[28-Mar-23] The change topic again

Helpful hints to make a change ...

As everything is more or less related to change it is an ongoing topic to write about.

Yesterday we had our System Demo to finish the current 3 month project phase. A really good overview of the work we have done, presenting our end-to-end solution in a combined demo of several teams. We are getting better in delivering the committed work and in improving our tools and way of working in parallel. Going forward it needs to be even more simple, standardized, fast and scalable.

A way to do this is to question/change the status quo, automate as much as possible and involve all required parties as early as possible. Especially the necessary change is causing some issues and areas of fear. People start to get concerned that we are sawing the branch that they are still sitting on. The 4 practices on the picture will be helping a lot going forward with this change.

The Germany wide strike yesterday was not leading to the expected chaos as a lot of people did adapt as needed. No public/private transport by plane, train and bus was not at all leading to the traffic jams that everybody was forecasting before. People stayed at home, thanks to the COVID-19 experiences from the last two years, or used the remaining transport systems besides their own cars - e.g. bikes, taxis or e-scooter. As every employee is responsible to come to the office in time, they had not a lot of choice. yesterday Hopefully the next negotiations between the unions and companies will lead to results shortly, we had enough strikes this year already.

• Where are Clean Energy Technologies Manufactured?

• TED Playlist: Best practices for business innovation

• Collaboration Superpowers: Virtual Team Celebrations

• The New Happy: Feeling overwhelmed
• Video: World's first robot that rides a bike!
• Video: 7 Mistakes Every Scrum Master Makes, And What to Do About Them

• Use AI to Your Advantage by Harnessing These Skills and Capabilities

• 9 Signs You're A Highly Sensitive Person

• Action on clean hydrogen is needed to deliver net-zero by 2050. Here's how

Source Youtube: Steal Like An Artist: Austin Kleon at TEDxKC

Source Youtube: The Evolution of Leadership and Purpose | Full Speech

[20-Mar-23] Interesting reports ... 

World Happiness and Climate Change 2023

"The World Happiness Report research leverages six key factors to help explain variation in self-reported levels of happiness across the world: social support, income, health, freedom, generosity, and absence of corruption. Governments are increasingly using this analysis to orient policies towards happiness.

Finland remains in the top position for the sixth year in a row. Lithuania is the only new country in the top twenty, up more than 30 places since 2017. War-torn Afghanistan and Lebanon remain the two unhappiest countries in the survey, with average life evaluations more than five points lower (on a scale running from 0 to 10) than in the ten happiest countries."

• 166 pages World Happiness Report 2023 as PDF

"The IPCC prepares comprehensive Assessment Reports about knowledge on climate change, its causes, potential impacts and response options. The IPCC also produces Special Reports, which are an assessment on a specific issue and Methodology Reports, which provide practical guidelines for the preparation of greenhouse gas inventories."

• AR6 Synthesis Report - Climate Change 2023
  

• Are you a micromanager? Or do you just work for one? 5 ways to tell

• 10 Bad Habits You Must Eliminate from Your Daily Routine

• Everything you need to know about hydrogen in the clean energy transition

• Achieving climate goals and renewable targets first requires solving the storage conundrum

Source Youtube: TRACTION by Gino Wickman | Core Message

Source Youtube: Where To Start When You’ve Procrastinated On Your Goals For Too Long

[19-Mar-23] The week 11-2023 summary 

The last winter week is finally over ...

For Meteorologist spring time started 01-Mar-23 according to the calendar it is tomorrow, the weather does already know and the temperatures go up. Time for gardening, we did start with first activities yesterday.

Just in case you are interested in all my BLOG posts from 2023 until 17-Mar-23 as PDF file in the moment, have a look on the Downloads page. The small eBOOK is available there.

Next week is kind of "the calm before the storm" week, a lot of preparation tasks for two workhops, our final system demo, 5 days innovation & training activities and the planning for our next 3 month project period. Hosting the workshops will be a lot of learning for the participants and fun for me, looking forward to it.

• GPT-4 Is Here: Unleashing the Power of Multimodal AI and Redefining the Future of Communication

• The 10 Must-Read Articles for Talent Professionals This Week (17-Mar-23)

• How Africa’s new Free Trade Area will turbocharge the continent’s agriculture industry

• Affordable childcare is possible — and access to it would benefit us all

• Gartner: 12 Essential Skills for Agile Developers

• 5 months ago, I asked 70 LinkedIn creators: "What is the ONE book that most impacted your career?

Have a great next week ...

More details about Usain Bolt

[18-Mar-23] From square to circle ...

More geometric figures to explain content

After a discussion with my wife we came to the conclusion that a circle or several circles could be a good approach to explain and present content as well. We are not the first ones :-)

Some examples on the picture and as link below:

• 10+ Types of Diagrams and How to Choose the Right One

• Free Venn diagram maker

• What is the DISC Model?

I like the Venn Diagram a lot, you just have to find the right text in the different fields to give it some content and value.

"There's this famous observation that I totally believe: Great startup ideas are the ones that lie in the intersection of the Venn diagram of 'is a good idea' and 'looks like a bad idea.' So you want most people to think it's a bad idea and thus not compete with you until you get giant. But for it to secretly be good." -- Sam Altman

Two years ago from today I was still on my old BLOG hosting website and the counter did show 500,000 overall readers. Just a small anniversary today. With my switch to the new hosting website and provider on 08-Dec-22 the counter was at 1,109,000. Since then there is no real counter anymore and I have to rely on their Website analytics information. The last month total visits number was 2,915. No idea how the old counter and the new way of counting visitors match? But as I have no possibility to influence it, why bother about the topic anymore?

According to the analytics I had 12,085 total visits since 08-Dec-22.

"You can create value with breakthrough innovation, incremental refinement, or complex coordination. Great companies often do two of these. The very best companies do all three." -- Sam Altman, taken from 200 Sam Altman Quotes

[17-Mar-23] Triangle and Square ...

Geometric figures to explain content

There are many triangles used to explain topics and priority setting alternatives. Besides the Success one, there is also the Iron Triangle or sometimes called the Golden Triangle of Project Management for example.

Today we have seen a first review of our new technical solution architecture, the 2.0 version of our status quo. Two more weeks to see the 1st MVP. Everybody is looking towards it, as we are on a really good track. Our challenge will be to put the green dot in the right place on the square that I came up with today. Reliability will be key as well as quality, but the new solution has to be fast and simple as well. The faster the better, as we need to scale up the daily/weekly delivery pretty fast.

And, not so easy for developers during their process, in the end the solution has to be operated by another team with less expertise. So it should be simple to maintain and reliable to reduce the effort of the new team taking over the responsibility in the future. Some more discussion might be needed, to agree the priorities and properly place the dot. Will keep you posted.

• LET GO – 4 REMEDIES FOR EXHAUSTED CONTROL FREAKS

• A Simple Guide to The (New) ChatGPT API with Python

• Tokyo wants to build a future-proof city. Here’s how

• Between Minds: Thought Leader vs Do Leader Source: Mindset and JESS3

• How CFOs further value creation by leading on sustainability

• Actions the best CEOs are taking in 2023

[15-Mar-23] New and old ideas?

A variety of links and pictures today

Google search was launched 1997, 26 years ago so easy for a lot of parents to be older than Google. On the kids side age has a different perspective, all people above 20 are old when they are around 10+.

A new release of the Scale Agile Framework version 6.0 came out today. See What’s New in SAFe 6.0

• Why skills development is vital for shipping’s green transition

• Hiring in 2023: How Talent Leaders Are Navigating a Changing Market

• Do You Want to Be Heard or Understood?

