Weaver’s Loom

Over the years, I’ve observed that there is a common set of behaviors that is part of what makes people successful in business that I think of as the rules of service. The most successful companies actual incorporate these rules into their corporate culture.

Here they are:

Rule #1 - The customer always comes first

Rule #2 - Your network (business) is your first customer

Rule #3 - You are the most important customer in your network (business)

These are very much part of the western culture, and parts of these are taught to us as we are growing up. For me though, there were subtleties in these rules that took me years to learn, and I’m still learning to apply.

Let’s look at the rules in more detail, starting with the last one.

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Last night I went to an event hosted by Redhat, Infogain and Azul Systems as a networking opportunity and to learn a bit from the vendors with my friend George Ross. It was held at Tesla Motors in Menlo Park, and the door prize was a ride in the new Tesla Roadster.

After the presentations, they had the drawing, and I was thinking it would be cool if George or I got picked. Right about then, they called out “Rob Weaver of AccuWeaver LLC” … I was the first pick to get a ride (they gave 5 people the thrill ride). (more…)

Since I’ve been blogging for a couple of months now, I have friends who are asking me “how do you blog?”.

Seems like a simple enough question, so I figured I’d blog about it (seems a little redundant blogging about blogging, but here goes). (more…)

One of the things I always struggle with as a project manager is how to communicate availability. If I’m using a corporate email system like Exchange, it is extremely easy to set up calendars to be shared, and everybody using that system has the ability to at least see your free/busy status which helps in setting up meetings.But when you’re dealing with a disparate group, who don’t have access to the same information, figuring out meetings can be difficult. I manage some of this complexity with tools like Plaxo and MobileMe, which allow you to keep calendars in synch across a variety of calendar systems, including Google, Yahoo and even the local calendar application.

This doesn’t solve the problem of how to check on availability however. What I’ve always found most effective inside the corporate firewall is to make my calendar public, and to ask my team members to share their calendars as well. This allows me not only to quickly schedule meetings, but gives me insight into what sorts of meetings my team is scheduling, and how they are managing their time. (more…)

After many conversations with the support people at Rita Mulcahy, I got an email telling me that they would extend me a special offer to extend my license for an additional 90 days for $75.

While I still have a problem with the whole idea of software license expiring, I understand the idea, and have politely suggested that they increase the visibility of this in their sales literature and product packaging. Software as a service is becoming more common, but extending that to shrink wrapped software is by no means normal (at least in my experience as a software professional).

If I still had a copy of Windows 3.x, I could install it.  In fact, if I took inventory, I’d bet way over half of the software I use is many years old, and far from the latest version. Anyway, I may pony up the $75 next week to get the license for long enough for me to get through my PMP certification.