Great Management Quotes

“The first people had questions and they were free. The second people had answers, and they became enslaved.” - Wind Eagle, American Indian Chief

“If you don’t like change, you’ll going to like irrelevance even less.” - General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff, U.S. Army

“It makes all the difference in the world whether we put truth in the first place, or in the second place.” - John Morley

“The truth that makes men free is for the most part the truth which men prefer not to hear.” - Herbert Agar

“Great leaders build a workforce for the future. They are human capital developers. Great leaders always ask themselves: “Am I prepared for what’s next?” They invest in themselves by constantly learning.” - Jonathan Fietzer

“Do what you do so well that they will want to see it again and bring their friends” – Walt Disney

“It is not a question of how well each process works; the question is how well they work together.” – Lloyd Dobens and Clare Crawford-Mason

“An ability to embrace new ideas, routinely challenge old ones, and live with paradox will be the effective leader’s premier trait.” – Tom Peters

“The highest challenge inside organizations is to enable each person to contribute his or her unique talents and passion to accomplish the organization’s purpose.” – Stephen R. Covey

“It is never too late to be who you might have been.” – George Eliot

“Leadership is a combination of strategy and character.  If you must be without one, be without the strategy.” – General H. Norman Schwarzkopf

“Trust becomes a verb when you communicate to others their worth and potential so clearly that they are inspired to see it in themselves.” – Stephen R. Covey

“I can teach anybody how to get what they want out of life.  The problem is that I can’t find anybody who can tell me what they want.” – Mark Twain

“Don’t measure yourself by what you have accomplished, but what you should have accomplished with your ability.” – John Wooden

“To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.” – Anatole France

“For every failure, there’s an alternative course of action.  You just have to find it.  When you come to a roadblock, take a detour.” – Mary Kay Ash

“It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.” – Harry S. Truman

“Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas Edison

“Strategy gets you on the playing field, but execution pays the bills.” – George Eubanks

“A life isn’t significant except for isn’t impact on other lives.”  - Jackie Robinson

Olympics 2012 Opening Ceremony in Danny Boyle's own words

If you download the Olympic 2012 Opening Ceremony album - "Isles of Wonder" - there is a foreword by Danny Boyle that explains the concept of the opening ceremony. I thought it was very helpful in understanding what the point of his spectacular was - and underlines, in my opinion, just how successful it was; here it is:

At some point in their histories, most nations experiencea revolution that changes everything about them. The United Kingdom had a revolution that changed the whole of human existence. In 1709 Abraham Darby smelted iron in a blast furnace, using coke. And so began the IndustrialRevolution. Out of Abraham’s Shropshire furnace flowed molten metal. Out of his genius flowed the mills, looms, engines, weapons, railways, ships, cities, conflicts and prosperity that built the world we live in.It was a revolution that filled the world with noise,smoke, prosperity, pain and possibility.

In November 1990 another Briton sparked another revolution – equally far-reaching – a revolution we’restill living through. Tim Berners - Lee invented the World Wide Web, and built the world’s first website. He took no money for his invention. This, he said, is for everyone.

Just like the Industrial Revolution, the digital revolution is turning the world upside down, taking music, books,shopping, conversation, information to places that they never went before.

But flickering in the smoke and noise and excitement, you can sometimes glimpse a single golden thread of purpose – the idea of Jerusalem – of the better world, the world of real freedom and true equality, a world that can be built through the prosperity of industry, through the caring nation that built the welfare state, through the joyous energy of popular culture, through the dream of universal communication. A belief that we can build Jerusalem.

And that it will be for everyone.

Danny Boyle

Artistic Director

London 2012 Olympic Games

Opening Ceremony

Moving up another Photography gear

At the beginning of June I had the opportuntity to undertake some one-on-one training with renowned Bjorn Thomassen in the beautiful Cornwall. 

My plan was to continue transferring my existing landscape photography skills to the world of portraiture and to continue to develop my own unique style and approach and set myself some new creative challenges. 

