Instead of “managing” the process in the traditional sense, management can help a lot more by: realizing that it is the teams that will discover and make the improvements, not management, giving teams the responsibility to manage and improve their own process as well as the freedom and authority to do so, establishing an environment that actively encourages teams to be totally honest about their problems and impediments, listening to what the teams say they need and respond to those needs, observing teams in action instead of just collecting numbers, providing useful feedback to teams instead of instructions or pressure. — Steven Gordon Read more →
The Peanuts Kids: Where Are They Now?
ANAHEIM — Authorities say a woman apparently jumped off an Anaheim freeway overpass Thursday and died. The Orange County Register reports that 50-year-old Sally Brown plunged to her death just after 11 a.m. from the East La Palma Avenue overpass onto the westbound 91 Freeway. Read more →
EppsNet’s Greatest Love Songs: I Can’t Explain
Why it’s great: Love makes you hot, cold, dizzy, happy, mad . . . I can’t explain it . . . Got a feeling inside (Can’t explain) It’s a certain kind (Can’t explain) I feel hot and cold (Can’t explain) Yeah, down in my soul, yeah (Can’t explain) I said … (Can’t explain) I’m feeling good now, yeah, but (Can’t explain) Dizzy in the head and I’m feeling blue The things you’ve said, well, maybe they’re true I’m gettin’ funny dreams again and again I know what it means, but … Can’t explain I think it’s love Try to say it to you When I feel blue But I can’t explain (Can’t explain) Yeah, hear what I’m saying, girl (Can’t explain) Dizzy in the head and I’m feeling bad The things you’ve said have got me real mad I’m gettin’ funny dreams again and again I know what it means… Read more →
Lightning on the Balcony
Rick Neuheisel
UCLA has hired Rick Neuheisel as its new football coach, replacing Karl Dorrell. UCLA people love this guy. They’ve been blowing Neuheisel’s meat whistle ever since the announcement. As a USC man, I say this: Great hire! Neuheisel will fail for all of the reasons listed here. Excerpt: “Neuheisel’s one great genius turns out to be his ability to make people think he’s a genius.” FIGHT ON! Read more →
Rose Bowl 2008: USC 49, Illinois 17
The conventional wisdom in recent years has been that USC has trouble defending spread offenses and mobile quarterbacks, like Illinois’ Juice Williams. I’m not sure that’s true. They’ve had trouble defending some mobile quarterbacks — Vince Young, Dennis Dixon — but so has every other team in the country. We took it to a real personal nature because we wanted to figure the spread-thing out, defend it really well and take the mystery out of it. We practiced so beautifully that it had to work out well. That’s a big deal. A really big deal. — Pete Carroll A total systematic beatdown. FIGHT ON! Read more →
Rose Parade 2008
A few years ago, my son went to the Rose Parade as a spectator. This year, he worked as a volunteer float decorator with a community service group from his high school. They worked on the City of St. Louis float, which won the President’s Trophy for most effective floral use and presentation. Yeah, I know pretty much every float wins some kind of trophy, but the President’s Trophy is one of the good trophies. To give you the flavor of the thing, here’s the list of “suggestions” given to volunteers by the float-building company: PLEASE DO NOT BRING RADIOS, WALKMENS, CAMERAS, HANDBAGS OR JEWELRY. BRING YOUR I.D. AND MONEY ONLY. FANNY PACKS WORK GREAT. WEAR OLD BUT WARM CLOTHING AND STURDY SHOES WITH CLOSED TOE AND HEEL. TIE BACK LONG HAIR. FIRE LANE MUST BE KEPT OPEN AT ALL TIMES AND THE AREA AROUND THE FLOAT SHOULD BE KEPT… Read more →
Happy New Year 2008
We toasted the new year with a $42 bottle of Moet et Chandon — marked down to $25 at Albertson’s! Lightning enjoyed gnawing on the cork . . . in fact, when anyone turned their attention away from their champagne glass, he’d stick his snout in and lap up some bubbly . . . Read more →
Torvalds on Specs
A “spec” is close to useless. I have _never_ seen a spec that was both big enough to be useful _and_ accurate. And I have seen _lots_ of total crap work that was based on specs. It’s _the_ single worst way to write software, because it by definition means that the software was written to match theory, not reality. So there’s two MAJOR reasons to avoid specs: – they’re dangerously wrong. Reality is different, and anybody who thinks specs matter over reality should get out of kernel programming NOW. When reality and specs clash, the spec has zero meaning. Zilch. Nada. None. It’s like real science: if you have a theory that doesn’t match experiments, it doesn’t matter _how_ much you like that theory. It’s wrong. You can use it as an approximation, but you MUST keep in mind that it’s an approximation. – specs have an inevitably tendency to… Read more →
Another Difference Between Dogs and Cats
PULLMAN, Wash. — A 6-year-old border collie died in a house fire after waking up his owner out of a deep sleep to warn her of the blaze. Marilyn Harvey and her son, Brent, rushed out the basement door, but Sandler turned back. Marilyn’s husband, John Harvey, who was in Seattle at the time of the fire, thinks it was because Sandler wanted to save the family’s 17-year-old Australian shepherd, who was still inside the house. Both dogs died in last Friday’s fire, along with a bird named Kellogg. A cat named Raja escaped unharmed. — Associated Press Read more →
