Category Archives: Observations

Handy info about blogging

I'm finding myself sending the same links and email message to people over and over, so here's a blog entry that covers the waterfront. Old hat for you experienced blog type people, this entry is for us newbies.

Bloglines is a great place to start subscribing to and managing blog/RSS feeds.

This page is where I've put some basic info about what RSS feeds are all about, and is also where you can find the link you need in order to subscribe to this blog.

RSS feeds are the Rosetta Stone that unlocked blogging for me and transmogrified them into something useful/powerful. I wrote this entry describing RSS feeds for PR folks to puzzle through some of the implications.

For the technical people, Xoops is the freeware that this blog is built in. It sits on top of two other powerful pieces of freeware — MySQL a very powerful database (competes nicely with the likes of ORACLE or Microsoft SQL Server) and PHP a nifty cross-platform programming language. That mySQL/PHP plumbing environment is a bubbling hotbed of great innovative software development.

Regulatory Issues — Speech

I'm off to give a speech to the assembled regional telecommunications lawyers gang this morning — my topic is the regulatory issues in VoIP. Good thing there are folks like Jeff Pulver out there doing a great job of blogging this issue — there's an amazing amount of stuff going on in this arena with new twists every day. Read his stuff to stay up to date.

Here's the outline of my speech.

How should we classify VoIP?

– A voice service?
– A mobile service?
– A data service?

Which way should we be consistent as regulators?

– By technology?
– By service?
– By layer?

Which things do we want to break?

– Universal Service?
– Access charges?
– Long-distance rates?
– LATAs?
– POTS?
– The Internet?
– CALEA?
– Numbering?
– Disability access?
– 911?

Whose ox do we want to gore?

– LECs and CLECs?
– LD Carriers?
– VoIP over Internet providers (eg. Vonage)?
– ISPs?

What is our goal?

– Promote new technology adoption and investment?
– Preserve existing investments/infrastructure?
– Assure quality and standardization?
– Level the playing field?
– Assure non-discrimination and access?
– Promote competition and lower prices?

Who does the regulating?

– International – ITU?
– National – FCC?
– State – PUC?
– City – Cable Commissions?
– Nobody?

An interesting approach to controlling email

Alison Overholt wrote Intel's got too much email in the March 2001 issue of Fast Company. I don't exactly know why it boiled to the surface for me, but I thought the list of do's and don'ts was a good one.

Of course, this was in that innocent age when viruses and spam didn't comprise 90% of email traffic. I'm hopeful that we'll return to that state of affairs within a year — the current spam/virus situation simply can't deteriorate much further before the big kids (Microsoft, Yahoo, etc.) arrive at a mutually-agreeable technical solution.

Thoughts on "trust"

Robert Galford and Anne Seibold Drapeau wrote this piece — The Enemies of Trust — for the APPA recently.

While I enjoyed the article and highly recommend it, I found it made something simple into something more complicated, at least for me.

The lesson I learned during a CDC management-training seminar many (many!) years ago has held me in good stead.

Quote:

Trust is built on making promises you can keep, and then keeping your promises

The tricky bit that often gets overlooked is to focus hard on the first half of that little bromide. We get in trouble when we too-easily enter into promises. Then, when we don't keep them, people stop trusting us.

Takes a long time to build trust, and it can be gone in an instant. Pay attention to those promises-made…

New Groove on the way

I'm a huge fan, and long time user of, Groove — one of the “Internet aware” sequels to Lotus Notes. I use it on projects when I come across fellow-addicts although I've never been very good at evangelizing new users into the fold. This is one of those things that you have to come to at your own speed, I guess.

Anyway, the new version (3.0) is due to come out next week and looks pretty darn nifty to me. One of the big complaints that many of us have had is that it's dang slow, both launching and switching between workspaces, which really gets annoying. All the Groovies are saying that this new version fixes that, which may go a long way towards bringing more converts into the fold.

Not freeware, but a very good value. It's got some pretty nifty “always on” encryption built in and I like the way copies of the shared workspaces reside on every members' computer. That saved my bacon one time when a computer crash wiped out the work on one team-member's computer and we could get them right back up to speed by pushing the workspace over to their backup machine.