It was an intensive and thoroughly enjoyable long weekend. While everyone else was partying in the street and enjoying the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations, we were hunting down mystical locations in the woods of Cornwall and working long hours in the studio to get the perfect picture. 

I'm thrilled with the results - though I haven't space to post them all here - but here's a little insight into how some of the shoots were created.

Concept: a young Goddess - floating above the clouds, over-seeing all that is on Earth

 setting up the studioMake up and costumefull set and lightinggetting in positionback-of-the-camera previewpicking the perfect take in Lightroom

The "out of the camera" shot in itself is rather lovely - but I had bigger ideas for the image. I wanted to give it an even more classical and ethereal look. This is the final image:

"Goddess of the Cosmos"This "crossover" between photography and painting is part of my personal style and part of the repertoire I can offer to clients, particularly those who want a timeless, classical and very high quality look. 

(Lots more at inpictur.es )

Not sure I could live without Twitter any more

If I ever needed reminding that the world of social media has introduced so many new opportunities to communicate and collaborate (and I don't need reminding) and make connections that never used to be possible, then monday was it. 

Three things happened. 

First, it was nice to wake up to a nice tweet from Dragonfli, who are the suppliers of our beepol lodge and beepol bumblebee colonies. They were very complimentary of the modifications I'd made to their lodge and tweeted that out to their followers, which has driven some extra visitors to our bumblebee project information - which obviously makes me happy. 

That's an amazing customised Beepol Lodge Nik!! Love the idea of temperature display as well!

Great to get such a ringing endorsement from the manufacturer. You never know, maybe they'll make the temperature display a standard feature? ☺

Next, I was contacted by the Richard at waspinator - this was a result of a couple of tweets in a combined conversation with Martha Kearney (radio 4 presenter) who keeps honey bees. She appeared on Simon Mayo's radio show in an interesting segment on beekeeping, and after when I checked her tweet stream I noticed she'd been in contact with waspinator due to some lack of success with the product at keeping wasps from hives.

I added to this thread, as we too had tried the waspinator but not managed to keep wasps from raiding our bumeblebee nest for precious honey at the end of the season, and Richard got in touch. Following some discussion with him, he gave some advice and offered to send us half-a-dozen waspinators to trial around the garden - to basically create a "ring of defence" around our bumblebee hive.

This is great news, as not only can we hopefully keep the wasps at bay this year, but we can also trial the waspinator in a bumblebee-inhabited environment and provide this data to the company and generally improve the understanding of how to use the product with bumblebee colonies.

Finally, I was honoured to be selected by The Tiffen Company to provide the cover photo for their facebook page. Tiffen is the leading movie and photographic effects accessory company and I use their software extensively as part of my workflow. The desktop software mimics their vast range of photographic filters and accessories and I love being able to take an "analogue" approach in the digital domain. This is the picture they chose:

A big thanks to Tiffen! 

So, all in all, busy day with my new found social media contacts. Not sure I could live without twitter anymore!

Focus On Imaging 2012

We had an excellent trip to Focus On Imaging (Wed 7th March), which is the UK's leading exhibition for the photography industry. Everyone who's everyone from camera manufacturers, album producers, frame makers, camera retailers, lighting companies, hosting companies, societies, awards bodies and so on is usually there. This year was no different and after the shock of Canon pulling out in 2011 they were back there this year showcasing the new EOS 5D mark III. There is also the usual array of seminars and tutorials for software and technique, and these are often very interesting.

 However, I actually completely avoided Canon's stand (didn't want to be tempted for a second time in as many months!) and I had some specific purchases in mind.

Focus is also a chance to meet up with fellow togs and I was delighted to meet up with some old colleagues/twitter friends and share a coffee and catch up with them. 

