Many people working in offices, even factory floors, complain about interruptions. To a great degree, interruptions are things you accept. You may feel like they are push upon you, and sometimes they, are, but for the most part, they are things we do to ourselves out of boredom, frustration or lack of engagement. These ten items are personal actions and behaviors … [Read more...] about Ten Ways to Reduce Interruptions at Work
Future of Work
Malcolm Gladwell, 10,000 hours and Genius at Work
Image by Daniel W. Rasmus ©2007 Malcolm Gladwell and the New Yorker Conference Back in 2007, I had the pleasure of attending the New Yorker Conference, “2012: Stories From the Near Future,” which took place on May 6 and 7, 2007 in New York City. A few days later I found time to cover my reflections on Malcolm Gladwell's presentation. The presentation was given … [Read more...] about Malcolm Gladwell, 10,000 hours and Genius at Work
Why Near Term Business “Trend” Forecasts Shouldn’t Be Trusted
I received a trend notification today of “5 things that will change in the workforce in 2013.” (I will leave the name of the publication out.) One of those items was:  the end of annual reviews. If this was a decade long forecast, the end of annual reviews would represent a good, controversial, thought-provoking item to include in the list. But as for 2013 being the year, … [Read more...] about Why Near Term Business “Trend” Forecasts Shouldn’t Be Trusted
A New Model for Categorizing Collaboration Technology
The traditional categorization of collaboration software no longer reflects the way people actually work. As we text over phones in the same room, or chat via instant messaging in the same meeting, the very idea of same time, same place or different time, different place seems archaic. Those categories reflect a good intellectual view of a technology in its infancy; they … [Read more...] about A New Model for Categorizing Collaboration Technology
What is an Information Worker?
What is an Information Worker? When Peter Drucker originally articulated the idea of a “knowledge worker” in 1959, he was proposing a classification with the primary goal of describing the work of people who applied knowledge directly and in a unique way, to the tasks assigned to them. One important differentiator of the knowledge worker was that he or she owned their means … [Read more...] about What is an Information Worker?