Archive for category Action

Well, I’ve decided to wrap up my blog. Time to move on. My original site here was a kick in the pants for myself to take action: too many ideas, not enough actually done with them. I can’t say that now I follow through everything 100%, but I have a renewed sense of purpose which is less involved with personal development.

So, instead of forcing some content out to my dozen of readers rather than writing from the heart, it’s time to move on.

Where to? Well, who knows. But first I wanted to tip my hat to those who are involved in personal development who are really something else. There are many good contributors, but for mine these two made me sit up and say I can change and I can achieve. Leo Babatua at ZenHabits, and Jonathan Mead at Illuminated Mind. Thanks gents.

I thought a list of what has happened since starting this blog might also be pretty snazzy:

• I have commenced and am now part way through an MBA that I was lucky enough to start due to a scholarship from Neville Sawyer. Neville’s kindness, foresight and determination to help young people is inspirational, and I am just one of many grateful recipients of Neville’s philanthropy.
• Through starting this site, I have learnt the WordPress philosophy and open source environment… and because I can’t do anything unless it’s balls deep, I’ve learnt enough CSS and PHP (programming languages) to get me into trouble. I’ve also met some great people who are able to get me out of trouble in those situations when I’ve broken something (again).
• It’d be a huge leap of faith to say the site or my actions changed anyone or anything much. I am proud of some things that have been born from either the site itself or the online blogging process itself. But hey let’s keep it on the downlow and just say the site has helped cured world hunger, world peace is close, and global warming is no longer a worry. Job done =)

Have fun world – I’m off to my next challenge!

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I had to do an essay on trust for Uni the other day.   I wasn’t too interested.  So much research says the same thing: Trust is good, develop trust within your team and you will be more successful, more productive, slimmer, richer, more likely to attract white doves, babies will stop crying when you smile at them, etc etc.

So I started poking around looking for something that was off the beaten track, left field of most of the fanatical trust findings.   As it turns out, there’s some good stuff out there.

Claus Langfred in 2004 decided to take a counter-intuitive approach and investigate what happens when teams have too much trust ie. when trust exceeds trustworthiness. In looking at 71 teams, Langfred found that high levels of trust resulted in low levels of monitoring. As this autonomy increased, team members were more often than not satisfying self interest rather than bothering to contribute.   A couple of studies by authors including McEvily et al (’03), Barney and Hansen (’94) and Szulanski (’04) demonstrate that trust in someone results in lower levels of vigilance and creates a bias where you give that person the benefit of the doubt.  This reduces the chances of you thoroughly screening the info you receive. In turn, you become complacent, and the quality of information you or your team receive decreases.  The best research usually turns out to stuff that seems so obvious once you hear it.

Social Engineers use these concepts regarding too much trust against us. One of the most famous of these engineers is Kevin Mitnick, who defined Social Engineering as the act of manipulating people to perform acts or disclose information that can rely on establishing trust between parties.  Mitnick didn’t know how to hack a password or backdoor his way into a server – he just got info from people by gently teasing it out of them.

Say you have a long lost friend or relative ring up.  They went to school with you or played on your team a couple of years ago.  They’re best friends with your partner.  They make sure to ask how your dog Fido or was it Patches is going.  Suddenly there’s a quick build up of trust, and you’re more than happy to give that person the benefit of the doubt when they get your dogs name wrong.   You smile to yourself and correct the person on the phone – your dog’s name is Lassie. Bingo! The Social Engineer hits the jackpot – a fair percentage of passwords are related to pet names, and there’s a good chance your password is lassie1, lassie1234, or has a last name, like LassieRayner.

So while there’s a dark side to trust, most balanced research seems to suggest that organisations find a balance between too much trust (or an overinvestment in trust) when groupthink takes over and not enough trust where no one wants to share anything and there’s a loss of information between parties as everyone holds their cards close to their body.  This implies an optimum level of trust exists – but trust is a dynamic and changing variable with a very unclear boundary between not enough and too much.  The answer?  Add just a little distrust to the equation – don’t take everything from those you trust as the gospel, and if you’re in a team, at least do a little monitoring of them once in a while.

Hello to all  - I’m a little sorry I don’t update this more but I’m stuck between apathy and a busy place.  I’m off to Karratha, WA on an Elec Eng. job.  As the Englishman I’m working with might say – It’s well far away!

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Who loves a cactus?

Feeling grouchy.  In a bad mood.  In a funk.   Cantankerous.  It’s been me in the past few days.  I cheered up eventually and started thinking about what happened the my usual cheery self.

We all have to deal with bad stuff.  Bad news, difficult tasks with difficult people, and disappointments all add up.  And sometimes we just plain wake up grumpy.

What’s the problem with us on these days? Who’s going to like us when we’re being a thorny bugger?  Why do we just sometimes feel a bit like a prickly cactus?

We’re tired out. Being tired is a sure fire way to make you unhappy.  There’s nothing like waking up feeling like you haven’t slept a wink and with a big day in front of you.  Work on getting more sleep, and you’ll have a bit more pep!  The ABC have some great sleep facts which should encourage you to have a snooze more often, including this little doozy: the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska, the Challenger space shuttle disaster and the Chernobyl nuclear accident have all been attributed to human errors in which sleep-deprivation played a role.

Unfinished business. Feel like you’ve got a lot on that you just must do otherwise your world will crumble down?  Chances are slim.  Remind yourself that you can’t do everything, things can be put off, and that when you die there will still be things left that you haven’t done.  In the mean time, try living a little and doing stuff you want.  A bit flippant perhaps – but why do we convince ourselves that everything must be just so without concentrating on what really matters?

You forget the real world and expect life to be fair.  We make mistakes, we feel sorry for ourselves; we wallow. The funny thing is that the moment you realise that life isn’t fair and and that things don’t always work out the way they should, you stop feeling resentful and start smiling. Bring it on.

Lower Stress: Instead of forcing yourself to bathe in a hot bath of stress, which is bad for just about everything, lower your tolerance to it.  Avoid it, delegate it, try to stop getting into those situations.  If that’s not possible, for example because your job that you love is stressful, work on releasing stress  – and not by throwing stuff out the window!  Some people are into yoga and meditation.  Others just like to go and have a laugh with mates at the end of a week.  Don’t just sit there  Improve your stress-coping skills and you won’t wake up like a bear with a headache.

Choose Your Battles: Arguing with everyone is sure to make you more grumpy, not less.   Sometimes you need to stick it to someone when they are giving it to you themselves. But sometimes we are just disagreeable and want to aggravate everyone.  Choose your battles wisely, you’ll be far more effective in winning those that are truly important.

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Homer Simpson

Is there anyone else quite like Homer Simpson?

An hilariously overweight buffoon you might say – but have a look at the real Homer.

If you want to lead an interesting and challenging life you don’t have to look any further for inspiration.

I’m not talking about the Homer who is obsessed with making the perfect butt grove in his couch.

I’m talking about the slightly deranged yet heroic Homer Simpson who will try anything – he’ll take action with no fear about the consequences that lie ahead.
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Flikr: _val_

Do you find it difficult to commit to one project at a time?  Or find that your interest in things peaks fast and falls away just as quick?

You’ll be really into playing guitar in one week, but you also want to read the latest blog post about (bad) money advice, and watch a few TED talks.  Or you’ll look up at night, see the stars, and remember that you’ve always wanted to know what all the constellations are called.

Committing all your action to one project and seeing it through is a special gift. I’ve never really been able to understand how just doing one project or trying to achieve one aim or goal really works.  There’s are so many interesting things out there.

The world is an amazing place.   As William Cowper remarked – “Variety is the spice of life”.
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