I got some great bargains, here's what I ended up:

• A new top-end tripod, suited to the 5DmkII and for shooting video, with a pistol grip head and movement in about 11 dimensions! Saved about £100 on this. 
• A Loweprowe "Flipside" camera bag (actually we got one each). Total bargain with about 50% off high street price - and it has room for oodles of gear and quick access without removing it from your waist. 
• A set of two studio lights, stands and soft boxes (about 1250W total equivalent output) and carrying bag - these were a complete steal and a great way to get started experimenting with some indoor studio work.
• An infra-red trigger system. This has yet to come in the post as they were out of stock at the show, but I am so excited about this. Again, it was much much cheaper than anything I have seen to date and actually supports IR, light and sound triggering (anyone fancy shooting a glass object?). I'm hoping (at first) to get some amazing bumblebee pictures with this kit! 

Once I get all this set up I will be able to post some pics, both of the gear and of the results... 

How I multiplied my Flickr traffic 20x times

It's no secret any longer that Adobe Lightroom has transformed my photographic workflow and I love the power it puts at my finger tips. It seems each week I'm discovering a new way to put it to use and take my photography to better levels, using automation to reduce the need to perform hours of mundane tasks. 

The latest trick has been to implement publishing to Flickr - but not only that to deliver upto 20x the traffic views for my photos that had been the norm before I started using Lightroom. 

Here's an image of some stats at the time of writing:

At the start of this graph (start of Jan) I did a little manual test to see what effect was caused, and this explains the rise to about 35 image views per day. However, after this you can see the natural tail as traffic drops back down to its organic level of about 4 or 5 views per day. 

The I implemented my lightroom meets flickr strategy and the traffic rose sharply. The peak on this chart is 100 views, representing about 20 times the traffic of my previous normal levels. That's one heck of a turn around. 

So, what's the secret? Well, there are two:

1) replace the standard Lightroom Flickr "publish" plugin with a much cleverer version written by Jeffrey Friedl. His plugins are awesome and by far the most full-featureed and flexible I've found. 

2) Use the plugin to submit your images to relevant photo groups on flickr. This is something you can configure the plugin to do automatically for you when you upload an image. By posting to interested and relevant groups your images will be exposed to a wider audience and generate more traffic. 

However, there are, of course, a couple of cautionary notes. The main one is that different groups have different rules and you have to adhere to them. This might include, for example, a limit of one picture upload per day. Lightroom won't count this for you - you need to just tracj this yourself. 

Also, you need to be relevant to the group - so if you are posting to a group which accepts sunsets, but with no people and with the sun below the horizon then you need to be sure that your automation is able to control this - i.e. that your metadata is sufficiently rich and granular. There's always going to be a fine line over how much is enough and how much is too much metadata: so pick your groups with this in mind. 

After setting all that up, publishing to Flickr is just a one click process, and hopefully you can see the results I have, or better! ☺

I'm in love with Lightroom

Adobe Lightroom. I remember trying it many many years ago in pre-version 1 form. It was disappointing. My overworked PC ground to a halt. I didn't really see the point of it - it seemed liked a bloated photo organiser. 

Half a decade or more on, my photo collection of some 30,000 images was languishing, unloved and closeted on a humming server in the corner of my underworked recording studio. The mere thought of sifting and organising my photo portfolio had become an insurmountable brick wall - too much to handle in one go; too much, even, to divide and conquer by hand. 

So, in summer 2011 invested in Lightroom version 3 - if for no other reason than all my photographer friends and acquaintances use or mention it, or its Mac "equivalent" Aperture. Lightroom has moved on hugely - now a superbly powerful workflow and editing tool, not just a photo organiser. I didn't even realise quite how powerful when I invested in it, but day by day I'm discovering more and getting increasing value and utility from it. Now I'm kicking myself: how did I manage so long without it? 

In the first instance, the major achievement Lightroom delivered for me was access to my photos again. That sounds like a bizarre thing to say, but the ability to browse, sort, filter, move, organise images with trivial ease and barely a click has made discovering what was in my collection a pretty straightforward task. This had previously become impossible - despite the superior abilities of Windows 7 to search and display files, I could still not easily get the 30,000 ft view, the 10,000ft, 1000ft and move with ease between them. In this respect, Lightroom totally delivers - working my way round 30,000 images is trivial. Identifiying those I like, those I hate and those I will decide on later is simply done. 