• Sahil Bloom: Unlocking the Power of Simplicity

• What is ‘dark data’ and how is it adding to all of our carbon footprints?

[13-Mar-23] And the Oscar goes to ...

“Dream big, dreams do come true. Ladies, never let anyone tell you you are past your prime. This is history in the making.” -- Michelle Yeoh with the award for best performance by an actress in a leading role

A great night with a lot of surprises and interesting stories. 4 Oscars for a German film, actress in leading and supporting role over age 60, and

Ke Huy Quan who did appear in an India Jones film as kid for the first time and did not play in any film for 20 years, wins the actor in a supporting role Oscar - respect and congratulations to all.

• Jamie Lee Curtis wins her first Oscar

• Green buildings can reduce city temperatures by up to 2°C, study shows

• Dr. Travis Bradberry: 8 Great Tricks for Reading People’s Body Language

• Say Goodbye to ChatGPT: Here Are New AI Tools That Will Blow Your Mind

A new week started ...

[12-Mar-23] My week 10-2023 highlights

Agile roles, comic pages and courage ...

One more comic page today that offers a lot of good content and easy to understand visuals - Wisdom Made Easy. The picture today shows how far we are already into 2023, week 10 of 52. 19% of this year is already gone could be time for a 1st review.

Business wise we delivered a great milestone at the beginning of the year, I did already host three workshops, another reorganization is in progress and I did send an initial heads up for the 3rd D&A Meetup scheduled for 26-Sep-23. The earlier the better, to have everybody aligned and supporting.

In private life we e.g. have a new family member, the daughter of my nephew, some admin tasks have already been taken care of, had a great short holiday and the studies of my daughters are making good progress. Looking forward to the next 10 weeks.

Tomorrow we start with the Sprint-4 Demo and then get ready to finish the current 3-month project period, with closing the open tasks, preparing our innovation & training days and organizing the next planning cycle. As outcome of the last team building workshop we are preparing local come-together opportunities in India, Portugal and Germany. As we cannot be together in the same place this is the only alternative for now.

Asking questions is my strong advice to all Interns during their Onboarding, as on the picture the answers are sometimes a surprise.

• EMOTIONS WHEEL FEELINGS WHEEL EMOTION CHART

• Transform your Life: Think, Do, Be

• The Best Examples of What You Can Do With ChatGPT

Have a great start into a productive and interesting week.

[11-Mar-23] Interesting perspectives

Pictures with a short explanation

Digital Transformation: The Ultimate Guide (one of many explanations)

Game Theory In Psychology: Examples And Strategies

What Is a Flow State And How to Get Into Flow

• Virtual reality is finally ready to revolutionize education

• Your Resume - Will Not Be Read by a Human First

• Video: Masih Alinejad's Toast at the 2023 TIME Women of the Year Gala

Steven Kotler is a New York Times bestselling author, an award-winning journalist, and the Executive Director of the Flow Research Collective.

Source Youtube: Purl | Pixar SparkShorts

• Reuse systems: in search of a vision for tackling plastic pollution

• Charted: Global Energy Consumption by Source, and Carbon Emissions (1900-2021)

• Algae-powered computing: Scientists create reliable and renewable biological photovoltaic cell

• Where does Europe's electricity come from?

• Beyond ChatGPT: 14 Mind-blowing AI Tools Everyone Should Be Trying Out Now

[10-Mar-23] More about courage

There is much more to find about this topic

The Purl video is not only a good example to support the Women's Day this week, it goes for a lot of diversity topics. Being different is difficult and stressful, but there are many opportunities for change, as you will see. Be strong, authentic and look for support.

• The cost of ambition: new research finds almost 90 per cent of women worldwide are penalized and undermined because of their achievements at work

• Midlife career change doesn’t have to be a crisis: Time to debunk 4 career change myths

The popular surviving bonsai from Hiroshima is priceless, not only because of its age, but also because its branches and trunk were able to survive the brutal devastation caused by the nuclear bomb. It is a small tree, a Japanese white pine, approximately two feet high, with a stout trunk, short strong needles, green and yellow in color, planted in the year 1625.

The age of the tree is really unbelievable and that in a more or less artificial environment. Great work of the gardeners taking care of it.

• Dairy vs. plant-based milk: what are the environmental impacts?

• Five key findings from the 2022 UN Population Prospects
  

My next two workshops will be around Personality Tests and to prepare an Elevator Pitch based on a predefined template (WHO, WHY, WHAT, HOW). Knowing their personality types, the participants will be able to  work on the template in their preferred style or to go outside of their comfort zone to try something new and show some courage. We will see, who is doing what? Stay tuned for more insights and results.

Have a great weekend.

[09-Mar-23] Having courage

Being authentic and different ...

In my list of helpful comic pages two days ago I did forget to mention The New Happy, see their Be You picture today. They are always offering great analogies between their pictures, mainly made out of dots and squares, and a supporting text. Get their newsletter ...

contrarian: a person who takes a contrary position or attitude
specifically : an investor who buys shares of stock when most others are selling and sells when others are buying

You need courage to do this, but it can be very beneficial in the end. It is the same in a discussion or meeting, when all participants have the same opinion, you can just talk about the weather :-), if not there can be a lot of fun and results in the end.

courage: mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty

Yesterday and Today I have seen several articles about courage and still had the Be You picture in my backlog for future posts. Today I will combine it all: 

• Leaders, March Towards Courage

• How to Get Started with Skills-Based Hiring

• HOW TO CLARIFY AND SHARE YOUR ASPIRATIONS FOR THE WAY PEOPLE TREAT EACH OTHER AT WORK

• Do you have the courage of your convictions?

• It Can Be Lonely to Stand Up for What’s Right

• TED Playlist: How fearless women lead

• The Ultimate Guide to Workplace Flexibility

[07-Mar-23] Fun comics to think about

It possibly happened to you already?

Here a quick list of comic pages that I am using regularly to look at:

• Work Chronicles
• Andertoons
• Sketchplanations

• Comic Agilé by Luxshan Ratnaravi & Mikkel Noe-Nygaard

Give it a try and have some fun ...

"When you talk to people smarter than you, it enhances your intelligence. I do things with people I like who are smart. It's not complicated." -- from How Shaquille O'Neal Made Himself Bigger Than Ever--as a Founder and Investor

• These are some of the surprising benefits of a four day working week 

• Mapped: Asia’s Biggest Sources of Electricity by Country

• Space scientist Dr Maggie Aderin-Pocock honoured with her own Barbie doll

• Fairphone 2 gets its final software update, seven years after original release

• Women in business, with Danuta Gray

• 3 ESSENTIAL CULTURE RULES ALL LEADERS MUST APPLY

• pwc - Risk: See it, share it, sort it

• Video: If Ever There Is a Tomorrow...... #motivation
• Video: Saltwater Powered Light and Electric Power

[06-Mar-23] Get clarity about roles

Scrum Master and Product Owner working together

When you read the Scrum Guide or any other helpful documentation around the AGILE topic, you will easily get the theory clear, but what does this mean in your daily work?

People take a training to hopefully understand e.g. Scrum and their role in this framework. All bring their personality, attitude, experience and expertise from past projects and assignments. With this backpack of capabilities they start their new agile role. And when they are willing to follow the Cycle of Growth to Unlearn - Relearn - Change (see picture), all should be fine, but this is not the reality.

Different kind of personalities with different previous roles, now in new agile roles are working together as good as possible, but never perfect and by the books or guides out there. Ongoing training, re-training and awareness sessions could help to improve, but these are not the standards. And the involved individuals have to be willing to change from their old roles to new ones, what is not always successful.

