The proper channels

If you want to achieve something, there's often two ways to do it. The proper way, or the way that will actually get results. Do you have procedures and processes that get in the way and other people have to work around?

Marching orders

I'm not the most political of people, but I do try to keep abreast of what's going on in the governance of the country I live in. I read a few political blogs and I've noticed something that I'm increasingly finding irritating. It seems you can't be a lefty/liberal/etc and a Christian.

The choice is yours

If you're a manager/supervisor/whatever you'll regularly have encounters with those who's work you oversee. In each of those encounters you can encourage, inspire or challenge (in a positive way), or you can do the opposite.

Are BT slowly imploding?

I have a suspicion that BT is a company in crisis. It isn't necessarily reflected in their financial performance (yet) and they probably don't know it; at least senior management probably don't. So where do I draw such a conclusion from?

Grrrrr Seagate and your shoddy disks

Should anyone be tempted to buy a Seagate Green 1TB drive model ST1000DL002, let me save you some bother. 


Don't. I've got four of them, they're all equally rubbish.

We own all your ideas

Recent legislative moves by France suggest their government is supportive of US style software patents in the EU.

This is a worry because at the moment software isn't patentable in the EU or UK. The problem with the US system is well debated but in essence is this: companies are able to patent an idea, often a vague description of that idea and what the software process will achieve but, crucially, without having to actually write that software.

This has lead to the rise of patent trolls, companies such as Lodsys (currently suing iPhone app developers, apple and indeed everyone from adidas to the wall street journal).

Lodsys are a fine example of the worst of the breed. The company doesn't actually produce anything. It only exits to hold and defend a portfolio of patents. Businesses like this contribute nothing other than to keep some lawyers employed.

So many ideas have been patented in the US that it's probably almost impossible to write software that doesn't infringe at least one patent.

And to be clear, it isn't a matter of copying code, that's covered by copyright.

I'm not a software developer and the chances of me being sued are somewhat small. However we should all be concerned about something that, in the view of many, stifles creativity and competition.

After all, the trouble with patenting ideas is 'there's nothing new under the sun'


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:York,United Kingdom

What's the point of this?

This is a waste of everyone's time:


An irresponsible dog owner isn't going to stop and look at this poster. If they did, it likely wouldn't make any difference to their behaviour. After all, PC Copper threatening the risk of an occasional £75 fine vs always picking up dog waste... Sounds like a good deal to me.

The implication of this is other places may actually say yes to dog fouling. In fact if I were put up a poster with my stupid grinning face next to a massive pile of turds saying "Yes! to dog fouling" would everyone suddenly go "oh. Ok then"? I somehow doubt it.

People who are lazy, stupid or generally irresponsible are not best reached through the use of posters. The very people who will look at this are those who will agree that 'something should be done'.

Enough of these same people obviously think taking this picture and putting together an uninteresting poster is actually doing something about the problem. It isn't.

If there really is a problem then really do something about it. That will mean confronting people, fining them, perhaps having a mob with flaming torches hunt them down. Because I doubt there's many in the Redcar & Cleveland area who genuinely think letting their dog take a dump on the pavement and leaving it there is really ok.

Management style

For a while now I've been thinking about management; the good, the bad and the plain unpleasant experiences I've had over the years have given me some insight into the whole business, so I'll share some thoughts over a few posts in case it's useful to anyone.

What's it all about?

Let's get down to basics. If you're a line manager, what does that job entail? More specifically if you had to sum it up in a sentence what would you say? (do comment below, I'd love to know your thoughts)

I answer that questions as: to ensure those I manage are equipped to do their job and are held accountable for the work they do/don't do.

Sounds simple enough, but start unpacking that and it quickly becomes big, occasionally complex and multifaceted.

It seems obvious but those you manage need to know what their job is.

Whether you're dealing with someone who in turn manages dozens of others, or the office cleaner, they need to know their responsibilities, authority to make decisions, who they're accountable to and for what.

Perhaps what makes this difficult is the irritating problem of people being different. What may be obvious to me, may not be obvious or even occur to you. It's a mix of personality, experience, motivation, etc.

Ask me to clean the toilet and I might clean the whole room, wash down the walls, vacuum the cobwebs, clean the basins, scrub the floors, check the supplies, etc. Or I might just squirt some cleaner into the bowls.

If I do the latter, you, as the facilities manager, may justifiably take me to task for doing a poor job, but did you clearly define it first?

It's a simplistic example but the same holds true no matter what the job... Before someone can do it well, they need to know what it is.

A few years ago I was in a role that was very poorly defined. It was basically defined as doing what the last guy did. Fine, but even though I sat next to him for 18 months, I never really knew what he did. From the outset I asked questions about what they wanted, desired outcomes, success criteria... I got nothing I could work with. Partly I was wrong for the role, but mainly it was simple bad management. I couldn't know I wasn't right for the role because my manager couldn't explain what the role was.

As a manager you'll build a relationship with those you manage, learn their skill set, understand their motivations, basically get to know what makes them tick. I think this is important for any manager. Fail to do this, just go by the book, and you'll probably end up with unmotivated, frustrated and generally fed up team members.

I'd like to leave you with an idea that I'll no doubt return to... Repeatedly. A good manager is, in a large part, a servant to those they manage, not the other way around.

Software protection - please end the madness

I've moaned before about software protection and how, in my experience, all it serves to do is prevent legitimate users from actually using the software they've paid for. Here's another real world example of just that.

Shortcomings in my internets

I've been trying to work out the best way to deal with the very large quantities of data I have sitting around on various hard disks.