One of the other stresses I faced in the pre-LR era was the organisation and naming of my files. Was my folder hierarchy right? Should I have source and production images together? If not, how do I track forwards and backwards between them? How do I keep multiple exposures (e.g. for HDR photography) together? How do I know which are published and which are not? Keep them in a special folder? Move them? Copy them?

So, file organisation, naming and proliferation had become a total headache. That worry has gone now. And I mean totally gone. I let lightroom do pretty much what it wants. I know that I can move files around if I want to organise them physically, but by tagging them appropriately I can collate any group of pictures according to any criteria I want. Collections of images can be pulled together dynamically based on almost any criteria you can imagine. So, forget where they are on disk, they are always just one click away from you in Lightroom anyway.

These two benefits delivered what I wanted, but Lightroom had/has more to give: Publishing. 

This incredibly powerful feature allows you to set up connections between your photo library and online photo publishing on sites such as facebook, flickr, 500px, zenfolio. The king of this feature is a wonderful gent called Jeffrey Freidl, who has written a large number of plugins that enhance existing and add new functionality for a raft of photo hosting locations; including in some cases the ability to two-way sync between your online pics and your local library. Wow. 

At first I ignored this feature, thinking I wouldn't use it; that was until I started tagging my photos more effectively. I quickly realised that I could develop a tagging system and a set of smart collections that pull photos together and automatically publish them to multiple sites effortlessly. And keep everything in step. So, you want 5 star rated pictures, that are a final production version, containing buildings, taken at sunset, outdoors, not indoors, and you want them dropped into a collection on facebook? No problem - totally automated with one click in fact. Oh, and you want those same images dropped onto 500px and Flickr too? Yep, that's one click. Oh, and you want those Flickr photos cross posted out to 10 or 50 or 100 buildings and architecture groups? Well, that's no clicks - the plugin will do it all for you.  Of course if you need some resizing, watermarking, renaming and so on while you go about it, that just all happens for you to. 

For me, this has truly become one of the most powerful and time saving aspects of Lightroom. I've encoded my workflow using tags; I've classified my pictures by topic. Lightroom now decides if they should be published and where. I just push the button to say yes, make it happen.  I honestly cannot tell you how something that took hours to do (and thus rarely got done) now takes seconds, and I really mean seconds. It's almost insane. 

I've not even talked about editing lightroom - which is not only powerful, but non-destructive (i.e. applied virtually, totally reversible and modifiable at any time). It took me a while for the penny to drop how powerful this was; perhaps because my first experience of this many years ago was Google Picasa, which is lame in comparison. It was some sort of unhappy hybrid between destructive and non-destructive editing and limited in functionality. In contrast, Lightroom has wonderful and precision editing capability and hooks into external applications. I don't even have photoshop installed. 

There are a couple of features I really love. 1) Stacking - which allows you to virtually group images together like a stack of cards. Perfect if you are an HDR shooter and want to keep your bracketed RAWs together. Or if you want to produce a few versions of an image with different looks. Talking of which, number 2) Virtual Copies - without making a copy on disk, you can simply make a virtual copy of an image, and then edit that, leaving the original untouched. It's a wonderful way to play with and compare mutliple different looks for an image. I love this feature.

Which actually brings me back to the start - I love the whole thing. Lightroom as a tool has totally transformed my workflow, brought life back to a neglected photo collection and provided a platform to take my photography to the next level, without having to worry about underlying administrative issues about file systems and folder hierarchies, about multiple copies for multiple purposes and trying to keep track of every single picture and where it has been used.

This baby is awesome and I know it has even more to give. It's worth every penny and I love it. 

TOGAF 9 Exam Pointers

Having been the first of a bunch to take the TOGAF 9 Combined level 1 & 2 exam (and pass, I might add ☺) I thought I would share my general tips about the exam as I've been asked by loads of my colleagues who are about to take it.

