Recently I received an article posted in Harvard Business Review (http://bit.ly/suqsP) dealing with time management. It really was a great little article and reminded me of the ever important need to have an Action Plan.
One of the key characteristics of the cyberMIND team is that we stress having an action plan. From projects to goal accomplishments to technical troubleshooting – having an action plan is a must.
http://www.time-management-guide.com provides a good synopsis:
Clarify your goal. Can you get a visual picture of the expected outcome? How can you see if you have reached your destination? What does make your goal measurable? What constraints do you have, like the limits on time, money, or other resources.
Write a list of actions. Write down all actions you may need to take to achieve your goal. At this step focus on generating and writing as many different options and ideas as possible. Take a sheet of paper and write more and more ideas, just as they come to your mind. While you are doing this, try not to judge or analyze.
Analyze, prioritize, and prune. Look at your list of actions. What are the absolutely necessary and effective steps to achieve your goal? Mark them somehow. After that, what action items can be dropped from in the plan without significant consequences for the outcome. Cross them out.
Organize your list into a plan. Decide on the order of your action steps. Start from looking at your marked key actions. For each action, what other steps should be completed before that action? Rearrange your actions and ideas into a sequence of ordered action steps. Finally, look at your plan once again. Are there any ways to simplify it even more?
Monitor the execution of your plan and review the plan regularly. How much have you progressed towards your goal by now? What new information you have got? Use this information to further adjust and optimize your plan.
Through the month of August we are turning our attention to technology used in the office environment. Building an efficient and effective working information technology function to your business is much like building a house. When a house is built, one of the first items in construction is the laying of the foundation. Policy specifically relating to Information Technology is the foundation of any well designed department or IT function. In this post we will be turning our attention to the ever over-looked and often costly under consequence – Internet Acceptable Use Policy.
The City of Plainwell’s web site – http://www.plainwell.org, a cyberMIND development, won the 2009 MEDA marketing competition for websites for communities under 50,000.
CA, this morning, put out a signature update for the eTrust Anti-Virus software. This update is causing some systems running eTrust Anti-Virus to falsely identify infected files which is causing applications to fail to launch or act erratically.
Had a meeting today with a friend and her associate and we were discussing some needs she has with her business. One of the items that came up in the discussion was that the IT folks were rude, not team players and at times domineering in their roles.
Unfortunately I hear this to often from too many people. IT people, not all, but also not a few tend to take their positions as a power position and lord it over people. You may remember the Saturday Night Live skit – Nick Burns the Computer Guy
This is some people’s reality and it is not cool. Well the “move” thing just doesn’t fly.
She expressed that one of the reasons that she came to us was that she always found that when I was helping her with IT related tasks the I would speak plain language and explain what I was doing and why. In fact, she learned from this guidance and was able to apply what she learned.
Rule #1 – Be a Friendly and Helpful IT person
You, as an IT person, whether solo, outsourced or part of an internal department need to be a team partner. In a business, you are part of an organism. You need to work well with others. You need to be able to communicate complex realities to people in simple terms. Non-IT people realize that IT is complex and it is a reality – they are looking for you to help them understand so that they can perform their task and role. They don’t need you holding them hostage or going on a power trip because you know something they don’t. Inter-business relationships are not barter relationships.
cyberMIND staff will always be friendly and helpful. We are well known for our staff’s ability to communicate well and effectively. We are a partner. We see the partnership and we participate for the good of the common goal.
Welcome to the cM blog. We’ll be using this space to provide you with insight, news and timely information in the world of technology as it impacts small to mid-sized businesses and residential users. Let a comment if you have suggestions of topics you would like us to expand on or cover.
Email & Web Rule #1:Litigation and Regulations, Productivity and Security Create the Need for Strategic Email & Web Mgmt http://bit.ly/ay1j65 months ago
