Small changes make a big difference. Habits provide compounding returns over time, but until you cross a critical threshold they appear to make no difference. To form or remove a habit make it obvious, make the positive action attractive, make it easy to start and finally make it satisfying to do.
Here we are. 2019 has passed, and we are readying ourselves to enter 2020! Before we turn the page and start a new chapter, I’d like to share my Annual Review with you. I conduct my Annual Review at the end of each year. The process reminds me to look back on the previous twelve months, celebrate my victories and evaluate my failures. Inspired by James Clear, I have decided to share this year’s review for the first time. I hope it will make me more accountable, and maybe you will also find value in my stories.
Recently I was asked to facilitate a retrospective for 26 people. Of course I said yes, but only afterwards did I begin to realise the challenge I faced. The reality is people work better in smaller groups, but sometimes you have to bring a large groups together. In this post I'd like to share how I ran this retrospective along with some of the learnings I gained. I hope you find it useful!
An open startup is a company that has chosen to publicly share metrics about their company. Normally they share revenue, users, and traffic numbers but in some cases they will even share, logs and dashboards too. They refer to themselves as an Open Startup, but what does this mean and why would you run a company publicly?
Over the last few years, I've been watching the change at Liverpool Football Club with interest. It's not so much the success that intrigues me but more the change in culture that began with the arrival of manager Jurgen Klopp. Over the weekend, I listened to a great analysis of Klopp's leadership on the podcast Eat, Sleep, Work, Repeat. After listening to the show I think there are two critical elements that have supported change at Liverpool and I want to share these with you today.
In a world where we are always asking ourselves "what's next?" I think it can be equally, if not more, important to look back and ask, "how did that go?". At work, we run retrospective sessions regularly with our teams to allow us to reflect on the previous week. We share what went well and how we could improve. I find this such a powerful practice, but it's only recently I've begun to embrace retrospectives more personally.
BitMate was a web application that helped developers start new projects faster. Was, is the keyword in this sentence. I founded BitMate in August 2016, but nine months later, I was closing it down. Here are the mistakes I made and the lessons I learned through my experience as a founder. If you are thinking about starting a company or at the beginning of your journey, I hope this post helps you avoid making the same mistakes I did.
Productivity is a measure of output over time. All other things being equal, the more you produce per hour, the more productive you are. There are lots of ways to increase productivity, but I believe all increases in productivity fall into one of these five stages.