And I did not even talk about the line management that decides who is taking which role and what to do in it. As long as we are working in hybrid environments - established organizations in an agile transformation that is not finished yet - roles and responsibilities are not 100% clear and subject to interpretation, what is causing issues. Sometimes more sometimes less.

“…the agile movement in software is part of a larger movement towards more humane and dynamic workplaces in the 21st century.” -- Rowan Bunning from 10 Quotes Related to the Agile Methodology To Get You Inspired

• Which countries have the most gender-equal parliaments?

• How to Revamp Your Company’s Meeting Culture

• 13 Things Science Says Will Make You Much Happier

• 20 Free Newsletters That Will Drastically Improve Your Life

Source Youtube: STOLEN FOCUS by Johann Hari | Core Message

Source Youtube: The Art of Improvement - 10 Questions You Need To Ask Yourself Constantly

[04-Mar-23] Transformations ...

Speaking the same language with your customer

You should never underestimate the power of words and speaking the same language with your customers. Assuming you are offering agile services and your customer is a beginner in this environment? 

Then you have two issues:

1. All agile keywords and phrases are in English and a difficulty for none native speakers, like e.g. German customers
2. Beginners do not understand, what you are talking about as expert, so you need to find a common ground and this has to be defined by the customer

Strip down your agile language to the customer level and find a good match between the customers's and your vocabulary. Give it a try ...

• Welcome to the Agile Guide by Wrike

• How the TransPod System beats the Profitability of High-Speed Rail

• CIRCULAR ECONOMY: Zero waste guide

• 6 Trends Leaders Need to Navigate This Year

• Grant Snider Comics: Overwhelmed

• Gary Straughan video: Can You Really STOP Estimating? + FREE Cheat Sheet

• THE POWER OF VALUES-BASED DECISIONS

• 4 TOOLS TO KEEP MEETINGS ON TRACK

• LinkedIn 2023 Most In-Demand Skills: Learn the skills companies need most

[28-Feb-23] Picture Tuesday

Found interesting pictures with reference material

• ConantLeadership: Why the Best Leaders Share Responsibility – The Leadership That Works Newsletter

• 4 WAYS TO PROCRASTINATE SUCCESSFULLY

[26-Feb-23] My week 08-2023 highlights

Quick recap of two topics from last week

It took some time to find the right source of the picture, but in the end I came to - Amazing Sculptures Show People Carving Their Ideal Figures Into Their Own Bodies - and even selected another picture of the ones available. For me it has nothing to do with body shaming or e.g. curvy models versus six packs, it is just a great analogy for the potential that everybody has below the surface, you just have to develop and grow it.

With the right attitude and skills you can do everything, if you have a certificate proofing it or not. I did get some feedback about my 22-Feb-23 post about certificates. I am not at all questioning people having a certificate that finally proves longtime experience or well developed expertise. As I always say "Other people need to see you as their role model, then you deserve this title. You cannot just take it on your own!!" Same with certificates, what you are doing should be fitting with the idea of the certificate and you should be filling the related role. The more the better.

I am getting concerned, when people are not covering the full scope of work and responsibility behind their certificate, or when the certificate does not at all fit to their personality type (find a lot of different personality tests on My new business page). For example not everybody should be or could be a good Agile Coach. With a low Empathy level or more interest in facts & figures than people, you better go for a Mentoring and not a Coaching assignment. My 2 cents ...

Most agile coaches should be called agile mentors, but this is a different story :-)

My planned Customer Loyalty workshop on Tuesday will be influenced by the strike in Duesseldorf, either via public transport restrictions or the airport that is impacted as well. We will see in 2 days.

• The 10 Must-Read Articles for Talent Professionals This Week (24-Feb-23)

• The Top 10 In-Demand Skills For 2030

• Sketchplanations: Without data you're just another person with an opinion

[25-Feb-23] To learn something?

How to learn new skills, T- or V-Shaped?

Quickly sharing some related content, have a great weekend !!

• The Big Mac Index: A Measure of Purchasing Power Parity & Burger Inflation

• How V-shaped are you and your people? And how will you let them grow as V-shaped employees?

• 6 things people do around the world to slow down

• Video: The Best Examples Of What You Can Do With Chat GPT
• Video: What We Should Have Learned in School But Never Did
• Video: THE EXPECTATION EFFECT by David Robson | Core Message

• 12 Lessons You Learn or Regret Forever

• Why older talent should be a consideration for today’s inclusive leader

• This new 'levitating' Chinese train will be the fastest in the world

• Leadership Skills 2023 Report

• Video: Tree Update 37 | How Ecosia counts trees
• Video: Michael Jackson - Super Bowl XXVII 1993 Halftime Show (Remastered Perfomance)
• Video: How This Chalk Artist Creates Illusions on Pavement | Obsessed | WIRED

• Certification: It makes money, but does it make sense?

[17-Feb-23] Ready for the weekend

No rain today, had a great time

We did visit Haarlem today, another nice town in the Netherlands. 

"Haarlem with its many historic buildings and beautiful old squares lies near the beach on the banks of the Spaarne river. It is wonderful to stroll through the narrow streets lined by the monumental buildings built by master Lieven de Key. Visit extraordinary museums, such as the Frans Hals or Teylers Museum, and explore its countless cafés and restaurants. Haarlem is called the most Flemish city of the north with reason!"

One of the famous people born in Haarlem is Guido van Rossum, a noted Dutch computer programmer and author, better known for creating the ‘Python’ programming language that earned him the title of the "Benevolent Dictator for Life" (BDFL).

"Python is an experiment in how much freedom programmers need. Too much freedom and nobody can read another's code; too little and expressiveness is endangered." -- Guido van Rossum

[16-Feb-23] The 5th season started today

The outdoor carnival did start today, until next week Tuesday 

Thanks a lot to Markus for sharing the ALAAF picture from Cologne today. 

After more than 2 years with COVID-19 everything is back to normal again, even the bad weather. It was supposed to be raining close to the official start at 11.11 AM. We left 12.00 PM to our short holiday at the Neatherland coast and the weather did go with us, as you can see on the picture I have taken from the living room. 

But as the experts say "there is no bad weather, just unsuitable clothing" and we are prepared.

Yesterday we have been to the cinema again, this time the new MARVEL film - ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA - interesting to see and a new start for a lot of other Marvel films in the future. With a new bad guy - Kang the Conqueror. Most obvious was that Marvel and Star Wars both belong to Walt Disney for a longer period of time already.

We have seen some reuse of scenes between the film studios, just a minor adjustment of colors and brightness, saves a lot of time and money.

• Stefan Wolpers: The Scrum Master Salary Report 2023

• How a plastic-eating enzyme could inspire a truly circular economy

• What leaders get wrong about responsibility

• Workplace Learning Report 2023: Building the Agile Future

• The Most In-Demand Skills for 2023

• Dr. Marcus Raitner: On the Wise Use of Our Insultingly Short Lifespan
• Sahil Bloom: The One-in-a-Row Principle

“Carry out a random act of kindness, with no expectation of reward, safe in the knowledge that one day someone might do the same for you.” – Princess Diana, taken from 50 Kindness Quotes By Famous People

[14-Feb-23] About kindness ...

“Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see” -- Mark Twain

Quote taken from - 100 Kindness Quotes By Famous People. Some good ideas on the poster, maybe you can try some out? I like for example - SMILE, ASSUME THE BEST IN EVERYONE and PICK UP LITTER. Works fine and gets noticed by other people as well.

Tomorrow is my first day holiday, I am off until next week Tuesday. The project will be fine without me - when the cat is out the mice are dancing on the table, for sure.

