information. Which it compiles into a human readable report. So say the Chairman of a large corporation does a search on financial reports by sector. He has an overall view of how his company is doing. He can share this with his directors and it can be seen by the sales managers. However, and this is the neat bit for the enterprise, the sales managers can only see those parts of the results for which they have clearance. Pingar connects to the company permissions system and applies its restrictions.

At the party someone stated “journalists may be redundant”. My reply was that as gatherer’s on information they are, but as analysts of information, they are in more demand than ever. It is okay having all this data but, someone needs to make sense of it.

This took me back to a subject which has been on my mind of late. The nature of the content on the web. Can it be trusted and how can business know the validity of the facts on which it is basing its decisions? You see there is a method to research which academics, journalists and “researchers” should use. They should record and verify the sources of the facts they are placing in their content. There is a huge swathe of content (like this statement) which has no factual backing and no references against which it can be checked. I cannot give you a reference or source here because I can find no study on the issue. Its based on observation and may be flawed. But I don’t think so.

Take for example slideshare.com. They provide a great resource, an easy to use method for sharing power points. You go to a conference and the presenter can make his power point freely accessible to all to re watch later. But how many of those power points contain references. I looked at 20 the other day on a particular sensitive subject and only one had any form of reference. Yet people are using these as sources. But they may be the emperors new content. Without substance, without research or references to research, to back them up. Or notice that they are opinion. They may well be created using sources which where created using sources which had no factual basis at all. Yet it is regurgitated and used by the misinformed or the under-pressure  and may well be presented as facts upon which business and political decisions are made.

There is an old adage, “if it is in the paper it must be true”. It seems that this has now become “if its on the web……”

This is one of the things I really likes about Pingar, it produced a report based on the search request using contextual matching. But it also then gave all its sources and with the click of a link would pull the data in to supply me with the deeper perspective as needed. Being built from an academic research perspective, it needs to prove the veracity of the data it is supplying. I am not totally sure how this will work in the web as opposed to an intranet. But then maybe this is actually the tool for the deep web. Finding the real source rather than the conversations about it. Or it may cause a change in the way results are supported with others providing better meta data to support the authenticity of what they are supplying.

That can only be a good thing.

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Google Social Search

October 27, 2009 — andrewnim

Its all the rage this week as its due out for the masses on Monday. Sites all over the web are discussing it and telling us all how it will work and how great it will be. Google have released videos telling us how they envisage it and how it will build us a circle of “friends” around our Google Profiles. Each time you search and are logged in to your Google profile it will begin matching and building your network. Connecting with your other social media activities.

I see a glitch, user names and email addresses are often very different. My twitter name is not the same as my Google account name and my business email is not @gmail.com. As a freelancer I work under other email addresses as well, reflecting the branding of the client.

So the picture which Google social search is going to create is not going to have me at its true center. It is more likely going to look like a Venn_diagram . Now this may turn out to be very valuable in the long run as the connections who reside within the overlap are possibly identified as the most meaningful. But how will they get their if you are not logged in to a specific Google account at the time?

It will be interesting to see if it works in practice and proves to be more than a gimick to get us all building our Google profiles. Which is the only way it is really going to work, with Google as the center of our online lives.

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Communicate before starting

August 7, 2009 — andrewnim

I was recently helping a client who has an issue with their web developer. As usual a big chunk of the issue was caused by poor communication, which in turn was caused by shortage of time.  But this problem cuts both ways. The client did not take the time to fully think out what they wanted and get help to define this and the developer did not take time to fully understand what was needed and what was expected. This was compounded by no ongoing dialogue, no project tool and no updates supplied to the client or asked for. Then suddenly the deadline was close and the site was only partly done and did not look as the client expected. Now both parties have a problem. For the developer, they may loose the commission and receive bad press, or go over their budget fixing things. For the customer, the whole project has created stress and they are now faced with paying a second time to get what they wanted done.

