Publish or perish
It’s a phrase that comes to us from acadamia. I have friends who are college professors. Some of them wrote books. All of them wrote papers.
At one point I considered becoming a professor. Not just a teacher, but a full on professor. I love teaching. And the writing obviously was not something that worried me. I didn’t end up becoming a professor. But, I did end up becoming a writer.
But, it wasn’t until recently that I started calling myself a writer. And yet, I’ve always written. To be successful, even in IT, it helps.
Mark worked for me at a large non-profit in Utah. He was a brilliant engineer, if somewhat green. Working at the non-profit I think might have been Mark’s first full time job. And he was good at his job. Like anyone who’s good at their job, Mark wanted to move up. He wanted to be promoted.
It wasn’t working out. Prior to me becoming his manager he’d been working at it for a couple years. It was one of the first things we discussed when I became his manager.
Mark was certainly skilled enough to be a senior engineer. He had tenure. But, he couldn’t write. Oh, he knew English. He could write a tech document well enough. But, he wasn’t a careful writer. Grammer mistakes and errors speling.
It was something we focused on. And it’s not like I did very much. I didn’t teach Mark to write better. I didn’t really do much of anything. All I did was explain the importance of his writing. He turned on spellcheck to make sure he didn’t make simple spelling mistakes. He asked me to look over some of his project writeups. But, the key for him was understanding that it was a priority.
At the next review period, Mark got his promotion. He’d earned it. He wrote his way to it.
The victors write the history
History isn’t like science. A physcist can tell you what will happens if you apply a specific force on a specific object for a specific time. In fact, given the same set of variables, every physicist will give you the exact same answer.
History isn’t like that. Even a simple event can have multiple perspectives. Ask two different people to describe the same event and you will get two different events. Which one is the “true” retelling of the event?
The one that gets written down.
Many people believe that during WWII Polish troops attacked German tanks with horse mounted cavalry. It didn’t happen. But, the Germans wrote about it. They turned it into a propaganda story. And now, 80 years later, the truth is less well known than the the story.
I write these scribblings here, of course. I also actively write from my local smalltown newspaper, the Timpanogos Times. (Sorry, there’s no online version.) And I’ve written a couple of books. They were technical books, written about software that has long since become obsolete.
And yet, of all my writing, the books still get traction.
I shall forever have respect for anyone who has written a book. For, until I undertook the effort, I had no idea how challenging it was.
– Charles Darwin
Just having completed the task, means that for better or worse, I’m known as an author.
Some people like to write. Some like to have written.
– Science Fiction writer, Ben Bova
If you want to be successful, if you want to be viewed as an authority, if you want to shape history: write.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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Today was the perfect time of year. Not just the best time of year. But, truly perfect.
It’s Fall. And I live in Utah. And if you don’t, I feel sorry for you. Maybe you guys near the Appalachians, might understand what I’m talking about. But, a beautiful as your fall foliage is, unless you have a 12,000 foot mountain as a backdrop, it really doesn’t compare.
The leaves here in Utah are starting to turn. I have nine maple trees in my yard. Mine are still green, but the ones in my neighbor’s yard across the street are already a beautiful mix of yellow and red. Across the street the other way, my neighbor has an Oak that he has to nurse along with added iron to make up for our soil. The Oak is dressed out in his fall colors. The mountain sides are also covered with the reds and orange and yellow and green of the native scrub Oaks.
It’s beautiful.
But, that’s not what makes it perfect.
The baseball season is winding down. My beleaguered Seattle Mariners have three games left. They are sitting at 66 wins and 93 losses and dead last in their division, 38 and a half games out of first.
But, while the Mariners will be headed home soon to lick their wounds and dream about next season, the baseball playoffs are just kicking off. And it will culminate in the greatest baseball championship in all of sports, the World Series. Baseball is my absolute favorite sport. And the playoffs is when it become exciting.
But that’s not what makes it perfect.
Football season has kicked off. While I grew up in the Seattle area and have supported the Seahawks most of my life, I’m not a huge NFL fan. But, college football is also going on. BYU, my alma mater is just down the road. I’ll put my BYU flag up tomorrow and stream the game over the internet. My daughter just started there as a freshman and attends all the home games. She was recently on TV as a friend of hers wore BYU’s rival’s colors during the first game of the season. A lone red jersey in a sea of BYU blue kind of stood out. My daughter was standing right next to him.
BYU has even won some tough games against ranked opponents.
But, that’s not what makes it perfect.