• German Video: So wird KI Arbeit und Geschäft verändern - ChatGPT: Meine Einschätzung | Dr. Pero Mićić

• Ranked: America’s Best Places to Work in 2023

• ChatGPT is absolutely remarkable. But try these 8 free AI tools to save 100+ hours of work

• ‘Just Say No’ to These 4 Interview Formats

[12-Feb-23] My week 06-2023 highlights

Looking ahead to a 2 day working week

Due to the hot phase of the carnival season that is starting next week Thursday and as I had to take my remaining 2022 holidays before end of Mar-23, I will be on holiday starting Wednesday. Tomorrow we will have the first Sprint Demo of the current three month period and Tuesday I am at the Campus again to say good bye to two other Interns.

This year is the 200th anniversary of the Cologne Carnival parade, a really long time that this all started.

Another anniversary has Levi Strauss & Co. - Celebrating 150 Years of the Iconic Levi’s® 501® Fit. - "We've been innovating to meet people's needs since 1853. We invented the first blue jean, and we reinvented khaki pants. Our brands are among the most celebrated names in apparel."

Today we are celebrating the 57th Superbowl, will be interesting to see, who will be winning in the end? - Only seven Black men have ever played starting quarterback in a Super Bowl. That number includes Mahomes. Hurts will become the eighth. - Super Bowl match-up between Black QBs doesn’t obscure the NFL’s racism.

Interested in a comparison of Mahomes and Hurts, see Comparing starting QBs in Super Bowl 2023.

“The best thing about it is you’re showing kids that no matter where you grow up, what race you are, that you can achieve your dream.” -- Patrick Mahomes

“With the opportunity I have, I just wanna share some light, and show these kids that you don’t have to choose the wrong way. You can do anything you put your mind to.” – Jalen Hurts

• The 10 Must-Read Articles for Talent Professionals This Week (10-Feb-23)

• Video: Honda - The Cog
• Video: WHAT YOUR AI VACUUM CLEANER REALLY DOES WHEN YOU ARE NOT AT HOME

• Meet the ‘Oldfluencers’ – Canadian baby boomers putting a new face on aging

• *THE BRAIN OF AN ELDERLY PERSON.*

• What are the top 5 things people want from work? New report

• All In On AI: How Smart Companies Win Big With Artificial Intelligence

[11-Feb-23] One day to go until LVII

NFL Superbowl 2023 (LVII) is on 12-Feb-23

On the picture you can see, what the Dream AI generated based on the words in the headline.

Brothers due to the Kelce family, one brother is playing for the Kansas City Chiefs the other one for the Philadelphia Eagles. And the mother is supporting both.

The women navy pilots due to a historical flyover at the Superbowl 2023 with an All-Women Team. "The Navy says the flyover will honor "50 years of women flying" for the maritime service branch, which began teaching women to fly in 1973."

The Search Engine Optimizer (SEO) of my webpage is making progress and the score is 77% in the meantime, I started at 28%. Interesting to see, how this environment works and what brings the score up.

Looking at the website statistics I do not realize a difference yet, since 08-Dec-22 the start date on the new hosting platform 8,497 visits have been counted. No idea, what this would have been on the counter of the old platform, but it does not make sense to worry about this anymore. This is history ...

• Why Elon Musk Does Not Follow Agile

• What Is Leadership? 10 Ways To Define It

• What Google Learned From Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team

• TED Playlist: A playbook for agile, inclusive leadership

• 30+ Killer AI Tools That Are So Valuable That They Feel Illegal To Know — No BS

• What is generative AI? An AI explains

[08-Feb-23] Being happy or not ...

Starting with Words and Pictures by Grant Snider

Cambridge Dictionary: HAPPY = feeling, showing, or causing pleasure or satisfaction

I started to do regular satisfaction checks in my project in last December. The latest survey was initiated yesterday with two questions:

1. How satisfied are you with your current role in the project, from 1 (low) to 5 (high)?
2. What needs to happen, to bring you to a higher level, if you are not already at 5?

After one day recognition is the top voted point, perfect match to the outcome of our last Team Building session around motivation drivers, where recognition was the top vote as well. But there are some more days to go, so we will see.

In parallel the whole project team is voting for the Top 3 Role Models of 2023 so far and the winners will get a certificate as 1st recognition. One step in the right direction.

"In behavioral economic terms, when we offer recognition we are acknowledging that the recipients have met a social ideal. They are behaving in a certain manner because they believe is the right thing to do. If we then recognize that behavior with praise or appreciation, we offer a confirmation that their behavior is desirable, and do so in a manner that recipients find meaningful." -- Cindy Ventrice, taken from

Top 102 Employee Recognition Quotes To Celebrate Their Endeavours

• Sahil Bloom: The Surfer Mentality
• Deloitte: Talent acquisition analytics

  Using analytics for smarter sourcing and hiring decisions

• 8 things you need to know about AI this month

• A neuroscientist shares the 4 ‘highly coveted’ skills that set introverts apart: ‘Their brains work differently’

• TED Ed video: Why aren't we only using solar power? - Alexandros George Charalambides and the explanation how the video was created

• How Lil Nas X’s Performance Coach Develops Talent

• 43 Best Resume Tips for Landing a Job in 2023

• ChatGPT Passes Google Coding Interview for Level 3 Engineer With $183K Salary

• These are the technology trends that will shape our lives in 2023
  

• Here's why we need to get more women in transport and logistics

• Tanmay Vora: Six Rules to Simplify Work

[06-Feb-23] Interesting lists ...

You might be surprised, who is on it

I know the new #1 on the Artists of all Time list, but the 2nd to 6th places are really surprising. I do not even know some of the names, mostly Classic and Country music artists.

We had an interesting discussion today about the planning cycles in our project. Every year is roughly divided into four 3 month long increments and we use an ongoing calendar over several years. For all team members to better plan their holiday periods.

The next planning will be between 04- and 06-Apr-23, one day before Good Friday and in the first week of the Easter school holidays in our part of Germany. We talked about three possible scenarios - stay with the initial plan, do it one week earlier or minimum one week later, to avoid a conflict with the holiday period. After a quick check with the Product Owners and Scrum Masters we realized that a lot of the team members did make their holiday planning, keeping the long known planning dates in mind, well done!!

In order to appreciate the smart guys we will make no changes to the planning dates. The rest either does not care or is not aware yet, so why bother? Keeping it simple ...

"Once you see the outcomes and the results, and you see how many people are helped and benefitting, you want to keep on doing it because it's so simple." -- Dolores Huerta, taken from Quote Master

• We Asked, They Answered: What Women Leaders Really Want at Work

• Video: STORYWORTHY by Matthew Dicks | Core Message

• 8 Things Smart People Never Reveal About Themselves At Work

• How Electronic Arts Improved Diversity With Something That Looked Like Bureaucracy, But Wasn’t

• Sketchplanations: Umbrellas and funnels

[03-Feb-23] Learning never stops

Be ready to go on and on and on ...

The concept of the customer loyalty workshop was approved yesterday. We double the initially proposed one hour by HR to two hours, try to make it more personal and combine a learning experience with a team brainstorming session. In the end we will be using a Circle of Control to get clarity about our situation and possibilities. 

In the mindset of Lifelong Learning it is always good to learn something new, leave your comfort zone or get/take another perspective once in a while.

Today was a great day as we did restart bi-weekly Brown Bag sessions in our project environment. One answer to the outcome of our last Team Building session around MOTIVATION drivers that asked for more Recognition and Learning opportunities. With the session today we offered learning around Python Coding Standards for the team and a recognition for the presenter in front of a larger audience. When we can come to a higher level of common understanding about standards and priorities, we could improve the quality of our software code over time. Exactly, what we need. 