Ah lahk et…

Moogul — think "Ebay" for people wanting to rent or borrow

This was an idea I heard first from local pal Dan Grigsby a while back. Now, here's another version, www.moogul.com, as described by John Borland in this article at CNet News.

Reminded me of Dan it did. So I wandered out to Dan's blog and was quite dazzled by all the stuff he's fiddling with these days.

Rummaging in Dan's RSS feed, I came across something called a PURL, and heading over to the www.purl.org site, discovered a whole new “name things on the Internet” gizmo. I got a little bit famous back in the '90's for my generic-domain-name exploits (eg. company.com, television.com, bar.com, etc.) so this PURL stuff is interesting to me. It seems like a great way to reduce some of the congestion in the Internet name space.

All in all, an interesting journey, well worth a blog entry…

Ah… a true pearl — management lessons from housework

This is an absolute gem by Hillary Johnson… The subtitle “It's time to throw Sun Tzu out with the trash” is what hooked me.

She's quoting from Cheryl Mendelson and Harry Bates' Home Comforts : The Art And Science Of Keeping House — which looks like a book to grab.

Sun Tzu wrote “The Art of War” and is widely quoted by management gurus as the font of all wisdom. Hillary blows that notion up in this piece, drawing extensively on ideas from “Home Comforts.” I'm not gonna extract the list, you have to go read this one yourself.

I spent a long time managing by avoiding the behavior of Dilbert's boss. Now I've got a new light to follow. Completely right on…

Virtual teams — community folks could use this technology too

Here’s an article in CIO that talks about the improved productivity of virtual teams. They are grumpy about video conferencing, but like the “shared workspace” systems that are coming into use.

I’ve been following (and using) those systems for a while now, and think that there are some good ones (like Groove) that have finally gotten to the point of being really nifty. But I’m getting even more excited about all the open-source activity in this area. Check out this very cool matrix of open-source “content management systems” and be amazed at the capability that’s available for really cheap.

Which brings me around to Community Computing. Read on…

I’m thinking that these systems could be put to great use by organizers who are trying to move the ball forward for their causes. I’m reminded of the early days of the Internet when Jon Pratt was working on this sort of thing over at the Minnesota Council of NonProfits and how much cheaper/easier these new systems would be.

So while I’m fiddling these systems into use in the private sector, I’m also going to be looking for ways that nonprofits could take advantage of all that virtual-team stuff that the CIO piece is talking about.

Spoofing caller ID

Ooo, now this one’s interesting… Here’s a writup in The Register talking about how some clever folks have figured out how to fiddle with caller-ID strings in the VOIP world — in both directions (inbound and outbound). Here’s a link to the article.

Hardly a “harmless prank” this could have some pretty nasty implications for stalking and identity-theft reasons. Read on for a few thought-provoking quotes…

Quote:

Callers with life-or-death anonymity concerns might consider spoofing just to get a little privacy. For now, Lucky says pranks among friends are the most common use that he’s seen of VoIP spoofing, but he believes that identity thieves and other swindlers could have a field day. “I’ve used it myself to activate my own credit cards, because I never give credit card companies my real number,” he says. “One simple spoof, and it’s like saying, if you have the guy’s phone number, that piece of information is more important than his mother’s maiden name and date of birth. If you have the phone number, you don’t need anything else.”

How ’bout them apples? This could cause the financial-services crowd a fair amount of heartburn. But what about the implications for people who are tangled up with a stalker? Here’s another quote:
Quote:

Privacy advocates, who had reservations about Caller ID when it was introduced in the 90s, aren’t happy that it’s becoming easier to subvert. “A worse case scenario is if you have a blocked number, and you’re a victim of stalking, and you’re duped into calling a number the stalker set up that was routed through a VoIP line,” says Jordana Beebe of the San Diego-based Privacy Right’s Clearinghouse. “It could put their life in danger.”

I’m also really interested in the regulatory impacts of VOIP, and this promises to generate a lot of pain on that front as well. Once again, here’s what The Register has to say:
Quote:

This arrangement relies on telephone equipment at both ends of the call being trusted: the phone switch providing you with dial tone promises not to lie about your number to other switches, and the switch on the receiving end promises not to reveal your number if you’ve asked that it be blocked. In the U.S. that trust is backed by FCC regulations that dictate precisely how telephone carriers handle CPNs, Caller ID and blocking. Most subscribers have come to take Caller ID for granted, and some financial institutions even use Caller ID to authenticate customers over the phone.

