Jobs Job

I wonder how many blog posts, Facebook statuses and tweets went out in the name of Steve Jobs over the past week? I will throw mine into the mix I suppose.

As stated in a previous post, I am not a fan of Apple because of their business model. However, Apple has probably been the most publicly influential company in my industry. There are tons of other companies who have many contributions. I believe Microsoft has been the most influential in the business sector (yes over IBM, Oracle, et al). But Apple is known by the public as having often pushed the envelope. Interestingly, the time period when Apple was the least productive, least innovative and nearly obsolete was when it was without Steve Jobs. Frankly it makes me wonder what is in store for the company.

So, it seems with a little logic applied (pun intended for any nerds like me out there), Jobs was the driving force, the lifeblood, the initiative to the innovation, the person leading the creative ship... You get the point. When Jobs started and ran the company, it was the leading edge with an uncanny ability to choose paths the masses either needed or were convinced they needed. That is staggering to think about. This man's ideas and leadership affected how many millions of people? Is there anyone else like that in the past 100 years? Or longer? The man completely revolutionized the way PC computing was formed, the the way the music industry distributed songs, and the way humanity saw mobile devices. By the way, there was also this little thing called Pixar which he helped to find as well, which revolutionized movies, CGI, and cartoons.

Not sure what happens to you when the last neuron flashes, but I can measure up the life of a man according to my own ethics and what I can say is "Well done, Steve. You live on through your innovation and leadership." A great story of an adopted man, creatively leading in an often drab world.

Tech vs. Humanitarian

Before I share this clip, I must make  some disclaimers. Combined they are shameful, yet honest. In 1998 when I first entered the IT sector, I had a job which blended PC-based designs with Apple-based designs. It did not take long to detest the business model of Apple. It was a fantastic high-end product but was one of the most monopolistic companies I had ever even known about. Back then there were 2 other companies who were allowed to make clones (Mac OS on non-Mac hardware). But even that was short lived and Apple tightened its belt so that Apple was the only one selling its own stuff. So that is the first disclaimer. I have not been, nor will I ever be a huge fan of Apple. We need their presence in the IT field because the push the market and drive innovation, but I don't like their company model.


The second disclaimer is probably where the shame comes in. During the GFC, Apple's stock was at a paltry $90 US/share. I decided to make money for my retirement account by buying into the company. Some people will think "Who cares, you made money?" but others, who are like myself, wrestle with the culture of the companies they support and that matching their own ethics. But I saw the money and took it. Because of that, I am just another greedy cog in the wheel which is spoken about in this ZDNet video. I did not like the culture of the company, but I didn't care because I saw the $$ potential.


So it is with some amount of shame that I share this from ZDNet. It is about a performance which highlights the tension between great technology and abusive ethics (or lack of ethics)...


http://www.zdnet.com.au/first-hand-from-foxconn-339323354.htm

The genius is in the process, not the marketing

It happens all the time all around the world all the time. Someone is clever enough to analyze a situation, find a way to gain from it, develop a plan, carefully enact the plan, and finally evaluate the results. Once in a while, this process is applied in a creative or innovative way which shift some paradigms. That shift isn't a process shift, but an application shift--finding new ways to apply the same process.


I ran across this video. I had not heard or seen the photo that is mentioned in the video, but the process clearly worked for these guys.

Here is a German based marketing company who seized on free publicity. They used the upcoming launch (a few years ago) of Google Earth in Germany to create some attention and some buzz. Their picture went viral and world-wide. Then they developed the above 'documentary style' clip to highlight the company's vision statement and creativity. In affect, I am advertising for them right now. What is impressive to me is their creativity to apply the same age-old process to the current technological and cultural trends. After all, what is more believable in today's psyche than Google Earth or a documentary.

Techie's Disgruntled History

Not me, I promise

Just read an article at ZDNet (AU) regarding job satisfaction, specifically 'most-hated' jobs. Four of the top ten were in the IT field and the most disgruntled was the Director if Information Technology. (http://www.zdnet.com.au/it-dominates-most-hated-jobs-list-339323134.htm). The article faults the "end user" which is basically everyone outside of the IT field.


