Archive
Ego Battles
And yes, I don my armor daily. It’s war out thar!
Your Operational Configuration
Which system configuration do you prefer? Which system configuration is most prevalent in nature? In the “civilized” world? What’s your operating configuration, and do you have just one?
21st Century Buddha
I’ve changed my mind. Instead of a “System Thinker“, I wanna become the…..
How about you? What do you wanna be?
Hindsight-Based
Here’s yet another insightful paragraph from William Livingston’s “Design For Prevention“:
An Attempt At Legitimacy
Regular readers of this bogus blog know that one of my differentiators is the dorky graphics that I use to communicate my wildly distorted and fantastical views of life. But being a lazy ass and unscrupulous dolt, I’ve pulled quite a few graphic clips off the web without asking for permission or giving attribution. Here’s one of my latest DICster faves:
In trying to assuage my guilt for stealing clips, I used tineye.com to track down the talented creator of the artwork – Mr. George Coghill. I e-contacted him a few weeks ago, confessed my sin, and asked him how I could make it right. Alas, I haven’t heard back from him yet.
BTW, I don’t look anything like the DICster icon…..
A Blank Stare In Return
In a previous life, I once was commiserating with a manager about how difficult and time consuming it was to keep up with technological change in the software development industry. She said “That’s why I went into management“. After sharing a chuckle, I asked her if there were any other reasons for movin’ on up. I received a blank stare in return.
In a previous life, I once was talking to a software lead and hinted that maybe he should do more than watching schedules and doling out tasks (like cutting some code from time to time or keeping the technical documentation in synch with the code or doing some exploratory testing on the code base or taking on the role of buildmaster). I received a blank stare in return.
In a previous life, I once asked a software lead why he moved out of “coding” and into the periphery of management. He said: “For more money“. When I asked him if there were any other reasons, I received a blank stare in return.
At least they were honest. They could’ve offered up the classic management textbook response: “to take on more responsibility“. Better yet, they could’ve said “to help people do their jobs better” or “to help improve the quality of our processes by reducing red tape and eliminating low value steps“.
So, are they “selfish” people? Nah. This ubiquitous behavior is simply a side effect of how the vast majority of reward and power distribution systems are structured in hierarchical orgs. It’s been that way for 100 years and it looks like it will stay that way for the next 100 years. But then again, maybe not.
Brain-Bustingly Hard
Unsettlingly, I admire the cross-disciplinary work of William L. Livingston because:
- It’s difficult to place into a nice and tidy category (systems thinking? social science? philosophy?).
- It resonates with “something” inside me but it’s brain-bustingly hard to absorb, understand, and re-communicate.
- The breadth of his vocabulary is astonishing.
- He doesn’t give a shit about becoming rich and famous.
- He digs up quotes/paragraphs from obscure, but insightful “mentors” from the past.
As the boxes below (plucked from the D4P4D) show, Gustave Le Bon is one of those insightful mentors, no?
A lot of Mr. Le Bon’s work is available for free online at project Gutenberg.
The Search For Accountability
As I’ve said several times before, WordPress.com is a sweet blogging platform. One of the many metrics that the customer-and-product obsessed WordPress team provides to its users is the list of terms that people have searched to land on your blog:
As you can see, the search term “accountability” dominates all others. WTF is up wit dat? It also looks like people want to learn more about “CSCIs, CSCs, and CSUs“. The funny ones are “lighten up francis“, “firing squad“, and “disco dancer“. I’m humbled by the fact that some people searched for BD00 directly with “site:bulldozer00.com” and “bulldozer00“. lol.
So, when are you gonna expose yourself to the world and start blogging your thoughts, feelings, and opinions? One of the tag lines of the best boss I ever had was “don’t keep it a secret“. BD00 has internalized it with the addition of “no matter how much it hurtz“.
Sticks and stones may break my bones. But chains and whips excite me. – Rihanna
D4P4D Tweetfest
I’m in the process of reading William L. Livingston’s “Design For Prevention For Dummies” (D4P4D). I’m a pretty fast reader, but like my prior consumptions of all of Bill’s other dense and mind-absorbing writings, it’s a slow going affair that’s severely playin’ with my mind. I can only read about 10 fascinating pages per sitting before having to abandon ship and recoup my senses. After a martini, it’s 1 page and done. D’oh!
The book is full of masterful and tweet-worthy quotes like these:
Bill, if you’re reading this bogus blog post, I apologize for the lack of attribution in some of the tweets. I think I know you well enough that you don’t give a chit, but since I twisted your words so much in some of the tweets, I didn’t know if I should attribute them to you. Cheers!
Problems, Symptoms, Solutions
I haven’t done a stupid-poopy-pic in awhile… uh, since yesterday, so here’s one fer ya:
And here’s the follow on:
It’s a good thing I have 5 different poopy clips in my plagiarized BD00 graphic toolbox, no?
Why am I here?
WTF?
Meh!
D'oh!
My BTC Address
Bulldozer00's Blog 