Stay tuned, this will be coming up again. Fersure…

VOIP — topic introduction

Ralph Jenson and I built us a pretty-darn-close-to-perfect copy of Vonage back a couple years ago and were within a whisker of kicking it off here in the Twin Cities. Unfortunately, Vonage came to town a year earlier than we thought they would and blew us out of the water. But I've been tracking VOIP stuff ever since.

These days the most interesting thing to me is the regulatory rasslin' that's going to be going on, so this will mostly be policy-wonk stuff. Heck, I've got to give a speech about VOIP regulatory impacts in a few weeks. That research alone should fill up several good blog entries.

Markle Foundation — longstanding heros

I had lunch with Sheldon Mains today and he reminded me of another topic area I want to cover in this blog — community technology.

This evening brought this article about the Markle Foundation my way from the Fast Company site.

The Markle folks have been supporting all kinds of community access technology stuff for ages. I ran into them back in the ’70’s when I was part of the community radio crowd. They were hip back then, and they’re hip now too. Hats off to the Markle gang, glad to see they’re still at it. Read on for a quote from the article that gives a sense of the kind of outside-the-box thinking they’re doing these days…

Quote:

Just listen to Hammond wax rhapsodic on the potential of the MP3 player as a force for social change: “This basically was invented for a market of rich teenagers to download music and walk around with it,” he says, digging unsuccessfully through a sheaf of papers for his own device. “The current model costs $150 and carries an hour’s worth of music. So let’s envision a world just a year away where we’re going to have $50 devices that can store eight hours’ worth of speech. Well, poor villages can afford $50. So suppose a village bought one of these things and then went to their local NGO to download compressed speech files that provide AIDS information, agricultural information, and so on. Listeners share the player with their neighbors, and then six months later, the village takes it back and downloads a whole new set of files. You would have an affordable information-transmission system that is under the control of the users.”

Pretty nifty, eh? Check out the Markle website if you’re feeling like getting smarter about community technology.

"Ten reasons why businesses fail" — More good things to watch out for

A good list posted by A.J. on the Value Management Partners site. Here’s a link to the entry. This is another list to re-check about every 30 seconds or so if you’re running a business. These issues can sneak up on you, and are lots easier to deal with when the problems are just starting.

Read on for AJs list…

10 Reasons Businesses Fail

Not controlling costs.
As soon as a business gets a little successful with a cash flow, they start spending money…frivilously: fancier cards, websites, and other marketing collateral. Add in fancier technology, extra people and sitting on their laurels, suddenly the positive goes negative. Along with costs…

Disregarding or misinterpreting financial records.

This works with costs in that if you can’t read your P&L how would you know if you have any money? On the other hand…

Inadequate accounting records.
You may know how to interpret your P&L and balance sheet, but you’re not getting the whole or correct picture.

Inviting fraud through poor internal control.

If you can’t read your records or are not getting the whole picture, you’ll never know what an accountant, bookkeeper or other employee may be doing behind your back.

Failing to aggressively sell.

Nothing happens until a sale is made.

Insufficient working capital.

No sales, too many costs, that counterclockwise circular motion begins.

Not carrying adequate and appropriate insurance.

Car accident, trip and fall, a minor mistake, they can spell doom when un- or under- insured.

Failing to adequately train and develop employees.

You have to show them what you want done! They can’t read your mind.

Improper strategic planning.

If your having any of the previous problems then you haven’t thought out a plan.

Not seeking advice or professional help when necessary.

You’re good at what you do. Don’t think you can do it all. Sometimes stepping back with a fresh pair of eyes can stop the downturn.

"Should we do this project?" questions

Johanna Rothman has a list of questions to ask when you’re contemplating the launch of a project — here’s the link.

This is a good complement to my Pretty Good Project Definition Worksheet which is a quiz I use a lot when chartering new projects. I may lift some of Johanna’s questions and add them to mine.