Blame Roger Goodell
My son’s explanation to his mom on why he can’t turn off Madden 2008 like she asked him to: I can’t stop in the middle of a game. Roger Goodell has not sent me a notice that we can do that. Unless there’s a weather delay or fans throwing things on the field, which there isn’t, so that can’t happen. Read more →
A Christmas Story
One of the cable stations had a 24-hour A Christmas Story marathon. I’ve never understood the mania some people have about this movie. I mean, it’s a nice movie, but 12 consecutive showings?! Anyway, my son turned on the 10 p.m. showing last night and we all watched it. My wife fell asleep as she often does watching movies, but the boy enjoyed it. Merry Christmas to everyone who’s taken the time to read this site over the past year. Read more →
50 Years Ago Today
According to the Los Angeles Times: Red Sanders decided to stay on as football coach at UCLA instead of pursuing the football coach/athletic director job at Texas A&M, a job recently vacated by Paul (Bear) Bryant. (Sanders would have a heart attack and die before the start of the 1958 football season anyway.) A father of three killed himself in front of his wife after losing his job on Christmas Eve. Silent-screen star Norma Talmadge died in Las Vegas. The Times gave her age as 60; according to IMDB, she was actually 62. Read more →
I Hold in my Hand a 63-Page Requirements Doc
I hold in my hand a 63-page requirements doc . . . We spend a lot of time reworking the requirements doc to reflect the reality of the system that we’re actually building. We also spend a lot of time reworking all the docs that derive from the requirements doc — design docs, UI docs, test plans, etc. — to reflect the changes in the requirements doc. Another way to think of this is that the project is driving the requirements, rather than the requirements driving the project. So why did we create all these incredibly detailed documents in the first place? We have a vast collection of well-documented ignorance . . . Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
Why There’s No UCLA Store
My son and I stopped by the USC Store at South Coast Plaza today. As you might expect, it was packed with people buying Christmas gifts, Rose Bowl gear and other branded merchandise. I wonder what a UCLA Store would look like, if there were a UCLA Store. A handful of angry, miserable people milling about, checking out the Las Vegas Bowl runner-up merchandise. FIGHT ON! Read more →
Declaration of Interdependence
We increase return on investment by making continuous flow of value our focus. We deliver reliable results by engaging customers in frequent interactions and shared ownership. We expect uncertainty and manage for it through iterations, anticipation, and adaptation. We unleash creativity and innovation by recognizing that individuals are the ultimate source of value, and creating an environment where they can make a difference. We boost performance through group accountability for results and shared responsibility for team effectiveness. We improve effectiveness and reliability through situationally specific strategies, processes and practices. — Declaration of Interdependence Read more →
Dan Fogelberg, 1951-2007
Among other accomplishments, Dan Fogelberg wrote “Longer,” one of the two worst songs I’ve ever heard, the other being “Sometimes When We Touch” by Dan Hill, who is unfortunately still alive. Aside from that, he seems to have been a very decent man. Read more →
Father-Son Greeting Cards
This is screamingly funny in an unfunny way . . . An Irvine man has started up a greeting card company specializing in father-to-son cards: Founder, Steve Cunningham, a father of four could not find masculine cards written with the right message for his boys. During his travels, or when away for long periods, he often wanted to send a card conveying “I’m thinking of you” or perhaps express an uplifting word of encouragement, motivation, or proud of you. After endless searches on-line and in countless retail outlets, Steve begged the question… why is so little attention paid to men, particularly fathers who play an invaluable roll in the development of their children? OK, first of all, Steve is an idiot. He’s got a less-than-rudimentary command of the English language, but like many incompetent people, is unaware of his own incompetence, and thus doesn’t hire a copy editor to clean… Read more →
President Obama
In December 2009 we will suffer a massive nationwide psychological depression. People assume that all of their problems can be blamed on George W. Bush personally. When the hated King Bush II has been back to Texas for a year and the beloved Obama has been in office for a year, people will look around for a quick status check. They will still be stuck in horrific traffic. They will still be paying insane prices for crummy housing in bleak, lonely communities. Their children will be getting a terrible education at the local public school, perhaps developing to about 15 percent of their potential. If in a hip urban area, criminals will still be smashing their car windows and taking their GPS. They will realize that virtually none of the things that are unpleasant about their life have anything to do with the federal government, except for the war in… Read more →
Our Time is Passing Us By
Ex-Blondie singer Deborah Harry, who played a solo show here in Orange County last night, is 62 years old . . . Read more →