• 3 WAYS TO FIND ENJOYMENT TODAY

• PRESENCE: 12 SIGNS YOU AREN’T HERE

• Video: 3,200-Megapixel Camera Is Nearly Ready

• Video: OpenAI GPT-4 Chatbot Search Engine For Microsoft w/ THIS + NEW ChatGPT AI Tool + Nvidia PADL NLP
• Video: My Apologies to the Simon Sinek Fans

• 5 Big Ideas for Building Great Cultures

• Aristotle on Storytelling in User Experience

• No Bad Ideas or Silly Questions: How to Facilitate a Truly Inclusive Culture

• Creating slides with MARP

[01-Feb-23] Value proposition ...

Why do your customers buy from you?

"What motivates people to choose you, to choose your products over the hundreds of alternatives? What makes your company, and your products, better than the rest? The answer: your value proposition."

What works for companies can also work for employees, as you can see on the picture today. Just copy & transfer a little bit.

"At the end of the day, the true value proposition of education is employment." — Sebastian Thrun, taken from 27 famous quotes about Value Proposition

• TED Talk: The single biggest health threat women face

• Infographic: Generative AI Explained by AI

• Sahil Bloom: 10 Dangerous Lies We Tell Ourselves
• Frank Sonnenberg: How to Determine If Someone Is Trustworthy

• Tony Robbins | The #1 Thing I’d Teach My Kids Today

• EFFICIENCY: ONE SIMPLE PLAN TO LOSE LESS MONEY

• How to Do 4 Hours of the Best Work of Your Life (Without Cheap Hacks)

• The Top 6 Reasons Digital Transformation Fails

• Six reasons successful leaders love questions

[31-Jan-23] Show Your Passion ...

Learn from the well known experts

You can say a lot about Steve Jobs as a person, but he was great in selling products. 9 hints how to improve on the picture.

I finished my first cycle of preparation for the Customer Loyalty workshop at the end of Feb-23 today. I did add feedback cycles using Mentimeter and even the possibility for a hybrid workshop setup, just in case not all team members can make it to the Campus to come together in the same room. Now I am waiting for comments from selected colleagues to further improve the concept.

• More details about Kevin Stirtz

• What People Want from Work in 2023 – The Leadership That Works Newsletter

• Google created an AI that can generate music from text descriptions, but won’t release it

• A watermark for chatbots can expose text written by an AI

• Thanks to Alpha Signal for proving the two links directly above
• TED Playlist: Harnessing the future of data

• Companies that change the game can change the world

• Attributes of a Powerful Question

[30-Jan-23] An interesting Déjà Vu ...

Going back 24+ years in time

Luckily the Website analytics is working again, currently the counter is at 7,474 total visits since 08-Dec-22, according to the One.com approach: 

"There are two ways of obtaining data to do web analytics; from the access log files or from page tagging with Javascript in the browser. Our statistics tool gets its data from the access logs. The advantage with using log files to collect data is, that you don't need to add any code to your pages and that all your pages are automatically analyzed."

As you might remember I am currently reading the HOW THE MIGHTY FALL by Jim Collins book (please scroll back to 28-Dec-22 for details). I am half way done and came across the name Carly Fiorina last week. Fun fact is that I know her from 24+ years back, when I was working in the IT management team of Lucent Technologies. During an IT Summit in New Jersey she was giving a key note speech in her role as Chief Marketing Officer. Really impressive personality.

I also mentioned her in my [11-Feb-21] Blog post, see 2021 eBOOK page 350 for further details.

In the Jim Collins book she is mentioned in her role as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Hewlett-Packard Company (1999 - 2005). In 2016 Carly did even join the Presidential Race. What was not really well received with her activities and "accomplishments" before. A lot can happen in 18 years, to be judged by better experts than me. 

• 11 Habits of Supremely Happy People

• Boston Dynamics SHOCKING NEW Atlas AI Robot Automation Technology + 3D Modeling GeoCode AI

• Gerd Leonhard #Futurist #humanistic analysis and review of #chatgpt and #generativeai gerdtalks13

• U.S. Employee Engagement Needs a Rebound in 2023

• “Being young is a state of mind, it doesn’t depend on one’s body.”

• Elon Musks Idea Of Colonizing Mars Is Crazy, But Would Be A Massive Step For Humanity – Russian Cosmonaut

[29-Jan-23] My week 04-2023 highlights

One month nearly gone, 11 more to go ...

Today is the 4th anniversary of passing the 100,000 overall reader milestone back on 29-Jan-2019. A lot happened since then when I passed the 6-digit counter for the 1st time. Last year I reached the 1,000,000 milestone on 01-Sep-2022, the first 7-digit number. Due to my Blog hosting company change the counter is not available anymore and the Website analytics is still a little bit foggy and not really easy to understand for me. Just today the analytics numbers from yesterday are gone and a very small number is left. Hopefully only a mistake that can be fixed shortly? We will see next week.

The other picture was provided by Stefan Wolpers in his weekly newsletter. Here some more of the articles he shared:

• Finding Adequate Metrics for Outer, Inner, and Process Quality in Software Development

• Building Products With AI

• Stefan is working for Berlin Product People GmbH

In the coming week I will be three times at our company Campus. Monday one Intern is leaving, on Wednesday another one is starting and Thursday for a face-2-face meeting with my boss. Always good to use this opportunity. And early Feb-23 all COVID-19 restrictions at the work place will be finally gone and we are back to "normal". 

Have a great, interesting, surprising and productive week. Here some supporting material:

• The Dangerous Animals of Product Management

• Quiz: Are you an extrovert, introvert or ambivert?

• The 10 Must-Read Articles for Talent Professionals This Week        (27-Jan-23)

• The Increasingly Important Role of AI in Customer Experience

Picture below from my [07-Jun-21] Blog post, see 2021 eBOOK page 220 for further details

The first review of the planned Customer Loyalty workshop did go well yesterday. We scheduled it for end of Feb-23 now and try to get as much as possible team members together at our location. Some fine-tuning is still required and I need to get all material that I plan to use also in English language, for our none German speaking team members.

My MOTIVATION workshop for the project team last Monday was very well received and I did get good feedback afterwards. I was asked to give it again for a larger team in the near future. Mouth to mouth recommendation is the best way to grow.

• Boston Dynamics: Sick Tricks and Tricky Grips

• You’ve heard of interior design and graphic design – but what about protein design?

• Liquid Metal Robot : A Real Life Terminator

• 5 ways that ChatGPT could transform Microsoft Office

• India's Solar Canals. Lateral thinking at its finest!

• Explained: What is ChatGPT?

• TED: The benefits of a bilingual brain

• 40 Nonfiction Books to Watch Out for in 2023

• 5 PROVERBS FOR PEOPLE WITH BIG DREAMS

• Employee well-being: The holistic way

• Averting an energy crisis requires bold investment in renewable energy — particularly in developing economies

[24-Jan-23] The system is up again ...

After several days the ChatGPT bot did talk to me again

As you can see, I was finally successful or reached a less busy slot in the system, to get three questions answered. The two ones I wanted to ask earlier and a third one to get the confirmation about the time based knowledge span of the bot.

Besides that I started to prepare the Customer Loyalty workshop today, based on the template provided by our Human Resource department. It is not perfect and I would have approached it differently, but these are the guidelines and I can only do some minor adjustments.

