Erudite Relics of Loc Huu Ho

BY AMBER SINGLETON RIVIERE
I was recently interviewed by Betsy Talbot of Married With Luggage, who wanted to know how I managed to bring big projects to completion so quickly. Here are the biggest three steps for me in getting things done.

Step 1: Prioritize.

The first step is to prioritize. This applies to decicinding what projects you take on in the first place, as well as prioritizing the tasks you do each day.

You have to first decide what projects will get your attention. As a business owner, you might have a hundred different ideas for creating revenue streams or even new marketing strategies you’d like to implement, but you can’t do them all at once. The way I like to prioritize projects is using a real estate method called “highest and best use.”

In real estate, agents value property based upon its highest and best use. For example, a house might actually be better suited as a commercial property, thereby tripling its value. You can use the same technique to value your time. Not all projects are created equal when it comes to creating the most value or the most return on investment. You have to decide which project will generate the most value at this time.

Once you’ve selected the project with the highest likely return on investment, you have to prioritize your tasks and how you spend your time each day. For that, I like to use the “revenue line” concept of Julie Morgenstern, author of “Never Check E-Mail in the Morning.” You never want to be more than three steps away from the revenue line. For a business owner, the first step away from the revenue line are those tasks that are most likely to generate immediate (or more immediate) income. That includes things like working on client projects, creating new products, and even invoicing, since it will lead to revenue right away. Two and three steps away from the revenue include lead generation activities, those that more directly influence your revenue, as well as those that indirectly influence it.
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1. People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered.
Love them anyway

2. If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Do good anyway.

3. If you are successful, you win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.

4. That good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.

5. Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway.

6. The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds.
Think big anyway.

7. People favor underdogs but follow only the top dogs.
Fight for a few underdogs anyway.

8. What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.

9. People really need help but may attack you if you do help them.
Help people anyway.

10. Give the world the best you have and you’ll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you have anyway.

The Paradoxical Commandments were written by Kent Keith in 1968, when he was 19, a sophomore at Harvard College. They were part of The Silent Revolution: Dynamic Leadership in the Student Council, his first booklet for high school student leaders. Here is how it all came about. Read the rest of this entry »

Original Source: 10 Things – Calvin Sun It’s easy to demotivate your staff without realizing you’re doing it. Calvin Sun highlights a few morale-busting behaviors to watch out for.

The sad thing about killing morale is that you can do it without even trying. In the words of a George Strait song, “It just comes natural.” But if you damage morale, you will lower the productivity of your group and create problems for yourself. Look at this list and see whether you recognize yourself in any of these morale-killers. Note: This article is also available as a PDF download.

1: Punish desired behavior

This action, and the following one, fall under the category of sending mixed messages. Do you think you could never do something like this? If you’re a parent, you may have had this conversation with your child: “Anytime you have a question or problem, please come see Mommy or Daddy.” But then what happens when that child does come see you? “Come back later; can’t you see I’m busy?!” With respect to the workplace, the number one example of punishing desired behavior is “shooting the messenger” following a management statement to “be open and honest about your concerns.”

2: Reward undesired behavior

How many times has it happened: You show up on time, or even early for a meeting. But because several people still haven’t arrived, the meeting leader decides to postpone the meeting for 15 or 20 minutes. What message does this action send? It tells the latecomers that arriving late is okay and tells the punctual people that their punctuality is useless. If you’re running the meeting, and people are on time, be fair to those people and start on time. This same principle goes for other situations as well. Read the rest of this entry »

Original Source: FINALINT So Says Donnie Garvich

I recently inherited a web app from a dirty, nasty, stinking contractor that claimed to be a competent enough programmer to be left alone to get things done. Unfortunately, we took him at his word. Functionally, most of the web app seemed to work at first glance. However, once the client took over the reigns and actually started using it things went downhill fast. The contractor disappeared after payment (die reputation DIE!) and I was left to try and get things working properly and performing up to snuff while the client limped along with what they had been given.

I decided to document a few of the things that I found wrong along the way.  These are really just things that every good programmer should already know to avoid… but obviously some people need to be reminded (or taught).

#10 – Don’t store settings in a configuration file

When you’re writing a sizable application, things like database connections and SMTP server information will be used throughout the app.  The best way to make sure your app is entirely immune to maintenance is to redefine those little bits of information every time you need them.  So instead of putting them in the configuration file (Web.config or whatever) just leave them in your compiled code.  Whoever inherits the app will thank you for sending them on a hunt through thousands of lines of code to change which SMTP server is being used.  What’s even more fun is when the next programmer only finds 14 of the 15 places where you’ve used this code and a single instance somewhere deep in the app silently breaks hundreds of times without anyone knowing.  Sometimes it’s helpful to build the variables in inconsistently concatenated strings. The repeated and more frequent interaction between the new developer and the disgruntled client will help strengthen their relationship.  And if you don’t hook up that love connection, who will?

#9 – Don’t store variables in [any] memory scope

One of the great things about databases is they store your bits of information and allow you to access them whenever you need them.  To make sure your app is as terrible as possible, you’ll want to be sure and access the database every time you need a bit of that information.  The more common the information is that’s needed, the bigger win you’ll have by making a new database connection to get that information.  Non-sensitive user information is a great use of this prinicple.  Don’t worry about defining a user’s information, such as “isAdmin” to a variable and using it throughout the current request.  Just query the database each time you need to know anything about the user.  After all, the client paid for that database, we’d better get as much spin out of it as possible! Read the rest of this entry »