Please note, there are strict disclaimers to sign about keeping exam material confidential, so I will not be sharing any of that here - however, some of my own study observations are mine and mine alone, and also some basic mechanics of the test are helpful for first-timers. I don't see why they couldn't tell you this upfront to reduce anxiety.   

Study Tips

1) I put everything in a mindmap in order to visualise the whole structure and relate concepts. I took everything our tutor had highlighted and put it here, along with keywords to remember and his other useful tips for passing. By doing this, in one whole view you can see everything you need to know and remember to pass level 1.

I HAVE HAD MANY REQUESTS FOR THE MINDMAP, in fact it has become a bit unmanageable - so you can now access a small pack of documents for a small donation, which also includes some example exam questions too.. The document pack contains mindmaps in the following format:

.mm = freemind
.mmap = mindjet
.xmind = xmind

The TOGAF mindmap is large - this is just a small section

My personal tips for Scenario questions (part 2 of the exam)

Please note, these are my personal tips based on my experience of one exam. They are therefore not scientifically/statistically valid, so be prepared to junk them if they don't apply. That said, maybe they will:

1) when looking at an answer, don't just consider the things they have covered in the answer to gauge its correctness, but consider the things that are missing in the others. If you read the rationale given on the example answers, you'll see why.
 
2) USE THE BOOK. Do not guess, even if you think you know it. In particular, remember there is stuff that may not have been taught. So, for example, in the BOOK there are recommendations about additions to process or other little snippets we never covered. You can't learn it in all in advance, but if you use the book during the exam (and know your way around it) you'll find the missing stuff.
 
3) Be careful with scenarios, not to over complicate them and distract yourself. But, consider reading at least the last 30% of the scenario (after you've read the question) - in most cases I found this was necessary to give the right context to the question. This helps avoid situations where there may be deliberate confusion going on with "fully correct" answers, but for different ADM phases. I get the sense that the examiner wants you to figure the phase(s) you are entering, in or exiting - and the answers alone may not establish that. 

For those that think having access to the book makes everything trivial - be careful. As you know, some concepts are not grouped as individual parts of the book. One particular scenario question took me almost 25 minutes to try and complete, much of it scanning backwards and forwards - and in the end, I gave up on the book and used instinct, because it was not helping me. (There are usability issues with the book too, see below).

Exam Mechanics Tips

First things First: you might have been allocated a 4 hour slot, but this is not the time you get to take the exam. This slot includes registration, signing everything, tutorial time, wrap up etc. For the exams you get:

• 60 minutes max  for Level 1 = 40 multiple choice questions
• 90 minutes max for Level 2 = 8 scenario questions
• You cannot use time from level 1 to carry over to level 2
• The exams run straight from one to the other  - there is no pause in between
• You can end early if you so wish - e.g. end level 1 after 40 minutes and go straight into level 2.

So - it's a straight 2.5 hour session plus registration etc. So, as with any exam, my advice is don't eat and drink beforehand!

I had to hand over all belongings, including keys and watch and of course, smartphone. So, you might as well take as little as possible with you to the exam centre.

The exam is conducted on a PC equipped with keyboard & mouse. You barely have to use the keyboard.

Writing materials are provided in the form of a marker pen and 2 laminated sheets of paper, a rather baffling solution. I had to ask for an eraser, concerned I might use all the sheets. I found this a generally unsatisfactory solution - felt tip too blunt, eraser ineffective. But that's it, that's what you have to deal with.

There is a tutorial to watch on the PC first about how the exam system works. I strongly recommend watching this as it explains how you can mark your answers for review and go back to them later if you have time.

The open book part of the exam allows reference to the TOGAF 9 book in PDF form. I found this system very clunky. The exam runs full screen (kiosk mode) on the PC and you cannot change this. The PDF opens up in front. You can move this and resize it to help see the content side by side, but it is a poor user experience. You could not maximise it. My screem was at most a 15 inch monitor running at, what I suspect was 1280x800 resolution. It was appalling, and barely possible to read the PDF, especially the diagrams. The whole thing opened with the contents window on the left of the PDF reader way too small and even if resized, it kept resetting back to this.