• Agile 2: Today’s Agile Roles Are a Dead End

• 10 DYNAMIC JOB INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

• strategy + business: “Like mountain air in the veins”

• Microsoft and OpenAI extend partnership

“It is not your customer’s job to remember you, it is your obligation and responsibility to make sure they don’t have the chance to forget you.” -- Patricia Fripp, taken from 19 Quotes on Customer Loyalty that Help you Appreciate Your Loyal Customers

Source Youtube: How to Hack Your Brain to Destroy Procrastination

[20-Jan-23] Quick topics collection

Good to know, or not, before the weekend ...

Or new Aberdeen gnome arrived, the left one, but it took some time due to the Brexit changes and a lot of strikes in the UK. So not in time for Christmas 2022, but super early for Christmas 2023. The right gnome now has a partner, much easier to talk about home :-)

ChatGPT is still not reachable for me, but in the press everywhere. Luckily alternatives are popping up, seems to be a coming market and the next "Gold Rush"? And first concerns about AI created content are getting louder, something to keep an eye on.

• Microsoft Plans to Build OpenAI, ChatGPT Features Into All Products

• wordtune: Your thoughts in words
• YOU: The AI Search Engine You Control
• Rytr: A better, 10x faster way to write

• AI art tools Stable Diffusion and Midjourney targeted with copyright lawsuit

• How Will Artificial Intelligence Impact Project Management?

• These were the biggest AI developments in 2022. Now we must decide how to use them

The surprising Exits of the week are Jacinda Ardern resigns as prime minister of New Zealand and Tom Brady finished the NFL season much earlier than expected.

My busy week finished smoothly, the planning phase was successful and the confidence vote after just two days much better than last time, even with one team more to keep an eye on. Now we have 8 teams in our Agile Release Train (ART). Today we finished the planning phase with a Team Building session around Motivation Drivers. 40+ people in two Break-Out sessions had a lot of fun and even learned something new. Positive side effect, I can reuse the workshop next Monday with another team - courageously simplify!!

• AYODEJI BALOGUN: LEADING COMPLEX, LARGE-SCALE CHANGE WITH HEART

• Pay Transparency: What It Is and How to Prepare

• What organizational structure is effective? Use the Organizational Map

• HOW DO YOU FOCUS AND MAKE THINGS SIMPLE?

• crosschq: Recruiting Benchmarks & Metrics Report 2023

• HOW TO ASK QUESTIONS THAT WAKE-UP PEOPLE

• Sahil Bloom: The 4 Types of Luck

• Atlas Gets a Grip | Boston Dynamics

• Agile Forecasting... WITHOUT estimates?

• 5 trends shaping the world of work -and how ministers and CEOs are addressing them

• The Wordtune updates that put ChatGPT to shame

• The Fastest-Growing Jobs Around the World in 2023

• 5 Signs You’re Much Smarter Than Average

• 30 Types of Happiness (And Why You Should Try Them All)

• How many steps a day do we really need to take? Here are the facts

[18-Jan-23] About responsibilities

Making good progress during the busy week

The project system demo last Monday did go pretty smooth and everybody was really impressed and positive about the achieved results. We did get a lot of good feedback from the Senior Management participants, what helps for team motivation going forward.

Yesterday the final preparation of the next 3 month project phase did take longer than expected, as usual because everything has to be ready at the evening before, due to an early start the next day. And with team members from three different time zones that are 5.5 hours in range, you have to be flexible in start and end times.

Today was the first of two planning days and we tried to maximize the Breakout session times for the different teams as much as possible. More work and less administration time is the idea. Tomorrow is Day-2 and we are already pretty far with the details for the coming three month.

As you see on the ChatGPT picture the system is still taking a break, as the growing interest seems to be much higher than the currently available resources. We will see, if this changes shortly? Maybe they have a hidden selection criteria in the background that gives new users higher priority than the ones who had already some interaction with the Bot before? 

[16-Jan-23] Starting a busy week

Celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the USA

A busy week is starting and not much time left besides finishing the last and starting the next 3 month project phase this week. Due to this just some pictures and interesting links today.

• The unseen forces that can cause your great new idea to crash and burn

• 23 BEST Things I saw in Vegas at CES 2023!

• Is ChatGPT a Google killer?

• Most people don't realize how powerful ChatGPT can be when used correctly - by Sam Szuchan

• Here's how to (actually) use ChatGPT as effectively as possible

• The 5 Biggest Fitness and Wellness Technology Trends In 2023

• The 10 Must-Read Articles for Talent Professionals This Week (13-Jan-23)

[14-Jan-23] Chatting with ChatGPT

Getting into more details about ChatGPT and the OpenAI capabilities

After the teaser from yesterday I did get into some more details today, created an account and had some first chats with ChatGPT. Really surprising I would say. Selective perception, the more you think about something the more you find and see about the topic.

• Microsoft in talks to acquire a 49% stake in ChatGPT owner OpenAI

Microsoft was already an early supporter of OpenAI, now they want to get into the driving seat I would say. Either to better control, what is going on. Or to shut a competitor down, Google is already very concerned about ChatGPT.

As the NFL season is now coming to the serious part before the Super Bowl LVII in Feb-23, I did ask ChatGPT one question there, facts and figures work quite well as far as I can judge!!

Now starts the time of Tom Brady, win or go home for the season is his preferred level of pressure and stress, we will see how far it goes shortly, maybe already this weekend?

The statement of ChatGPT about the Turing Test is pretty smart I would say, shows some level of "self-awareness" and self-reflection already.

The answer to my question about the quote from my Blog post from yesterday is nice and political correct. Avoiding any conflicts and not answering anything wrong or stupid. Smarter than a lot of humans :-)

• Animated Chart: The Rise and Fall of Music Sales, by Format (1973-2021)

• Every Song With Over 1 Billion Spotify Streams

• Top A.I. Tools of Early 2023

• DEEP down into ChatGPT's rabbit hole

• When Big IS the Next Small Step

• The Dead Horse Theory by Monte Pedersen

• Tokyo wants to build a future-proof city. Here’s how

• How to get Scrum Teams comfortable asking for help

• 4 leadership trends to watch in 2023

• Want to get — and stay — employed through 2030? 10 jobs to consider (article from 01-Jul-2020)

• 4 Ways to Rewire Your Brain for Positive Thinking

• The Biggest Global Risks of 2023

• Simon Sinek: If You Don't Understand People, You Don't Understand Business

• No Trousers Tube Ride - London Underground 2023

• The Top 26 Science Books of 2022

• Everything you need to know about hydrogen in the clean energy transition

• Can bossless management work?

[13-Jan-23] Friday 13th ...

Quitter’s Day is held on the second Friday in January. This year, it falls on January 13.

"Research has shown that people quit their resolutions for the year by the second Friday of January." Exactly my argument why resolutions make no sense. If you need it, you should start and stop in your own time and not waste your New Year with it. If not, even better.

Dan Rockwell did post a nice article about this topic today - DON’T MAKE STUPID COMMITMENTS

Did you hear about ChatGPT so far? "We’ve trained a model called ChatGPT which interacts in a conversational way. The dialogue format makes it possible for ChatGPT to answer followup questions, admit its mistakes, challenge incorrect premises, and reject inappropriate requests."

When you read about a topic (ChatGPT) in very different newspapers, it gets more than less hyped in Social Media, market leaders get a little bit concerned (Google) and people you would not expect come up with this topic as well (in this case my 80+ year old father in law), you can be sure it is serious. Last time this happened it was TikTok. Some insights:

• I Used ChatGPT Every Day for a Month, Here’s What I’ve Learned

• ChatGPT gained 1 million users in under a week. Here’s why the AI chatbot is primed to disrupt search as we know it

Maybe a good opportunity to discuss about the Turing Test with ChatGPT? - "What Is the Turing Test? The Turing Test is a deceptively simple method of determining whether a machine can demonstrate human intelligence: If a machine can engage in a conversation with a human without being detected as a machine, it has demonstrated human intelligence."

