Action

There are 59 posts filed in Action (this is page 6 of 6).

Bookmarked When police officers are told they’re in a war, they act like it (Vox)
Via Dave Winer, I am going to start following Patrick Skinner, it sounds like he understands both the problems and how to solve them…

Patrick Skinner spent a decade running counterterrorism operations overseas for the CIA. He worked in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Jordan; met with kings and presidents; rose through the ranks. But he came to believe he was part of the problem, that the very premise of the work was flawed. So he came home, and joined the police force in Savannah, Georgia, where he grew up.

I first learned about Skinner in a New Yorker profile. Then a friend mentioned his Twitter feed to me: There, Skinner reflects, in a thoughtful, continual stream, on the work of policing, the importance of treating your neighbors like neighbors, the daily work of deescalation, and the behavior of his menagerie of pets.

Bookmarked George W. Bush finally steps onto the right side of history (CNN)

In 2020 all Americans are deciding whether to be on the side of the race-baiting President Trump , or the American people who are protesting to make our democracy inclusive for black Americans. George W. Bush made the right choice: “Achieving justice for all is the duty of all,” writes Dorothy Brown. Which side will you be on?

A moving article, glad to see GWBush stepping in…

Bookmarked

Takeaway: work constantly to create alliances with others

Starting off the year 2020 – My Three Words

As I came to work this morning, I began to think about how to start the New Year. Over the Christmas break, I did some listening/reading at Sean McCabe’s website on writing (It All Starts With Writing, podcast episodes 39, 139, 303). I would like to do more writing in 2020. I also listened to an Akimbo episode on “showing your work“. Harold Jarche (Seek-Sense-Share) and Dave Winer (Narrate Your Work) are other views on this topic.

Other thoughts that I had:

  • If you keep doing the same things, you will get the same results
  • Failing to plan means planning to fail

After this reflection, I think the three words I would like to guide my year (following Ron Chester’s example) is – Read Write Help.

 

How can we work together on the open web and on software development

I have been in several conversations in the last week (voice and email) where the concept of “working together” in software development came up, and several threads emerged:

  • how the original developer doesn’t/shouldn’t have to do everything – others can contribute (to me, a key concept in open source)
  • how interested/engaged users can be an important force in the direction in which a software application or tool goes forward

Dave Winer has written about this many times:

I have tried to follow that second point in several ways:

I am getting ready to start working in the computer music area again after a long absence, and I am reviewing available tools to see if they fit the areas I am interested in. In that way, I am trying to practice the concepts of working together as I have outlined above.

Anyone want to work together with me? Let me know!

If you want to hurry, slow down

The title of this could have been “If you want to go faster, slow down”, but I liked this one better. The reason for this post is a set of events that happened to me recently, where multiple immediate actions fell in my lap. As I tried to take case of these actions, I made mistakes along the way, which slowed me down. As I was trying to solve one of these actions, other things changed which I did not know about until some time later. If I had known, I could have taken other steps to address the action. As it was, those people were hurrying as well.

What is the takeaway here? If someone presents you with a request for immediate action, slow down and think about it. Ask some clarifying questions. See if the deadline is really as dire as the person thinks it is. By taking these actions (slowing down), you have a better chance of finishing faster (the goal of hurrying). I will try to remember this when (not if) this happens to me again!

On taking responsibility

When someone says “I take responsibility…”, what usually happens is that they take some action (they apologize for something, they amends, they do what they said they were going to do).

Taking responsibility is taking action.

I observed several examples of this over the past week. I attended a homeowner’s association meeting with 50-60 homeowners present. One of the agenda items was about taking care of dog poop in the neighborhood. It came out that the HOA board had decided to spend money to put a poop bag dispenser near the HOA office. However, the “year supply” of bags ran out in 5 months, and the board did not want to spend any more money on bags, so they removed the dispenser. In the meeting, there was not any further action suggested that anyone wanted to take. The real problem (unstated) was that people who have dogs that walk through the neighborhood are not picking up after their dogs (not taking responsibility).

I then thought of several things in my life that I would like to see happen (do more writing, lose weight, get in better shape). However, I have not taken any action. By my statement above, I am not taking responsibility for making those things happen.

I am taking this as an opportunity to take stock of my own responsibilities – a good action for all of us.