High school football is also in full swing. My son plays cornerback for Pleasant Grove High School. He’s on the JV squad, but today was the first day he got to dress for the varsity game. His school, Pleasant Grove high school was taking on Skyridge. PG was 3-1 going into the game. Skyridge was undefeated. The game was at Skyridge and was their homecoming game. The lead went back and forth. The skies threatened rain, but held off. The wind was a brisk but comfortable harbinger of the coming storm. Pleasant Grove tied the game with 3:21 on the clock and took the lead on the point after attempt.
The then held off Skyridge to collect their forth win of the season. And my son, although he didn’t play, was right in the thick of the celebration afterwards.
It was perfect.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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It had been years since I’d thought about him. And why not? It had been nearly 10 years since he worked for me. And he was only on my team for slightly less than a year. He had been an intern then.
Craig was one of the first interns I’d hired in my role as a team manager a large non-profit in Utah. I really enjoy working with interns; interns and new college grads.
Those brand new to the workforce are looking for direction. Everything is happening to them for the first time. I often think of my early years in business and wish someone had helped shape my thinking a little bit.
I’m a huge fan of the singer Billy Joel. I’ve seen him in concert multiple times. Sadly he quit making original music many years ago. He now does concerts of his old music. He also occasionally lectures to college classes. It’s a combination concert and discussion.
He offers the lectures as a way of “paying it forward.”
There’s a job aspect to this thing that I do. And maybe I can help someone else who is starting out.
I guess that’s part of the reason I like to work with those just entering the workforce. Craig was finishing up his final year in school. Coming to work for us wasn’t easy. In fact, Craig put quite a bit of work into it. He sent a letter to the acting director over our entire division. That letter worked it’s way down to my department. My manager forwarded his resume to all the Team Managers.
I’ve been asked to see if we can find a spot for this recent graduate.
The best part was that he didn’t take up one of my FTE, or full time spots. No one else wanted him. Which was great becasue I really wanted him.
He was brilliant. Much smarter than the engineers we typically were able to attract. Not that our engineers weren’t good. But, Craig was one of those guys who gets to pick his spots.
We worked together for 8 months. He described me as “An old guy who tells stories.” He left us because he had an opportunity to go to work for a startup with an exciting product with plenty of startup funds.
I don’t know if I should take it.
Why not, it’s great.
Well, my internship was for a year. And I’m not sure what people would say if I left it early.
Considering that anyone who asks about your internship would have to ask me, I can tell you that no one would say a thing about it. Go, your job here isn’t a career. This new opportunity could be the start of that career.
Oh sure, I could have kept him for another few months and I would have gotten plenty of good work out of him. But, I’ve always beleived that you do right by your employees and they will do right by you.
So, after nearly ten years he reached out.
Say Rodney, you had that list of 16 Management Rules. One of them came up in a meeting the other day. Do you by chance have a copy?
Sure. They are located on my blog, here. (16 Management Rules that Make No Sense.)
By the way, you are the still the best boss I’ve ever worked for.
And I realized that was why I do what I do. If the very first boss you had in the workforce can leave an impression as your best boss, your career will have had a good start.
The end
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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The world don’t give a damn about how sensitive these kids are, especially the young black kids. You ain’t doin’ these kids a favor by patronizing them. You’re crippling them; you’re crippling them for life.
– Remember The Titans
My daughter recently went to college. She’s not my oldest daughter and she’s not my youngest daughter. In a family of 13 kids, eight of them girls, most stories are just about a daughter. She started at BYU in the Fall. Sadly for me, she adjusted easily to living in a college dorm. Happily for me BYU is only about 20 miles away and she comes home to visit often.
Unlike some college kids, she doesn’t bring her dirty laundry home. She’s been doing her own laundry for years. All our kids have. They also clean bathrooms, wash dishes, vacuum. They mow the lawn. They weed the garden. In fact, they do most of the chores around our house.
We used to live in neighborhood about five miles from our current house. The house we were in was nice enough. But, the problem was the yard. The house was in a “planned” neighborhood. The houses were actually packed two to a lot. The open spaces were all shared. The HOA took care of mowing the grass, and maintaining the landscaping.
Part of the reason we moved was the yard upkeep. I wanted a place where I could make sure my kids had to work. Our current place is perfect. It’s really important that my kids had a chance to work while growing up.
One of the online groups I’m a member is a loose collection of aquanitances. Wednesday’s we get a chance to air “Pet Peeves.” It doesn’t matter how petty or how trivial. One friend posted this week that she’s having to evict a college student that she’s been allowing to stay with her. The college student, while nice enough, is a slob. My friend has to fumigate and replace carpets. It will cost more than the sloppy student paid in rent.
