Articles for category: Initiative

September 19, 2018

Greg Thomas

When You Don’t Pick the Change?

Change is great. Change is amazing. But what about when you’re not the instigator of the change or you don’t see it coming? Depending on the scenario and context you might be able to pivot extremely well, in other scenarios you may not – you may be thrown for a loop and sit there looking at your screen wondering why you? Why did this have to affect me? I didn’t ask for this happen? This is outside of my control. You didn’t pick the change but it happened. So now you can either rail against everything that is happening or

September 18, 2018

Greg Thomas

No one “likes” getting a kick

Who wants to be told to practice more? Study harder? Invest more effort? Step up your game? Do more? Never stop? No one wants that kick when they already think they are on top of their game and doing great.  If you’re delivering a kick in a Performance Review, it’s often received with a little bit of “Wha?  I thought I was doing great?”. That’s why you need a kick, so you keep getting better, so the next review isn’t a case of “Wha?  I did great last year?” You might not like getting a kick, but deep down, you

September 17, 2018

Greg Thomas

Your Journey, Your Dime

If you want to learn something new – a new skill, new programming language, new anything – its on you to figure it out. It’s not your employer’s responsibility to cover the costs of the journey for you? It’s not up to the user group to stop everything they are doing and bring you up to speed. It’s not up to the beer league team you are playing with to show you to shoot better. It’s on you. It’s your journey, it’s your dime. Where all these people can help you, is in the negotiation and the starting of the journey? What

September 14, 2018

Greg Thomas

Video Games get Upgrades

Enterprise Software and Mobile Devices – DO NOT. If I am writing a piece of code that is going to upgrade a system, I am not looking to Apple or Microsoft to figure it out – I’m looking at Blizzard and Steam to show me the way. Upgrades are painless, have never failed (for me). I know what’s in the patch, I know when maintenance is coming up and the implementation is flawless. And every time, whether it happens or not, I feel like I am getting something shiny and new – not a bunch of hidden features that are buried

September 11, 2018

Greg Thomas

The Motivational Shift

I recently had the motivation for a particular project and plan that I was on change – drastically. Where once the end result was clear and lit, now it is dark and unknowing (I’m thinking a spooky fall evening, with fog on the path type of unknowing). The direction of this project changed 3 months ago but I still find myself struggling with what to do next and whether I was still to be invested for the right reasons or not. It’s been harder than I thought and I still don’t know where it will go next. I’d like to