• 7 SMALL ACTS OF DEFIANCE

• unFIX: Value Is Customer Experience, Not Customer Expectation

[11-Jan-23] Nudge the world

On a way to the world we dream of

Today a collection of different links and topics that could be related:

• Poor Habits Lead to Poor Results

• Navy Seals Can Teach You How to Have an Unbreakable Mindset

• Development That Pays: Let's put Agile to work! in videos 

• The secret to a happy life -- lessons from 8 decades of research

• These 3 smartphone apps are helping to reduce food waste around the globe. Here’s how

• France’s plan for solar panels on all car parks is just the start of an urban renewable revolution

• The ripple effect of a coaching culture at work

• CES 2023 Day 1 favorites-Dell 6K Monitor, Acer electricity generating bike desk, AI exoskeleton, and more

• A new space-based invention will radically improve climate change forecasts - here’s how

• Animals on the brink: Why extinctions matter

• Real-world data quality: What are the opportunities and challenges?

“If there is anything I would like to be remembered for it is that I helped people understand that leadership is helping other people grow and succeed. To repeat myself, leadership is not just about you. It’s about them.” – Jack Welch, taken from Famous Quotes on Coaching for Leaders

There is a really interesting LinkedIn post using the picture with the three kids - This post from Joe Rogan will help all of us keep things in perspective today.

• Our 10 Favorite Book Bites of 2022

• 4 SIGNS YOU LACK EXECUTIVE PRESENCE AND HOW TO EARN IT BACK

• These smart mini-robots could soon clean and inspect pipes

• Stronger material in 3D printing could one day be used on Mars - but how?

[06-Jan-23] Review of my 2022 JAR content

“Writing is the path to clarity." -- Pejman Milani

As promised on 28-Dec-22 I did open my JAR today and reviewed the success and fail notes of 2022. In total I had 62 notes, 29 work and 29 private life related ones. Only 4 fails - one for the Russia invasion in the Ukraine in Feb-22, one more for the stock exchanges going down due to this. Then one for a broken Linux Mint installation - I decided to install a newer version over the existing one as alternative to a new install from scratch, what was the approach in the end as the update did not work as expected. The last fail was related to a marketing department that did not understand my NO to their offer immediately, so I had to repeat it several times for them.

A lot of the private life successes had been related to my BLOG, to the overall counter, weekly or 5 week average reader records, an article series about Symbiosis that I finished in Jan-22. Fits to the thinking versus writing picture today, as well as the Sahil Bloom 1-1-1 method - Every single evening, at the end of your work day, open up your journal (or favorite digital tool/application) and write down three simple points: 1 win, 1 point of tension and 1 point of gratitude.

The other private life topics were related to e.g. finishing books, learning new stuff, nice holidays, meeting friends, celebrating events with the family, taking care of must do tasks (one-time or yearly), a new bike, etc.

In the work environment the success notes had been related to three main areas:

1. Hosting Workshops
   • Several Unique Selling Point workshops for Teams or our Talent Program
   • Team Building Workshops for several teams and after every PI planning 
   • The 2nd Data & Analytics Meetup and two break-out sessions for a management meeting
2. Agile activities
   • Nomination as Scrum Master for the New Leadership transformation project
   • Nomination as Release Train Engineer for our 2nd ART, running four PI's during 2022
   • Streamlining the project and reducing the planning effort from 3 to 2 days 
3. Feelgood management
   • Taking care of Interns before, during and after their Internship
   • Driving the "5-minute" learning posts from 601 posts until 1,650+ in the meantime
   • Getting a lot of positive feedback from the Interns and peope following the learning posts

Was a really great experience today, to review the year 2022 based on the 62 notes. Will do it again for 2023 and did put the 1st two notes into the JAR today.

[01-Jan-23] The week 52-2022 highlights

Closing the year 2022 ...

Just finished putting together my 5th eBOOK. It is already available via the Downloads button in the main menu/page. 388 pages with all my content, pictures and links from 2022. This is more than one page per day. Have a look, worth checking it out I would say, but I am not objective ...

I did also create a PDF file with all my five eBOOKs today, just for me 2,246 pages in total, as reference and to search for interesting topics that I did cover in the past already. Very valuable once in a while, when you quickly look for different references related to one topic.

One the picture today an overview of the 4,627 visits on my BLOG page since I started on the new hosting platform on 08-Dec-22. As the statistics page is making a different between USA and the individual federal states, I had to add all up to one total number and percentage. Giving a really good overview of the main reader countries as well as the global distribution of all interested parties so far.

This week we will be going to Hamburg to see the Hamilton Musical. Finally, as we had to move the date two times due to COVID-19 before. Waiting for it will be worth it, according to what my daughters did tell me about the music and story so far. We will see in the coming week ...

• Queen guitarist Brian May, fashion designer Mary Quant top U.K. honors list

• The Top 10 Tech Trends In 2023 Everyone Must Be Ready For

• The Top 5 Technology Challenges In 2023

• Top 5 In-Demand Tech Skills For Jobs In 2023

• The 5 Biggest Business Trends In 2023 Everyone Must Get Ready For Now

• How To Build A Positive Hybrid And Remote Working Culture In 2023

• Infographic: Automation May Not Come for Everyone's Job After All

I had a day off yesterday to celebrate the 19th wedding anniversary with my wife. It is called the Honeysuckle one, or Mother of pearl in Germany. The German name sounds better, anyway it was really nice and much too warm for a Winter day. Today it will be even above 17 degrees celsius, time for shorts and not New Years Eve. More global warming ...

The review of my 2022 and finishing the 5th eBOOK will happen in the coming days. Goal setting for 2023 is easy: No new year resolutions, staying authentic, sharing knowledge/ideas/experience, having fun and enjoying life-work coexistence. All the best for your 2023.

• Scott Galloway: 2023 Predictions

• 3 reasons why the future of carbon capture looks promising

• This chart shows the growth of India's economy

• Sahil Bloom: The Best of 2022

[31-Dec-22] Last day of 2022 ...

Just another 9+ hours to go in Germany

Close to the new year 2023 and the three famous people on the picture died in the last week of 2022.

• “I was born to play football, just like Beethoven was born to write music and Michelangelo was born to paint.” — Pelé (born: October 23, 1940 - died: December 29, 2022)

• “Fashion is about eventually being naked.” — Vivienne Westwood (born: April 8, 1941 - died: December 29, 2022)

• “Thank you for your love and support. May you always experience the joy that comes from putting Christ at the center of your lives.”
  — Pope Benedict XVI (born: April 16, 1927 - died: December 31, 2022)

Just assume these three would be sitting together in a train on their last journey, where ever this is going? Interesting topics to be covered: How you win three soccer World Cups as player? How you combine Punk music and fashion? How you retire as Pope and cause a lot of issues, as there is no pension fund planned and no appartment available, besides the crypt with former Pope graves :-)

They all did go their own way against the pressure and different opinions from the outside, a good concept.

Some best of 2022 TED Playlists, have a look:

• 4 Ways You Can Shape How Others Perceive You and Build an Outstanding Personal Brand

• Vodafone's mobile network has a digital twin

• Learning Fundamentals: My favourite books for 2022
• Frank Sonnenberg: You Bear Sole Responsibility for Your Circumstances

• AI generated MARVEL BABIES | Turquoise TV

There are so many ideas, what you can do to reflect on a full year, why not using the 21 questions? The article behind the picture goes into much more details and examples, have a look.