My friend knows a little about the student’s upbringing. She never learned to cook or clean or do chores. My friend feels bad about having to evict her, but feels worse about the damage to her house.
My daughter at BYU has a roommate from our hometown. They both applied to the “Y” with the idea of being roommates. Her roommate took her clothes home to her parents the first few weeks. See, her friend grew up in a home where she didn’t have chores. At least not the same amount as my daughter had.
My daughter is starting to realize that rather than a punishment, the chores she had growing up were actually giving her skills that she would need in life. Skills that her roommate missed out on.
My daughter’s friend is now doing her laundry in the washers and dryers provided in the dorms. Her roommate taught her.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2019 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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I enjoy conventions. Especially computer conventions. I’ve always been a bit of nerd, and conventions are places that nerds get to be the stars. Or at least they get to be accepted and don’t have to excuse their nerdiness.
I remember attending a high school reunion. I think it was the 20th. A guy from high school mentioned that he was a computer consultant helping companies move from IPv4 to IPv6.
So, if a company is already on IPv4 do the devices have dual IP, or can you create a gateway that lets you communicate between IPv4 and IPv6?
You know what, Rodney? Let’s just focus on the reunion.
But, at conventions, you can hold those nerdy conversations and nobody thinks they are out of place.
During the day conventions are all about techy-nerdy topics. But, the conventions also provide entertainment. And a ticket to the convention also provided you a ticket to the entertainment.
My favorite was the Novell Brainshare convention where we got a private concert from Huey Lewis and The News. They were somewhat past their prime at that point, but the music was just as great as when I first heard it in the 1980s.
One more reason I love conventions. You can be a nerd and get to hang around rock stars.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2019 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Like many companies, my company uses Microsoft Skype as our conference software. It’s a very convenient and cost effective method for making calls. In fact, most “phone calls” between employees are Skype calls.
When we have outage conference calls, we hold them on Skype. When we have project meetings, we hold them on Skype. When we have a second outage conference call, we. . .um. When we have calls from executives wanting an update on our multiple outages. . .yeah. . .so. . . When we have client calls where they want an update on the status of our outages. . .and our missed project calls. . .yeah, that’s not gonna work.
I’m not often doublebooked. Most often it’s when we have an outage. I’m on an internal conference bridge and I’m also on a client based conference bridge. Occasionally, I’ll have a project meeting that I have to dial into while also on an outage.
Skype has an annoying “feature.” You cannot be connected to multiple Skype bridges. Well, that’s not entirely true. Skype allows you to talk, text and share screens. However, if you are on a Skype call and you join another Skype call, the program decides that you should suspend the first call.
But, you can “quit” the voice portion of a call and still stay logged into the chat and screen sharing portion. That was my situation today. We had two outage bridges going. And I had a project meeting. I joined the Skypecall for the outage bridge I was planning to run. The sound came through my headset. On the rest of the calls, I joined the chat portion and then then dialed in my desk phone into one and put it on speaker phone with the microphone muted. I dialed into the project meeting on my cell phone and used an attached headset. One headset in one ear, the other headset in the other ear.
That was pretty much my day. Of course I also had email, texting an chat that were all active as well.
I work for a communication company. Today, I felt like I was a communication company.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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The most famous ship in the Star Trek universe is the USS Enterprise. In fact, in the series and the movies there have been multiple Enterprise ship.
- U.S.S. Enterprise NX-01
- U.S.S. Enterprise 1701
- U.S.S. Enterprise 1701-A
- U.S.S. Enterprise 1701-B
- U.S.S. Enterprise 1701-C
- U.S.S. Enterprise 1701-D
- U.S.S. Enterprise 1701-E
- I.S.S. Enterprise
There have probably been a few more that I’m missing. There’s a famous scene in Star Trek IV “The Voyage Home” where the crew travels back in time to 1986 to procure some radioactive material. LT Chekov communicates to Admiral Kirk
Admiral. We have found the nuclear vessel.
Well done, Team two.
And Admiral. . .It is the Enterprise.
They were stealing material from the U.S.S. Enterprise aircraft carrier. It was a funny scene. Especially since Chekov pronounces it “wessel.”
When NASA was searching for a name for it’s original space shuttle, an online petition was started that suggested the name Enterprise in honor of the movie star ship.
And yet, in the Star Trek canon, the Star Ship Enterprise is actually named after the original space shuttle. In a sense, The Enterprise is named after itself. I have no doubt that if we ever do build a faster than light spaceship, it will be named Enterprise.
If you build it he will come.