Being in the industry for over decade now and seeing all of the changes that accompanied that time, this is not at all surprising. In 1998 when I snagged my first IT job, we were rock stars. I didn't need an education, much experience, or references. I just had to be able to speak enough tech jargon to out-wit the HR person. And, because we were stars, we were paid well above anyone else with our same credentials (most in the field at that time had graduated from Year 12 and that was about it). We also had that rock star swagger to us, after all we were smart, over payed, and we were the nerds making it rich. We were extremely arrogant.


Then came the bubble bust after Y2K. Those who had taken the initiative to educate themselves and get certified in specific areas maintained their level of awesomeness (luckily I had), while those that rode the lazy train were dumped off at the 'end-of-fiscal-year 2000' train stop (if they made it that far). We maintained our status in companies because tech stars were performing voodoo witch tricks that no one could comprehend. And we sure as hell weren't going to tell them how easy it actually was.


Then a couple things happened. People started to get PCs into their home. Worse yet, they started to understand the mystical creatures. Techs had to start digging deep and begin to specialize. There was some level of witch-doctoring maintained if we dug deep enough and buried ourselves in those crevasses which "end users" did not explore. Also, for some reason, businesses learned from their Y2K mistakes and techies no longer had free rein. 


What happened after that is really important in the evolution of the techie. Up to this point we were your typical INTJ or INTPs with little regard to our social skills. We didn't need to be. All of the other fields had to learn political games, relationship building and communication skills. Those skills worked against us having technology covered in a shroud of mystery, so we ignored them and tried to work against them. But the more people understood, the more us techies seemed like immature, uneducated grunts rather than the valuable rock stars we once were.


Also around that time CIO and Director of IT positions became numerous. Often, because of our uninformed view of the macro company vision and culture, techies were overlooked for such positions which were typically held by accountants of all people. They had the same strengths and deficiencies in their core personality, but they had learned to navigate the politics and relationships.


Ever since that place, techies have been playing catch-up. For many people in the field, a relationship with a computer is much easier than that with other human beings. So it is not a surprise that techies are disgruntled about their job, and even less surprising that all of the stated issues that contribute to the disgruntled feeling involve people as opposed to situation-based issues. Also not surprising is that there is a general lack of respect for those in the IT field. Our 'Wizard-of-Oz' history doesn't exactly build credibility.


So there we are, in my opinion, where we generally deserve to be.


  

Primary Education & Blogs...

As a techie, I want to provide people resources to make their job more effective. Sometimes this means a job becomes obsolete because of the technology, but that has happened throughout history with new advances. So when I am paid to help an organisation's technology, my ultimate goal is to provide the organisation the best tools for their budget and company culture.

A few years ago I was working for the education sector with a large organisation which was in charge of several schools ranging from Kindie to Year 12. It was a difficult assignment for a few reasons. I was (and remain) passionate about kids having an opportunity to learn. So the decisions made based on cost or work load frustrated me. After all, this is one of the most important things we do for our world--educate the next generation(s).

Another frustrating factor was the technological incompetence of the teachers. Now I have the utmost respect for teachers, so when I say incompetence, it is not in condemnation of a teacher. I mean the word according to its definition: "lack of physical or intellectual ability or qualifications." (dictionary.com). Yes, there were examples of some teachers who just did not have the intellectual ability to understand how technology could be used as a tool for education. But for most teachers, it was the absence of the intellectual qualification. For many of those people, they could not be bothered to learn how technology could impact their teaching abilities.

I also found that any change in an educational system seems like a culture change. Which implied for me, small technology changes would (and did) take years to be accepted into the organisational community. It was much like trying to run in water--lots of energy for very small gains.

So when I run across teachers who teach but appropriately use technology as a tool, I get very excited. Sometimes the excitement comes from a small thing like running across a blog used in a Year 2/3 class while looking for reviews of a play you are about to go see. So here is what prompted these thoughts:

Mr. Baldock's Year 2/3 Blog