Software and I: How to Manage a Self-Managing Team? As we all know, there’s no shortage in confusing and counter-intuitive ideas and practices in the Agile world, but the idea of a self-managing team has to be one of the best. Indeed, the idea that a manager can manage a self-managing team sounds oxymoronic at best, and at worst – plain moronic. In this post I will try to clear the air and explain what it means for a team to be self-managing, and what is the role of a manager of such a team. By the way, this post is the fourth in my series of Demystifying Agile. What Does It Mean to Self-Manage? A self managing team, or as it is sometimes also called, a self-organizing team, is, above all, a mature team. The first thing such a team does is to take charge of how they do their work, which is to say, they define the tasks they will have to complete in order to deliver the solution (requirement / user story / feature). In short, one must merely point them at a goal, and they will do everything needed to achieve it! What else? Wrong. Summary
Console Recorder Finally...a "black box recorder" for the cockpit of your plant: the control room! The Longwatch Console Recorder automatically captures HMI, SCADA and DCS displays and provides you with live and recorded images of exactly what was on the operator displays at any point in time (including the mouse tracks). The Console Recorder is a great tool for: Reduced Downtime: don't dig through alarm logs, operator logs, trends and reports - just play back what the system was showing the operator and you'll know what happened and how to fix it. Troubleshooting: it aggregates and associates the information in various databases - by showing you that data the way the operator saw it! Training: Just like the pros: use console recording as "game films" to show best practices for procedures, startups and shutdowns. There are two versions of the Console Recorder: Value Edition - a basic screen recorder that provides live and recorded read-only images.
Methods Map Showing results for Qualitative research Showing 1-20 of 859 items Back to top Choose from the "Show content" menu to display related content here. Getting the Most Out of the Research Experience Brian Roberts While each research situation is different and no book can fully prepare the researcher for what they experience – this book provides a guide to what may be expected. The Handbook of Social Work Research Methods Bruce A. "`Not so much a handbook, but an excellent source of reference' - British Journal of Social Work This volume is the definitive resource for anyone doing research in social work. The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research in Psychology Carla Willig & Wendy Stainton-Rogers The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research in Psychology provides comprehensive coverage of the qualitative methods, strategies and research issues in psychology, combining 'how-to-do-it' summaries with an examination of historical and theoretical foundations. Social Research is a bourgeoning field.
How to Become a Focused Thinker In his book Focus: The Future of Your Company Depends on It, marketing consultant Al Ries gives a tremendous illustration: The sun is a powerful source of energy. Every hour the sun washes the earth with billions of kilowatts of energy. Yet with a hat and some sun-screen, you can bathe in the light of the sun for hours at a time with few ill effects. A laser is a weak source of energy. Focus can bring energy and power to almost anything, whether it’s physical or mental. Does every area of your life deserve dedicated, focused thinking time? 1. I’ve found that I need blocks of time to think without interruption. But since one lets us connect with people and know their needs, and the other lets us think of ways to add value to them, we need to value and give attention to both. 2. Once you have a place to think, you need the time to think.Years ago I realized that my best thinking time occurs in the morning. 3. 4. I believe goals are important. Be sure to write down your goals. 5.
The Lean Startup A startup is an institution, not just a product, so it requires management, a new kind of management specifically geared to its context. This context is one of extreme uncertainty. Startups are human institutions designed to learn whether a product or service serve a market or, in fact, whether the market exists at all. Traditional product development is about trying to create a solution to a known problem. By contrast, most startups have is they are trying to create a solution to an unknown problem. The Lean Startup methodology addresses these unknowns by proposing a set of management principles that seek to test assumptions and eliminate unknowns.
12 Universal Skills You Need to Succeed at Anything Email There are a lot of skills you don’t need. You can be happy and successful without knowing how to rebuild a car’s engine, program a web application, or replace drywall. There are other skills, however, that can’t be avoided – skills that tie into various aspects of everyday life, that are not only useful, but totally indispensable. In this article we’re going to skip the super basic skills like reading, driving, and using a computer, and discuss twelve slightly more advanced skills that are woefully under-taught, and universally applicable. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. What did we miss? Photo by: Zack Schnepf If you enjoyed this article, check out our new best-selling book. And get inspiring life tips and quotes in your inbox (it's free)...