Read on for the list…

Is this Project Worthwhile?

 

Not all projects should be done. Some projects don’t even rate discussion. But sometimes it’s a lot harder to tell when a project is worthy and should be considered. Here are some questions I ask when trying to evaluate when a project is worthwhile:

 

  • What business need does this project fill? (Does the organization obtain value from this business need)
  • Is this project a strategic project for us? What makes it strategic? (Does the strategic reason behind the project change the importance of the project?)
  • How does this project fit into all the projects we’d like to do? (Does this project make sense for us to do?)
  • Have we done a project like this before? Were we successful? What did it take for us to be successful? Do we have any doubts about our ability to do this project? What are those doubts? (Are we doomed before we start?)
  • Do we have the staff or other resources to do the project? (If we can’t adequately fund the project, what should we do differently?)
  • What is the effect of finishing this project on time, not finishing this project on time, or not finishing the project at all? What ripple effect does this project have on others?

 

I supposed if I wanted to make this easier, I could have arranged everything in a table with a yes or no at the top of each column, and you could just mark yes or no. If you have enough yes’s, the project is worthwhile. The problem I have with that approach is that when I ask the first couple of questions with a senior management team, the answers aren’t always yes or no. Sometimes the business need is clear. Sometimes the strategic importance of the project is to have a small project to practice a new set of techniques on. Sometimes the time constraints make the business need clear.

 

If you use other questions, I hope you post them in a comment. Knowing whether a project is worthwhile is a huge part of management’s necessary decision-making. Because if a project is worthwhile, it’s worth funding, staffing, and moving along. If it’s not worthwhile, it’s worth killing — quickly.

posted by Johanna at
| link |

A "watch list" for growing companies

Another one from Decker Marketing, this article is pointing at the Dando Advisors site, but i couldn’t find the original article on the Dando site.

At any rate, here’s a list of “business health” indicators. I’m loving this one. I recently had an experience in a company in which every single one of these red flags was flying. Ugh.

Read on for the list…

Dando’s Top 10 Watch List for Growing Companies

Wrong people in key positions. These include friends, family members or long-term loyal employees who are not qualified to occupy key positions.

Poor communications. Senior management feels it is losing control as a result of having less direct contact with day-to-day operations.

Vague hierarchy. Watch out that the leader’s role is appropriately defined considering the company’s size and leadership needs and the leader’s skills.

Bloated hierarchy. Too many people reporting to the president and/or other senior staffers. Thus, the senior management team really does not operate as an aligned team to guide, plan, lead and manage the company.

Management deficiency. There is not an aligned executive leadership and management team that is staffed with individuals who are proven and skilled at getting desired results with efficiency and quality; developing people to successfully do their jobs; identifying operating inefficiencies, overcoming obstacles and implementing the needed systems and structure to correct the inefficiencies.

Imprecise accountability. There is a lack of clarity for management accountability and design of specific data needed for creating accountability.

Poor rewards. There is lack of an appropriate middle and senior management compensation process that is tied to accountability and results.

Old habits. Accounting, financial performance reporting and control systems have become obsolete for the size of the company, and the complexity and level of information needed to operate a more sophisticated company. Sometimes old processes limit the ability to make hard decisions on a timely basis.

Careful growth. Diversification into products or businesses do not fit the company’s expertise and market experience, or acquisitions are made prior to the company being properly structured to integrate them.

Precise balance. The company is not properly balanced between marketing and sales. There is increased competition and a lack of planning to effectively react to the competition and the market.

Business recovery — putting things back on track

This article in the Decker Marketing blog lists ingredients for a turnaround effort. By my lights, these aren’t bad things to do in any project, not just the turn-around efforts. Don’t get me started about how so many projects are miserable just because people don’t run ’em well.

Read on for the list…

1. Get the right people together
2. Have a strong facilitator who owns the plan
3. Analyze root causes
4. Choose the levers that need to move to move the business
5. Identify what every and any team can do to drive those levers.
6. Focus them on these activities. Assert timelines and results for all initiatives
7. Report back soon on status and progress.
8. Have senior management present for accountability, if necessary.
9. Repeat until sufficient progress / trajectory is achieved.
10. Take a day off. You deserve it.