Hair Styling meets Team Leadership

Last February 14th, I was at the En Vogue Salon getting my regular hair cut. The owner, Kim, commented that I'd made considerable progress in my personal grooming and attitude since I had first started coming there. There was, however, one skill that continued to elude me: the stylish hair muss. I finally figured it out, and I realized that there was a lesson about team leadership somewhere in there too.

Crazy? Read on.

The Mystery of Hair Mussing

A little background for those of you who are mystified, as I once was, by the world of hair styling: After you get your hair cut, the stylist will typically put something in your hair to make it look better. In my case, Kim uses a "styling wax" (Paul Mitchell Tea Tree™, if you must know). She dabs a small amount on her fingers, spreads it over her palms, and then with a few expert swipes at my hair makes everything look right. It's magical! Carson Kressley on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy calls this zhushing, and the best way I can describe it is that it's an artful running of the fingers through the hair. The result should look in-place, but free and playful. Kim is a master of the zhush, and even though I've seen her do it many times when I'm in the chair, I could not for the life of me duplicate it at home. Clearly, my technique was at fault, though I could not understand how I could mess up something as simple as running my own fingers through my own hair.

I mentioned this sad state of affairs to Kim, who cheerfully asserted that it was really easy. She said that we'd do "Hair Wax 101" after the hair cut, and she even promised that she'd wash my hair again if it didn't work. Now that's service...you can see why I like going to this place.

It's All in the Finger Pressure

Here's what I was supposed to do, as explained by Kim:

1. Put a small, pea-sized dollop of hair wax onto the tips of my fingers.
2. Rub hands together, spreading the wax evenly over the fingers and palms.
3. Run fingers through hair.
4. Tweak hair until it "looks good."

I did 1 and 2 just fine. Then, as Kim watched with mild horror, I used my fingers as a kind of meaty comb, pressing firmly into my hair and scalp. I went from the back and front, thoroughly applying the product throughout my hair. The result: spiky helmet head. The problem? Too much force.

Kim commented, having diagnosed the problem, that guys tend to put too much pressure on their hair. She told me that from now on, I was only to run my fingers through the top layer of my hair. She fixed my head as she explained the process; I noted as I watched that I shouldn't touch my scalp at all. If you do, what happens is that you end up waxing the roots of your hair, which makes them stick up funny or lie flat against your scalp. And to be clear: it's not a "good look."

The second trick is just let the hair fall where it wants to. When your hair is cut by an expert, it will do this. The hair wax is to add some texture and some variation to the surface, plus a little bit of sheen. Some bits of hair will be out of place after the zhush. She just flicks those parts lightly until they land better. You don't want to force the errant hairs into place, because it'll look unnatural. It's like dusting cocoa on a cake, or scattering rose pedals or leaves...you want things to fall naturally to look natural.

Application to Team Leadership

About a week later, I was relating this story to the New Media Group. We had been talking about management styles prior to this, and I made the observation that the "artful hair muss" was very much like an experienced team lead. So many new managers think that their responsibility is explicit control over a team or project, so they press hair and apply external controls that end up being unfunky and unproductive. The result is a mess. The experienced team lead, on the other hand, already knows what naturally happens in a team environment and knows how things will "naturally fall" given the personalities involved and the nature of the task. A few artful zhushes and taps, and everything falls into place. There is no need to apply explicit pressure to force things into place, because the experienced team lead knows how things will unfold. Of course, having the project set up right in the first place (analagous to having a good haircut) helps the project fall into place even better. Remember, though, there are two parts: you need expertly cut hair in the case of the hair wax, and you need to have a team that can work together. Every head of hair has its cowlicks and weird quirks that an expert stylist can work around, and the same is true for every team. It's easier said than done, of course.

So next time you're putting gel in your hair or energy into your group, consider the light touch and help things fall where they naturally would. You need less force than you might think, and sometimes you don't need any at all. Think about how you'd organize the team along natural strengths, and what you need to do to make sure that these fall into place naturally. At the very least, it'll help those long meetings go by quicker.

Hocus Focus

The past couple of weeks have been, for me, very un-GTD. Instead, I seem to be in a "Things are Getting Done, Somehow" mode; stuff happens, but not in any particularly directed manner. To top that off, I haven't been doing my PCEO forms, nor have I been doing Menu of the Day. Yet, I'm feeling weirdly productive. I think it's because I've been talking to a lot of people and have been slowly booking up a backlog of projects, so now, it's time to get busy!

It's focus that eludes me at the moment.