It’s hard to believe that Star Trek was made in teh late 1960s. It’s been over 50 years.
One of my kids has a “dumb” phone. No email. No apps. Just phone and text. It’s slightly smaller than a deck of playing cards. One of the biggest differences between this modern “dumb” phone and the early phones are that the earlier ones were “flip” phones. You had to physically open them to talk and physcially close them to hang up.
They were designed that way because on Star Trek to use the original communicators you opened them to talk and you closed them to hang up.
Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek built it. . .and they came.
Here are some similar things that Star Trek showed us and then we invented them.
- Star Trek replicators became 3d Printers
- Universal translators are a thing
- Tablet computers
- Tricorders are handheld scanners
- Holodecks are now allowing dead celebrities to go on tour
- Communicator badges are now powered by Bluetooth
- Saying “Computer” now sounds like “Hey Siri” or “Hello Google”
- Phasers are still theoretical but direct energy weapons exist
- Hyposprays are used to administer flu shots
- Automatic doors
- Androids meet robots
And even Star Wars light sabers are possible.
The movie Back To The Future suggested we’d have flying cars by 2016. We don’t have flying DeLoreans. But, just a few years later, drones are being turned into personal flying taxis. Back To The Future also predicted that after 107 years the Chicago Cubs would win the World Series in 2016. They missed that prediction too. But, only by a year. The Cubs won it all in 2017.
I’m not a great programmer. In fact, when it comes down to the details of coding, I’m not very patient. My buddy CK is much better at the details of coding. He spent years at Microsoft. He’s been a Dev-Test lead for years.
But, here’s the funny thing. I’m better with a blank page than CK is. I can start from nothing and lay out the classes, the procedures, the methods. If CK can see what is being created he can build off of that.
It’s one of the unique and nearly magical things about us as a species and as a society. We think. We think. We imagine. We dream. And after someone imagines it. . .we build it.
Field of Dreams, one of the best baseball movies of all time, sees a slightly confused Kevin Costner build a baseball stadium in the middle of a corn field. He imagines it. Then he builds it. And then the magic starts to happen. (More than the normal baseball magic.) Oh and the ghosts show up.
Traveling faster than light is impossible. Science explains that. But, it makes the movies better.
I have no doubt that someday we’ll manage it. And I have no doubt that ship will be named the U.S.S. Enterprise.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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You guys sell a reservation system for rafting companies, right?
Well, we’re still developing it, but yes, that’w what we’re working on.
I’d like to sign up to use your software.
I’m sorry. I can’t let you do that.
Why not?
It was crazy. My software sold for $10,000 per copy. We were a few months away from releasing version 1.0 and we were running on Angel Investor money. Our burn rate was about $30,000 per month. And we’d burned close to $1,000,000 in the two year development of our product.
New customers were the lifeblood of any company and here I was turning away someone who called me and practically begged me to sell her a copy.
The product was called RESMARK. We released version 1.0 and thanks to our patient investor, we lived to release future version. It still exists today. (www.resmark.com)
VAPORWARE: A product that doesn’t yet exist, but that people act like it does. (Microsoft circa 1990s)
No comparison is quite so stark as comparing a finished software product to its originally design document. My software was no different. It’s true we were building a reservation system for rafting companies. But, as we worked toward our release date, we had to make compromises.
At one point I realized I no longer had a feature set to satisfy even one of my ten beta testers. They had each put up $5,000 and were given the promise that they would be able to provide input into the development process.
My solution was to go on an extended roadtrip. I visited each rafting company who had signed up for my software. I explained to each of them what our current status was. I was able to save 9 of the 10 companies.
So, why not take the $5,000 and sign up a new client?
Because no clients are better than an unhappy client. And that’s what I was going to get. The company that called me was an adventure company, but they rented out bikes and canoes and kayaks.
My software was designed to track reservations for rafting trips. Despite my prospective client’s insistance that she’d be happy with whatever version 1.0 was like, I knew that she would not.
Maybe you woud call it playing the long game, or seeing the forest instead of the trees. Or maybe, you’d call it focusing on winning the war instead of a battle.
I called it, “I don’t want to disappoint another customer.” I also realized that any short-term gain I could get would quickly be overshadowed by not being able to keep the client happy.
Better to have one happy customer rather than 100 unhappy ones.
And better a non-customer than a disappointed one.
Sometimes your best customer is the one you didn’t sell to.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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I have ADHD. Adult Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
Some people don’t think it’s a real thing.
I guess it’s good that my therapist and I aren’t those people.
