Clarke Ching - More Chilli Please

New AgileThinkers.com blog - it is about the people, more than the process

Hi everyone,

I've just started publishing a new weblog where I interviewing agile "thinkers" - the people who are thinking about agile and making it better.  I want to learn what makes these people tick, what motivates them, and what keeps them up at night.  It's a blog about the people, much more than the processes.  Take a look at: www.AgileThinkers.com

My first guest is Jim Shore, co-author of "The Art of Agile Development".  I've just published my first Q&A and will be following up shortly with more from Jim and his co-author Shane Warden. Jim and Shane will soon be giving away a copy of their fantastic new book - read more about that on the blog

I'm also currently in the midst of interviewing Johanna Rothman, Jarred Richardson and Jeff Patton. Ron Jeffries, Alistair Cockburn, Andy Hunt are also keen.

If you've got a suggestion for another interviewee then why not email me at Clarke.Ching@gmail.com.

www.AgileThinkers.com

Clarke Ching

p.s. If you're interested in the Theory of Constraints, then take a look at TOCThinkers.com  which I've been publishing for the last few months.  Just today I've added a podcast with great TOC thinker (and a nice bloke too) Eli Schragenheim.  I'm working with Steve Holt to share a fascinating Critical Chain story from Boeing and next month I'll be interviewing Chris Cheng about her inspirational & remarkable use of TOC in rehabilitating prisoners in a Singapore prison (I chatted with her for an hour today and I honestly feeling like a different person for it.)

Google homepage - I'm going crazy

I'm going crazy trying to STOP Google from sending me to my personalised iGoogle page. What I want to do is have the normal classic google to ALWAYS be my home page ... but I also want to be able to switch to the igoogle page. Trouble is that I've tried lots of little obvious tweaks and they don't seem to work. Google seems to always remember where I was last and send me there ... but I don't want that ...

Any suggestions?

Gladwell's latest article is a keeper

"The lesson to be drawn from black and white [IQ] differences [...] : I.Q. measures not just the quality of a person's mind but the quality of the world that person lives in."

http://gladwell.com/2007/2007_12_17_c_iq.html

Fwd: Tipping point theory - toast?

We all love the Tipping point book right?

Would it have sold so well if it was called "Theory of the Tipping Point"?

(Like Constraints management sounds more appealing than the Theory of Constraints)

It is, after all, just a theory.

What if the theory is wrong?

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/122/is-the-tipping-point-toast.html

[via ... apologies, but I'm not sure]

Cooking with Kids ...

Step 1.  Take two kids. 

....

Step 8.  Serve with Rice.

 

[amazon.com]

Fuck off he didn't hint.

From Rolling Rocks Downhill:

Fuck it. Ron was right – we had to rewrite them. 

But we couldn’t.

Fuck it.

From the Author.

Fuck it.  Some times, but not often, "Fuck" is exactly the right word for my book.

But some people might be offended so I shouldn't use it.

Fuck it.

What do you think?  Is swearing okay in a modern novel?  What about a modern business novel?  What about a blog.

Dilbert song

Scott Adams writes:

The other day I asked you to contribute nonsense lyrics that could be combined into a hit song, under the theory that many hit songs have nonsense lyrics, so writing them can’t be that hard.

A band in Germany, called RIVO DREI (http://www.rivodrei.de/en/) picked out the best of your nonsense lyrics and strung them together to create an actual song that is a sure hit. The random lyrics sound amazingly like they might mean something deep if only you concentrated a little harder. And it’s catchy. These guys are brilliant, on a variety of levels, including marketing, obviously.

The song is surprisingly good.

Influencing skills in IT

For once, I side with the pointy headed boss ... sort of. 




[click to get a full size popup]

He's identified a common problem in IT - poor influencing skills - but if he asked himself "why" just one more time he'd have to admit that it was a management problem for not helping the less-verbally-skilled to communicate better. 

There are many ways to do that and none of them start with the words "They just should ..." or "It's there fault ..."

Odd Venn diagrams - number 3

This one includes me and my favourite subject – my book.  I also manage to point out the very good company I keep in our little genre of 2.

Tom Demarco and I are the only two authors (he published, I not) who have written a bustech novel.

 

Amazon employs psychics?

I have diabetes.  I presume that sometime in the past I've bought a book from amazon about diabetes.