Here's my problem: I've got more than a few projects I'm working on simultaneously, each requiring different parts of my brain:

• A pure eye-smacking visual design project
• A Flash XML protocol definition and back end interface
• A corporate web rearchitecting and reskin
• Creating a video game class library for a learning environment.
• Conceiving and writing my first article for an online magazine

Then there's the usual:

• Continued Printable CEO forms development
• Ongoing social network expansion
• New Media Group
• Conference Calls & Meetings
• This blog
• Business stuff like accounting, creating marketing strategies and collateral, etc.
• Keeping a clean house

I'm not used to dealing with this many projects at once, but I figure it's good to pile on the pressure to see what happens.

I immediately have noticed that my "action path" is quite random. Instead of focusing on one task and seeing it through to completion, the environment itself is distracting me. For example, I'll need to write a check, so I pull up a bill and start filling it out. In the process of finding the bill, I have to find an address, so I look at my mail program, get distracted by another email I have to answer, which triggers a need to dig info up on Google, and then I have to go upstairs and I forget that I was paying the bill, because in the process of grabbing a stack of mail from upstairs I end up reading something that distracts me further from my path. Then I see a pair of socks on the floor and start collecting laundry.

And that's a good reason not to work at home :-) It's filled with distractions! However, working at home is a lot cheaper than renting space, so I need to find another way to maintain focus.

Elements of Focus

I think we tend to think of Focus as a kind of mind trick: you're either focused, or you're not. You tell your brain "OK, FOCUS" and the well-trained mind tunes out all distractions.

If your brain doesn't work that way, then focus can be gained through use of external motivators. For example, a project manager can remind you of what you need to deliver by what time. Your state of mind is regulated by a third party that acts as a sort of pacemaker for keeping your brain in a regular rhythm. Setting a deadline and promising it to someone is another way of putting some external regulation on your focus mechanism. In game design, keeping the goal clear and concrete is essential! "Ship By This Date or Die" can work wonders :-)

I also have a theory about how your eyes play a role in the focus game. This thought popped up just a few days ago:

• I was talking to a friend about really listening to people. Eye contact is important in making the other person feel that they're in a conversation, and I mentioned that I sometimes am not sure exactly where to look. If I focus on the left eyeball of the other person too long, I wonder if it's too intense or maybe impolite. So I move my gaze around a bit. My friend found this fascinating because she's a martial artist, and part of her training is to know exactly where to put your eyes. She thought it was cool that a non-martial artist like me was thinking of these things. In each case, the eyes are essential parts of the activity.

• You know how the physical act of smiling cheers you up, even if you're feeling bad? By forcing yourself to configure your face into a smile, something happens that makes you feel better. It's fascinating that the body can induce good feeling to chair-bound nerds as myself; I suspect that people who exercise regularly totally know what I'm talking about.

So combining these two insights together, here's what I'm thinking:

If I deliberately control what I'm looking at during the course of the day, will focus follow? In other words, visual focus lead to mental focus, much in the way that smiling leads to feeling good.

It seems plausible, though I have nothing backing me up. Most of the time my eyes are looking at everything and taking it in. It's natural then that I get distracted; since I'm not controlling what I'm looking at, I'm allowing distracting impulses to enter my brain, which has to fight off the impulse. And the best way to not get into a fight is not to be there in the first place, you know?

Other Contributors to Focus

Above we've talked about The Mind, and the Mind Following the Body. There are other helpful tricks that we can think up too. Consider the Body itself:

• The string around your finger is a good mnemonic to remind you to stay on task. It engages our senses (our built-in interrupt system), and he physical proximity of the string provides low-level and continual reinforcement of what you need to do.

  The reason it works is that it's pretty much always in view. It catches your eye if you've chosen your string well, and even the sensation of having a string on your finger may remind you that you should be focusing.

• Diet affects my mental clarity, I find. Complex carbohydrates (breads, sugars) induce an insulin rush that makes me feel sleepy and unfocused; I have learned to cut out sugar and other carbs almost entirely if I need to be focused and alert. If you are one of those people who feel like napping after lunch, then you're probably in the same boat. Hard to focus when you're feeling sleepy.

• Also overlooked is proper hydration. You're supposed to drink 64oz of water (not soda) a day. When I've remembered to do this, I've felt great. This contributes a great deal to mental clarity, but not in an obvious cause-and-effect way. Give it a try and see if you don't feel better after a day.

• Adequate and regular sleep cycle? Can't focus if you're tired.

• Regular exercise gets the blood flowing. And sometimes just going outside and going for a 15 minute walk induces a marvelous sense of clarity and focus, as you ponder what it is you need to be doing.