It definitely is a thing. But, for me, anyway, it’s not a disabling thing. Not normally. People with ADHD are as different as people without ADHD. But, we do have a few things in common. We get easily distracted. It’s not really boredom. We dread detail oriented tasks, until we cross some magical threshold called “hyper-focus” and then you can’t draw us away from them.
Our brains are often (always?) always active. You’d think this is a good thing, right? Not always. In fact, not often. I have often have to focus on what I’m going to say next in a conversation. Not because I’m not paying attention to the speaker but because the conversation in my head is going so much faster than the conversation in front of me that I am in real danger of actually forgetting what my point was.
But, there’s one aspect of my job where my ADHD is a benefit. I’m the designated crisis manager for my account. If something goes wrong with any of the computers, I’m the guy that gets contacted to coordinate the recovery effort.
We have over 2000 computers in four different states across three time zones. Lots of things can go wrong. Not big things. At least not always. But even the smallest thing might generate a call. Of course there are also big things that can go wrong.
And that’s where ADHD kicks in. The worse the issue, the more engaged I become. The bigger the crisis, the more my tendency to think on a million things at once kicks into high gear. But, this time I’m thinking of things to test, try, check to resolve our issues.
And during those times something kind of cool happens. I start to focus. I’not bored. I’m not tired. I don’t even really notice the clock. My entire attention is brought to bear on the problem at time.
The ironic part is that I don’t like outages. It’s like my watching my son play football. He plays defense for his high school football team. I love to watch him play. But, I have trouble rooting for his team. I don’t want to see the offense on the field. My son doesn’t play offense. I want to see the defense. And I don’t want them to hold their opponents to three-and-out. I want the opposing team to have a nice long sustained drive so I can watch my son play.
That’s not a great recipe for winning a football game. (My son’s team wins a lot of games.)
Managing outages is the same mentality. I’m good at it. I get energized by it, but it’s not something I actually want to have happen.
People that I work with don’t understand my attraction to my job. They cannot imagine doing my job. In fact, on the rare occasions that I’m not able to take calls, the people who have to back me up absolutely dread it.
I’m actually pretty good at my job. In fact, I excel at it. And, I enjoy it.
Do you get to do what you enjoy and you are good at?
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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Apparently I was a clever little kid. At one point my mother and I were flying back home after visiting my grandmother. I was about five years old. I loved my grandmother. We called her Granny.
Like many little kids, I didn’t want to leave.
But, you have to go with your Mom.
But, why?
Because if you don’t she’ll be lonely on the plane.
Granny, is anyone staying here with you?
No. You all are going together.
But, I should stay.
And why is that?
So, you won’t be lonely.
My mother loves to tell that story. There’s another story they tell about me and my grandmother. The two stories may even be from the same trip.
We were driving in the car. I could barely see out the window in the back seat. Car seats with their boosted seat hadn’t yet been invented. We passed a beautiful house. I remember it being one of the most beautiful houses I’d ever seen.
Granny? Someday, I hope you get to live in a house like that.
My entire family laughed at me. They knew something that, as a little kid I didn’t know.
I went to a wedding over the weekend. (Attending a World Event. . .In the Backyard.) Among other things it was a gay wedding. The decorations, were colorful and appropriately specific.
My cousin was getting married. Another cousin came to the wedding. Actually, she’s my 2nd cousin. My grandmother (Granny) and her grandmother were sisters. I never knew what a second cousin was when we were growing up. She was just a cousin.
She flew down from Washington with her young son. He’s seven years old. Technically, he’s my 2nd cousin once removed. He and his mom stayed at our house over the weekend. With most of my kids gone off to college we have plenty of space.
It’s funny with cousins. Especially ones you’ve grown up with. You might not see each other for years, decades even. And yet, when you get back into the same room, you pick up where you left off. My cousin and I talked for hours, cramming years of history into a few short hours.
At the wedding, my cousin’s son was one of only a few children. He had a great time. During the wedding he found an abandoned toy airplane “crashed” into a fence to play with. As he was leaving he took one of the small Pride flags.
He still had the flag when he came to the reception. I’m not sure my cousin’s son understands what gay means. Certainly not what Trans means. And yet, he was happy with his Pride flag. It was a colorful flag. He probably still has it and took it home.
To him, it was just a flag. Even though to others it had more meaning. Important meaning.
And that was the message I got. The differences that seem so important to us as adults are often lost on kids. Gay, straight, trans, young, old, religious, aethist.
To a kid, it’s just a flag. Or a house. The beautiful house that we passed by that I hoped my grandmother would get to live in someday? It was a funeral home.
But, to me, it was just a beautiful house.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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