All of this could be avoided by actually setting aside some time to sit down and get some agreement on expectations. This works for any project: draw up the process; explore the issues; draw some wireframes and create some lists. Set some milestones. But most importantly get to understand each other and what you need to provide. This is all basic stuff really and there are books galore written about it, but nearly always from the perceptive of the project manager. The trouble here is that small business owners are so busy project managing their business and don’t or wont take on the new project. They expect the developer/ supplier to do that. Only often they are a small business too and concentrated on doing what they do. They also have their way of doing it and often “know” best.

If both side have a check list before they sit down they can then easily see on which parts they agree, and then on which parts they need to spend time discussing. And that is were you need to spend your time, because these are the points which will eventually cause a falling out.

So if you are hiring, either get someone to help scope the project and spend time putting it together for you, or spend that time yourself and find examples and ask questions.

If you are the prospective developer, remember your client may not understand what you do and take time to explain it to them. Have a method and check list to reach an agreement. Then provide  a fairly detailed scope. Get this signed off and then ensure you spend 20 minutes a week updating the client. It will save you time in the long run.

I really am not saying anything new here, but it needs to be said again and again. It’s been talked about by plenty of people and will continue to be. In fact while I was writing this someone else was posting this check list for a Drupal Design Brief. I suggest you grab it and keep it, then use it both as a supplier and as a client.

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Free range ideas

July 29, 2009 — andrewnim

One expression I really don’t like hearing is people extolling others to “think out side of the box”. It’s often too late for that by the time this is being requested. It’s usually said to people who have actually been trained by school, parents, work and their peers to think in certain ways and do certain things. Fit in, do as you are told, be part of the gang, do it this way, do it our way. Some of this is needed, it gives us grounding and allows us to achieve as a society. But it needs to be offset by encouraging freedom of inquiry and analytical skills. We need to encourage young people to do what comes naturally: to question.

But that’s for the future, that may help our companies in a few years, but not now. Now we need to think about the staff both present and future. When you are next looking to hire a new employee what will you be looking for? Someone who will just fit in or someone who will stir things up a bit? I don’t mean hire a work place psycho, I mean someone who is free- range rather than battery reared. Some one who does not want to be a wall flower, but who is actively going to suggest new ways of doing things and is going to challenge when it is needed. Some one who is not afraid to say NO!

Not every organization wants or needs a blue sky thinker and i’ts the last thing you need in a small close knit organization. But you need someone who is happier with open fields and green pastures. However, and this is an important however, this one person is not going to be a catalyst for change unless you allow and encourage it. Which means you also need to encourage your other staff to do the same. It will not happen over night and does not need trips away for team building. You just need to get them to start thinking about how they do their jobs and give them incentives  if they come up with an idea that boosts your business. People generally are happy to tell you what is wrong with a process they are involved with, if it is one they have been given to follow. They are quiet happy to make improvements. You just need to encourage them. When people criticize see it as constructive.

If you want free range ideas you have to create a free range enviroment, not a box you then have to get them to think outside of. It means meetings which are informal and without hierachy; it means subtle continual changes in the way you interact in your company. You have to be brave and you have to learn to listen- really listen, in the same way you should be listening to your customers; customers you will get more of as your staff start solving customer problems and giving great customer service.

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What is IT?

July 1, 2009 — andrewnim

Here is something to think about: When someone says Information Technology, what do you think of? Computers? The Internet? Mobile phones? Do you think paper and pen?

I doubt it. But paper and pen are information technology, they may be old now but they are still valid means of passing information from one place or person to another. Which is at it’s fundamental, what Information Technology is all about. The Sumerians were the first to use codes or language to pass information, so in a sense they created Information Technology. But before them our stone-age ancestors painted on walls and invented language; the means to pass knowledge verbally. The Egyptians improved it by using paper rather than lumping rocks around and the Romans came up with the first PDA A wax tablet which could be used many times.All of these methods were constrained by time and distance. Information could only travel as fast as a man, running or riding. Until flags, fire, bladders (yes bladders), the telegraph and then the phone came along in that order. Finally news and knowledge could travel faster than a man.