Consider also environmental approaches:

• Paper-based approaches work partly because they're less distracting. Computers morph between productivity tool and entertaining distraction in the blink of an incoming email. Paper doesn't morph like that, which is why I like it. Plus you aren't limited to displaying your task list on the computer screen, but can move to another area where you can think.

• Feedback-based Procedures help focus, because it narrows down the list of things you really have to be aware of to move forward, and you don't have to think. It never occured to me that the type of projects that I tend to do themselves are not particularly proceduralized in this way. By creating some procedure for doing this kind of creative work, I may be able to improve my productivity by simplifying the complexity of my mental work. An interesting idea!

• When you don't have a separate office away from home, a work shrine might provide a sense of respite away from distraction where you can see the big picture again. I haven't been able to maintain this as well as I like.

My tentative conclusion is that Focus can be trained. I could even develop a focus-enhancing regimen that increases my productivity. Will have to think how that can be packaged for deployment in any given situation.

Which reminds me:

• Distraction storage is essential if project ideas keep popping up. My Pickle Jar is good for that, as is this blog. I don't have time to think about this stuff now, so into idea cold storage it goes.

Ok, that's enough for now. I really should be working :-)

» Read Part II of Hocus Focus

Creating a Hybrid CD-ROM with Toast 7

Geeky notes in progress to myself on a CD-ROM project: how to create a CD that will work on the Mac and on the PC, using Roxio Toast 7 and a small flotilla of support utilities. This is the first time I've done this in---geez---12 years, so I had to research the current process.

I don't want to have to look this up again, so I'm writing it down. VERY GEEKY. You've been warned.

These notes are still a little rough, but should get you in the ballpark of what you need to do

Make sure you read the comments at the end too; there are some helpful notes that other users have added (especially regarding the tricky hiding of files).

Update for Toast 8: I'm told by a reader that the newer version of Toast, version 8, actually implements a lot of these features more intuitively now. I have not personally confirmed this though.

Authoring Options

The project: A Flash Projector that loads SWF movies from a subdirectory named _data. The projector needs to automatically run on the PC, and open a folder on the Mac with the projector readily clickable. Also, want to make it very obvious what to click on by hiding files that are not user-friendly.

I last used Toast in 1993 to make hybrid CD-ROMs. These are CD-ROMs that have both the nice Mac icons and PC files. The Mac doesn't see the PC files, and the PC doesn't see the Mac files. If there are shared files (for example, giant video files), they can be made visible to both Mac and PC sides.

• MacImage is a PC solution that does the job, but doesn't allow you to create a nice Macintosh partition with custom backgrounds. Looks like a good solution for sharing data with basic functionality, but it won't create a CD that holds up to the expectations of discerning Macintosh users.

• Adaptec Toast 7 Titanium ($99, Macintosh) still has a custom hybrid mode that allows you to create decent hybrid CDs. And a lot of other "home" oriented uses like "backing up your DVDs" and other such nonsense. Despite that, I bought it after MacImage didn't end up doing what I needed. It seems to work, though the UI dialogs are a little buggy. This used to be very solid German software when it was just from Astarte. What happened?

Hardware / Software Kit

Here's what I ended up using...

• Powerbook 12" with a Matshita CD-RW CW-8122 combo DVD/CDRW drive.
• Mac OS X 10.4.3
• Roxio Toast 7 Titanium (version 7.01)
• AutoOpen 1.0 from Nibfiles.com No longer available!
• Apple Disk Utility 10.5.3 (198.5)
• XCode developer kit utility SetFile to set invisibility bit
• Photoshop w/ IconBuilder XP from iconfactory.com (Windows Version) to create .ico file
• Text Editor on PC to create autorun.inf file
• Blank CD-RW disk for testing (didn't want to waste lots of CD blanks)

Prepping the PC Side

When someone inserts the CD into a Windows PC, it should automatically run a file (assuming AutoRun is enabled and functioning). This is accomplished with the AUTORUN.INF file. It must be prepared on the PC side, because PC-ANSI line endings must be used otherwise AUTORUN will fail. In other words, don't use the Mac to create the following file, and don't edit it on the Mac either. Here's my AUTORUN.INF file:

[autorun]
label=E3Expo Prospectus
icon=_dataE3Video.ico
open=E3ExpoProspectus.EXE

Notes:

• label is the name of the CD as it will appear in My Computer. This is different from the CD-ROM Volume Name. It may contain spaces and be over 16 characters (unlike the CD-ROM Volume Name). This may be a feature only available on Windows XP.

• icon is the pathname to an icon to use for the CD-ROM, as it appears in My Computer. Here it's pointing to a directory called _data. The E3Video.ico file contains Icon resources created with an Icon Editor. In my case, the program I used was The IconFactory's IconBuilder XP.