I'm not sure if the PDF reader was an old version or something customised - but searching was a poor exerience: slow; and the FIND button, while helpfully on screen, took up a load of really valuable screen estate. I was unimpressed with the setup in terms of usability.

There is only one cure for this (unless you get a better PC system): know the book as much as you can in advance.

The system allows you to leave questions unanswered if you wish and also "mark" (i.e. flag) them for review. After the last question you then have a summary page which shows a list of all your questions and which are unanswered and "marked". You can go back to any question at this stage to continue working on it. I finished early, but used all the time available via this review screen to go back and check all my uncertainties. The exam system itself is easy to use and navigate - I had no complaints with this.

Your time remaining is shown at the top right of the screen in minutes and seconds at all times. I had no access to any other clocks/watches other than looking at the sun.   

And if you are taking your exam soon: Good Luck!

Recipe for awesome Pea and Ham soup

I'm afraid I tend to cook by instinct and taste, so what I don't have is a completely prescriptive recipe measured to the nearest gramme. ☺ If you need to follow a recipe like that, you need to look elsewhere. Otherwise, do what I do, and taste what you're making and judge what to use as you go along.

With that out the way, here's some of the best Pea and Ham soup you'll ever make.

Ingredients

• Dried Peas - soaked (the quick variety usually take about two hours to soak)
• Onions - about the same amount as you have peas
• Turmeric - a couple of teaspoons - optional if you don't have it
• Cumin seeds - again, optional - but if you have them, a teaspoon or so
• Coriander leaf - fresh or dried - fresh is obviously best; add enough to make a difference but not to overpower
• Chilli powder - as much or as little as you like
• Black pepper - lots
• Garlic - loads - at least several bulbs, maybe double
• A teaspoon or two of English mustard
• Ham, bacon or lardons; smoked or unsmoked whichever you like about 1 Quarter the amount of peas
• Marigold swiss vegetable bouillon stock powder - seriously, this is the best stock you can get, use it in everything
• Olive oil

Method

Prepare the peas according to the packet (this usually means soak and rinse for a few hours).

Dice onions into small cubes if you haven't bought them pre-diced. Warm the pot with a few spoons of oil olive oil and start sauteing the onions. Also add the garlic, ham, and turmeric. Keep stirring and sauteing to start caramelising the onions. 

After about 5 minutes of good sizzling, add everything else (except the stock powder) and stir is together. I usually keep this going on a the heat for a minute or two before then adding boiling water. 

Reduce to a simmer and keep stirring. Stir in a few spoons of stock powder. Keep tasting and adding as required. Remember that over time and as it cools the soup will taste more salty, so don't go too mad, just keep tasting. But make sure you add enough. Leave to simmer for 30 - 40 minutes, but keep checking on it and tasting. Add more pepper if needed. 

Serving

Usually I part blend mine with a hand blender, just to remove any chunks (especially if you used lardons). Served, of course, with home made chunks of ciabatta bread.

Delish. 

Think Different

Of course, as everyone raced to type their reviews of the iPhone 4S on Tuesday 4th October (myself included), little did they know that Steve Jobs was on his deathbed. And that Tim Cook, the new CEO, was having to deliver his annoucements almost certainly knowing that was the case.

I feel a great sense of loss of such a wonderful role model; many would say in the field of business, marketing, user experience - and clearly Jobs had so many talents in so many areas. But for me, all that rolls up into a genius for insight, innovation, simplicity and change.

It is absolutely immeasureable the influence Steve Jobs had on so many lives in the digital age. He may not have solved World hunger, but you can bet your bottom dollar that his legacy in bringing digital information to the masses marks a turning point in history.

So much has been said about Steve Jobs over the 48 hours following (over 4000 tweets per second) and will no doubt continue to do so, that it's hard to add a fitting tribute.

So, I'm going to play back some of Apple's own words, words that have Steve Jobs' DNA all over them. Words that, to me, are poetry.

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Rest In Peace Steve