As much as this was great for those in power it also caused problems. Not only did they know of unrest in the provinces, so did the other provinces. Rulers have always sought to limit access to information technology. But it has always found a way to get away from them. The printing press was the first real expression of citizen knowledge and power. People were empowered by the knowledge contained and more easily disseminated in a little book. No more asking permission to read a great tome in the chain library ( so called because the books are held captive by chains).

The telephone and the radio gave the next huge leaps in passage and engagement. But then the television arrived. Dictators rejoiced and knowledge slowly sank under the bilge called “reality TV”.Then came the internet. Rather than just viewing, people began using information. It has been said that this is a new age, with people creating as much as digesting information. That is not really true, people have always done this and found many ways to pass on that which they have created. The difference now is the potential reach for what they have created and how fast it can travel. Once again those in power find them selves troubled by the ease with which people create, receive and use information. Look at the recent events in Iran.

The downside to all of this is that there is so much information we cannot deal with in meaningful ways. This makes it as useless as if it it did not exist. Worse it makes us miss that which we need to pay attention to. Information technology is about the information. The rest is just the delivery, its not important. Wether you get the message via email or letter is not important, its that you get the message. More it’s that you act on the information contained in the message. So take a few minutes, have a think about what you do and how you do it. Before you grab hold of the latest fad or upgrade, ask your self, “ does this help me deal with my information any better, does it improve my decisions and my outcomes?”. Be honest, because if it does not, you may just be about to save a lot of money and time.

Posted in Collaboration, Ideas, Random thoughts. Tags: , , . 1 Comment »

Three Pillars of collaboration

June 7, 2009 — andrewnim

It is my view that there are three pillars on which good collaboration sit. Without them it is destined to be, if not a failure, a very uphill struggle. Which may explain why so many projects suffer from drift and over complexity. It is my experience that applying agile methods to any collaborative project does in deed help support the three pillars. You could say it becomes the bracing which holds them straight.

Communication

First rule of collaboration involves actually talking to each other. If you are not talking, you are not collaborating. The problem here is  more often how you are communicating. By what means and how often, this depends on the nature of the collaboration. Email is suitable for some efforts and a disaster for others. I would not suggest trying to build a website or working as a team on a  marketing campaign  via email. Nor would I suggest doing a sale that way. It’s fine for delivering the invoice but not the discussion.

Now I have worked on projects which had people in different parts of the world and different time zones. Trust me when I say that such projects can be a nightmare without good rules and one person coordinating. Some  vendors of software and services will tell you how easy it is to “remote” work with their product. Well some of these products do help you communicate in “better ways”, but really the only way you are going to create good communication is to actually spend some time sat in the same room learning something about each other.

Honesty

Goes without saying right? Wrong! Honesty requires taking the blame for your mistakes, it requires being truthful to yourself, your colleagues and your customers. You are not going to know how honest someone is until the chips are down, or the cash has to be paid. The only way you can find out about someone’s lack of integrity is the hard way: through experience.

But there is some good news, you can take precautions such as  creating a strong team, who communicate well. That will create the required empathic connections to overcome problems. Respect each other and things should fall into place.

Consistency

This is not to be confused with boring or unimaginative. For example, if part of the team supplies creative services you want to know that they will keep supplying the same levels of creative output not have off days at an inconvenient time. Unfortunately we don’t always work at 100% so, when one person is working at a low, other team members should be able to spot it and help out by being supportive and encouraging. If your team has these abilities consistency will flow.

Consistency is about supplying an expectation to your customers, an expectation of supply and quality. Customers don’t like suprises, except nice ones. And neither do people involved with collaborative endevour, although they often get them. Which is when good communication and honesty come to the fore to save the day.

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