• open is the program to run. The pathname may not have any spaces in it. You can also select an icon to show, if it's embedded in the EXE, if you're not using the icon entry by appending a comma followed by a number. To do this you would have to build the icon into the EXE resource, which requires other development tools on the PC to do.

You'll note that there's three files listed: The _data folder, the AUTORUN.INF file, and the projector itself E3ExpoProspectus.EXE. The average person may not know which file to click on to run it, should AutoRun fail to work on their computer. Fortunately, we can hide all the files except for the projector using the Toast 7 ISO Layout Tools.

Prepping the Mac Side, Part I

We're going to make a separate disk image to contain all our files for the Mac side. This will allow us to set it up just right:

• We'll have a cool Custom Background Picture for the Folder!
• There will just be ONE icon, the movie projector, to click on!
• The Folder with the projector will automatically open when the CD is inserted.

1. Launch Disk Utility (it's in your Applications/Utilities folder). Create a new disk image that's big enough to hold all the files you want. I made a 40MB disk image, with R/W access, and named it as I want my CD to be named when it's inserted. Save the disk image (it has a .dmg suffix) somewhere. Use Disk Utilty to mount the disk image. An icon will appear on your desk representing the new disk image. This is a virtual hard drive. Cool! For the sake of example, the Disk Image shall be named E3Expo Prospectus.

2. Copy all your Mac files, including files you plan to SHARE on the PC side, into the new disk image. Arrange them how you want. Warning. In my limited experience, deleting and re-adding files seems to mess up some file references after I burn (background images not showing up, for example). It might be something else, but thought I'd mention it. Renaming files is OK, though.

3. To apply the background folder image, go to the Finder's View menu and choose Show View Options. Click This Window Only at the top, then choose Picture at the bottom. Navigate to an image that's on the new disk image you created. If it's not there, move it there. For my example, the background file (I'm using a PNG file) needs to be on the volume named E3Expo Prospectus, because that's going to be converted into my CD of the same name.

4. Adjust the size of the window to match the background, and position icons artistically. If there are files you're planning on hiding later, just stuff them somewhere away from where the pretty layout is happening. You may want to use the Finder to hide the toolbar (the selector on the left of the window) and change to icon view. Both these options are in the Finder's View menu.

5. Close your folder window and open it again. This will save the layout.

We're eventually going to hide all the files we don't want users to see, but before we do that we have to set up Toast 7 to access files shared between the Mac and PC side. That's because Toast can't see hidden files, so to add them to the PC side they need to be left visible.

For reference, here's the files in the _data folder, to be shared between both the Mac and PC sides of the disk, as it appears in my mounted disk image on the Mac:

/Volumes/E3Expo Prospectus/
    _data/
        folderbg.png
        video.swf
        loop.swf
        E3Video.ico
    E3Expo Prospectus

The only file I want showing is E3Expo Prospectus, the application(not the volume name). So, I plan to hide the _data folder. Since I also need to share this folder on the PC, I need to wait until after I've added it to the ISO builder in Toast. Make sense? No? Well, just take my word for it.

Toast Prep, Part I -- Build PC ISO Side of Disk

The Custom Hybrid mode is available when you show legacy formats and settings in Toast 7's preferences. While you're there, also check Show hidden files in content areas.

1. Make a new CD and choose Custom Hybrid as the type. You'll see that you can choose a Mac and an ISO part of the CD. We're going to set up the ISO side first. This is what the PC sees.

2. Click on the Select ISO button and you'll see a Layout box. Add all your PC files here. For SHARED files, add them from the Mac disk image you've been working on. Toast will figure out that these are shared files and will do its magic behind the scenes. Note that there is some kind of bug with adding folders...if you add a folder first, the listing gets messed up. So add a regular file first, then the folder.

3. Name the CD to something other than "My Disc" It must be less than 16 characters to conform to Windows standards ("Joliet"). Note that the label entry in the autorun.inf file will be displayed in place of the actual CD Volume name on newer computers; older computers will see the old name.

4. After you're done adding everything, we can hide the files. Select the Icon (not the name) and type COMMAND-I (Info). You can then check the hidden option. Alternatively you can double-click the Icon to get this dialog. It doesn't seem to be documented. You can even hide the AUTORUN.INF file and AutoRun will still work, at least in my limited testing.

5. I left the Layout and Settings dialogs alone. The Defaults seem to work fine.

Prepping the Mac Side, Part II

Now that we've added our shared _data folder to the ISO side, we can go ahead and hide the files we don't want to be seen by the Mac user.