"By three methods we may learn wisdom. First, by reflection, which is noblest. Second, by imitation, which is easiest and third by experience which is bitterest."

– Confucius, taken from Top 100 Reflection Quotes To Gain Perspective

• 4 leadership trends to watch in 2023

• Ranked: The 100 Biggest Public Companies in the World

• Boushra Almutawakel: The Hijab Series

• The New Happy: To all those pursuing a dream

• How deep learning can improve productivity and boost business

• Leadership 2.0: How To Exceed Your Goals In 2023

[27-Dec-22] Some good pictures today ...

As one picture says more than 1,000 words, I am saving some words today :-)

Tsundoku - "A beautiful Japanese word for the acquiring and piling up of books without reading them. Constructed from 2 words loosely meaning piling up and reading".

Perfect fit to our sustainable Christmas tree this year, see my 23-Dec-22 post. The majority of the books have been read in 2022 and piled up in the form of a tree, so let's call it a 75% Tsundoku.

As a side note: Due to the new hosting provider of my BLOG I cannot reference single posts with the URL anymore, sorry for that. You have to download the eBOOK and search for the right post in the PDF document. Not the best solution for a one time search, but quite comfortable if you search for several times or different posts.

[23-Dec-22] A small Christmas break 

Taking a two days posting break to celebrate Christmas with the family

As you can see on the left picture our sustainable Christmas tree out of books is ready. Still a kind of tree, just out of paper in the meantime and with a similar silhouette. My daughters did struggle a little bit with the amount of books required and the right concept to get a tree like look-and-feel with the best possible hight. Some more years to go and we will have a perfect tree out of books, for sure. Enough DIY's are available, but finding it out on your own is also a lot of fun and better to learn about a proper building process.

Wishing you a great Christmas time with your family and friends.

“I stopped believing in Santa Claus when I was six. Mother took me to see him in a department store and he asked for my autograph.” -- Shirley Temple, taken from 50 Best Christmas Quotes to Get You Into the Holiday Spirit

• Visual Capitalist: Our Top 21 Visualizations of 2021
• Visual Capitalist’s Top 20 Visualizations of 2020

• We desperately need to disrupt our approach to retirement saving

“You think Yoda stops teaching, just because his student does not want to hear? A teacher Yoda is. Yoda teaches like drunkards drink, like killers kill.” – Yoda, taken from 40 Yoda Quotes That Will Leave You With All the Star Wars Feels

[21-Dec-22] Collecting ideas for 2023

Using the quiet time and holiday period to ReThinkandFocus

The Everyday Change Play Book: Because change doesn't need to be shit - arrived today already. When I am quick and the book is not that thick, it can still become part of our sustainable christmas tree, based on all the read books in the family during 2022? We will see.

My first day of the holidays and this was my highlight. The breaking news on the news channel I follow (the translation from German) - "At some distance from Earth, a team of researchers observes a large exoplanet in its death throes: According to their calculations, Kepler-1658b is getting closer and closer to its star as time goes by - a collision is inevitable."

I like the some distance from Earth statement as well as the urgency of the collision. When you read the article in more details, here an English version, you understand that the distance is 2,600 lightyears and the collision is expected to happen in 2.5 million years from now. Luckily I did not miss this message, so I am prepared in time :-)

Just in case you want to do a Personal Annual Review of 2022, here an idea from Sahil Bloom with 7 questions. He is offering a free download template:

1. What did I change my mind on this year?
2. What created energy this year?
3. What drained energy this year?
4. Who were the boat anchors in my life?
5. What did I not do because of fear?
6. What were my greatest hits and misses?
7. What did I learn this year?

“The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” — Phil Jackson, taken from 49 Famous Teamwork Quotes And Sayings

• This Algae Powered a Computer for a Year With Just Water and Sunlight

• Why Internal Mobility Should Be a Top Priority Right Now

• Student-made solar-powered car sets a new world record by traveling 620 miles

• unFIX: The Multiteaming Way: Organized Anarchy at a Startup Company

• Ask Yourself What Really Matters

• The power couple: Why solar and storage are key to reducing geopolitical risk and securing access to energy

[20-Dec-22] Year end coming closer ...

Had a great team come-together today

As mentioned yesterday we had the final whole team meeting today. We did take a look back in 2022, reviewed the status quo of the project and, what will be coming early 2023. A great session with a lot of fun and involvement. We did select the Role Model of the year - a person who someone admires and whose behaviour they try to copy.

In the end we had two winners, selected by the team and everybody had 3 votes. One was an obvious choice the other one more a secret favorite. He was very much surprised to see his name and appreciated the choice of his colleagues a lot. An early Christmas present for him.

In the end I used the opportunity to make some marketing for my Blog, especially with the India feature from yesterday. In the current Statistics visitors from India are only 13th place with 1.23%. There should be much more possible :-)

At the end of the day I started my Christmas holidays until 06-Jan-23, really looking forward to a more quiet period and some time to read a book. One on my list is - The Everyday Change Play Book: Because change doesn't need to be shit.

• Management 3.0 Blog

• Lisette Sutherland - Interview with Jurgen Appelo

• 16 PRACTICAL WAYS TO BE AN INSPIRATIONAL LEADER

• ‘A New World of Work Requires a New Way to Lead’—Stephen M.R. Covey, McKinlee Covey, and Doug Conant on Leadership in 2023

• Differentiate Yourself as a Leader: 4 Ways to Challenge the Status Quo

• The power of incremental momentum

• [German only] Führungskräfte empfehlen: Diese Business-Bücher solltest du 2023 lesen

• 10 DOS AND 7 DON’TS FOR MENTORING MILLENNIALS

• How trees make oxygen, and other ways they are vital to human existence

• What Santa Gets Right About Workplace Culture

• 10 Ways To Spot A Truly Exceptional Employee

[19-Dec-22] Interesting insights

Never thought about the size and the numbers

"Hypothetically, if India’s states were to all became countries today, they would take up half the spots in a ranking of the world’s top 20 most populous countries."

When you look at the numbers you will realize that a lot of countries would fit into the whole population of India. I am working with Indian teams for a lot of time already, but did never take this perspective. You can always learn new stuff, when you are ready to change.

Find a 3.5 minute video summary of the book at Managing Transition William Bridges by Constance Jenkins Pritchard.

Our Sprint-4 Demo today was a great success and we could show a lot of progress on our journey until 09-Jan-23. Tomorrow we will finish the year with a 1-hour get-together, to recap our accomplishments, to celebrate the good work a little bit and to get aligned for our way forward in 2023.

“Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, and today is a gift... that's why they call it the present!” -- Master Oogway

• Climatarian, flexitarian, vegetarian, vegan: Which diet is best for the planet? (And what do they mean?)

• Mapped: The World’s Countries Compared by 20 Key Metrics

• ‘Wind and Solar Are Proving Themselves’: Renewables Met Rise in Electricity Demand During First Half of 2022

• Great to see, when former colleagues are making their way to success - AmCham Bulgaria CEO Ivan Mihaylov Comments on Bulgaria's Relationship with US Investors

• This MIT research could help us unlock smaller, lighter and safer batteries

Post updated 17-Dec-22 to have proper order on mobile phones

[16-Dec-22] Do you get this joke?

Just a matter of interest or age ...

When you like cartoons, but never heard about The Roadrunner and the Coyote from The Looney Tunes before, this joke might be hard to understand?

"The Acme Corporation is a corporation that features prominently in the Road Runner/Wile E. Coyote cartoons as a running gag featuring outlandish products that fail or backfire catastrophically at the worst possible times." - so much about ACME ...

In summary the key point in communication is, be aware of your audience and their diversity types, not only with respect to a