Workers, Take Off Your Headphones - Anne Kreamer Technology, for a free-lancer like me, creates a powerful and not entirely mad illusion that we work in a peopled environment of rich diversity and experience. As I sit to write each morning, I draw upon the vast network of people (many in active chat windows) with whom I’ve worked in the trenches over the course of a 35-year career, while also having the benefit of opinions and insight by expert strangers a click away. I sometimes even wear earplugs that allow me to immerse more deeply into my subject matter, creating a bubble that blunts distractions and sharpens my focus. For me, it’s the best of both worlds. Alone, and yet truly interacting with people, even if they are across town or in a different country. But what about younger people just entering a traditional office environment? This is very much a new world with myriad legal and security issues for both employer and employees, which are beyond the scope of this post. Missing out on opportunities to contribute and advance
OmniFocus iPhone App Review No matter what line of work you’re in, what your schedule’s like, and what kind of devices you rely on, you need to have a getting things done app on your phone. Getting things done, or GTD for short, is the productivity methodology envisioned by David Allen. In it, he describes the system he created to organize your life and get tasks done. The GTD system is very popular, and there are many iPhone apps built around it. OmniFocus, a personal favorite of mine, is one of these apps. Now like any category of iPhone apps, there are ones that are minimalistic, and there are ones that are hardcore. When you first open up the app, you’re asked if you’d like to sync your tasks (don’t worry, this can always be changed later in the settings). When you add a new task to OmniFocus, it goes into your inbox. OmniFocus provides you with several different ways to sort your tasks. Another way to sort your tasks is by context. Developer:: The Omni Group
10 Small Habits of Less Stressed People Image by KevinLallier (license). “Unnatural work produces too much stress.”Bhagavad Gita “The time to relax is when you don’t have time for it.”Sydney J. Keeping the stress away in life isn’t just about the big decisions and challenges like the career, your most important relationships, money and health. It is also to a large degree about what you do each day and week. Here are 10 of them that are having a wonderful impact in my life and have had a very positive effect for many people. Write it all down. Use your mind for better things than remembering what to do. One thing at a time. You’ll get better results and feel better and less stressed if you do just one thing at a time. Ask instead of guessing. Reading minds is hard. Don’t make mountains out of molehills. Before you start thinking too much about something and building it up something big in your head, ask yourself “am I making a mountain out of a molehill here? Pack your bag before you go to bed. Keep everything in its place.
Worker Productivity: Sweet Spot Is 40 Hours a Week There's been a flurry of recent coverage praising Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer of Facebook, for leaving the office every day at 5:30 p.m. to be with her kids. Apparently she's been doing this for years, but only recently "came out of the closet," as it were. What's insane is that Sandberg felt the need to hide the fact, since there's a century of research establishing the undeniable fact that working more than 40 hours per week actually decreases productivity. In the early 1900s, Ford Motor ran dozens of tests to discover the optimum work hours for worker productivity. They discovered that the "sweet spot" is 40 hours a week–and that, while adding another 20 hours provides a minor increase in productivity, that increase only lasts for three to four weeks, and then turns negative. Anyone who's spent time in a corporate environment knows that what was true of factory workers a hundred years ago is true of office workers today. Accounting for Burnout
Multitasking Seems to Serve Emotional, Not Productivity, Needs By Rick Nauert PhD Senior News Editor Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on May 1, 2012 The pace of everyday life and the ubiquity of media make multitasking a common part of daily existence for many. And while new research suggests multitasking can be stimulating and fun, it is actually not productive and hinders cognitive performance. “There’s this myth among some people that multitasking makes them more productive,” said Zheng Wang, Ph.D., lead author of the study and assistant professor of communication at Ohio State University. “But they seem to be misperceiving the positive feelings they get from multitasking. Take, for example, students who watched TV while reading a book. “They felt satisfied not because they were effective at studying, but because the addition of TV made the studying entertaining. Wang’s study warns that multitasking can become a chronic, nonproductive behavior for college students. But surveys show that media multitasking is only becoming more popular.