1. You need to make sure you have XCode, the development environment, installed on your Mac. It's included with every MacOS X CD, and it's also downloadable. It's HUGE, so you might look around for another utility that sets the hidden bit on files. I had XCode installed already, so I just used that and didn't both to look elsewhere.

2. Open up Terminal (in Applications/Utilities). Type the following without pressing RETURN at the end. Also leave a space after the "V"...

   /Developer/Tools/SetFile -a V 
   

3. Now, open up the disk volume you've been playing with the custom background and icon positions, that you ran AutoOpen on before. Find the name of a file you want to hide (it can also be a folder). Drag and Drop it on the Terminal window. The rest of the command line will be be filled in, and you'll see something like this (here I dragged the _data folder):

   /Developer/Tools/SetFile -a V /Volumes/E3Expo Prospectus/_data/
   

4. Go ahead and press RETURN now. This will set the INVISIBLE BIT on the file. Do this with the other files you want to hide. If you need to undo the invisible bit, replace the upper-case V with a lower-case v in the command line (use the up/down arrow keys in Terminal to review and edit history).

5. You'll probably notice that the files don't seem to be disappearing right away. Don't worry about that...it takes MacOS X a while to catch up. We'll be forcing it to do that in the next few steps.

6. When everything is done, EJECT the disk volume, then REMOUNT it. You may do this through Disk Utility, which seems more robust than double-clicking the .DMG files directly. My system becomes unstable otherwise.

7. The files you set to be invisible should now be invisible. You'll probably want to resize the window and rearrange the remaining icons to make everything pretty.

8. Move the newly-prettified window to the upper-left corner of your screen. This ensure that the folder will be viewable on machines that don't have the high resolution that yours has. Close the window, then open it again.

9. Now use AutoOpen to set the disk volume to Auto Open. Consult the manual for specifics. This will set the disk image to open automatically when inserted, once it's burned to a CD. If it actually works, send your $10.00 to the author of AutoOpen! [12-15-2006] Apparently AutoOpen has disappeared, but this article has some information about Auto-opening folders by using the following command in Terminal (I've modified it to reflect the name I'm using for the Mac disk image):

   sudo bless -folder "/Volumes/E3Expo Prospectus/" -openfolder "/Volumes/E3Expo Prospectus/"

   Note: I haven't tested this yet, but am just writing it here for next time I need to burn a CD.

Toast Prep, Part II -- Prepping the Mac Side

Having finished making the mounted disk image exactly the way we want, we're finally we're ready to set up the Mac side of the CD. It's easy: Just click Select Mac... on the Custom Hybrid window in Toast 7.

1. Select the disk volume you've been doing everything to.

2. Click OK

3. You're done!

Burning the CD

I used a CD-RW (rewriteable CD) to test my CDs on both PC and Mac. Keep in mind that CD-RW discs aren't as fast as regular CDs, so if your application is data-rate sensitive you'll want to check it on a regular CD-R to get the true sense of how it works.

Anyway, click the big red button in the lower right of the screen to burn the CD. It should take just a few minutes.

Testing the Mac Side

Now the exciting part...making sure the damn thing works.

1. If you have another Macintosh, test on that. If you don't, make sure your unmount the disk image you selected in Toast first! Otherwise you'll have two copies of the same volume, and when your CD runs it will grab files from the disk image. You want it to grab files from the CD itself.

2. Check that the folder is opening automatically when you insert the CD.

3. Check that the background image is showing up correctly.

4. While you're at it, check file names too. Make sure everything's pretty the way you like it.

Testing the PC Side

1. Find a different CD that you know works with AutoPlay, and make sure AutoPlay is working. Some PCs do not have functioning AutoPlay. The owner may have turned it off, or AutoPlay has become corrupted by a third-party piece of software. Troubleshooting AutoPlay on a PC is not my idea of fun, so I'll skip the explanation. If it doesn't work, find a PC that does have it working. Most CD-based installers for the PC use an Autorun.INF file, so chances are you have a CD you can used to test.

2. Once you've found a PC with working AutoPlay, insert your Hybrid CD in and see if it works. If it doesn't, double-check the AUTORUN.INF file. You might have screwed up a pathname, left out the [autorun] line at the top of the file, or you didn't listen and used a Macintosh to create the file with the WRONG line endings. You might have also used a filename with a SPACE in it for the open line. I have done all these things, and they are all irritating things to have happen to you.

3. If AutoRun does seem to work, then you're good! Look in My Computer and see if the name of the CD is showing up as how you've defined label in autorun.aif. This may be a Windows XP feature...not sure if it's available on 98, ME, or 2000 (see the end of this doc for my testing notes). Also check that the Icon (the .ICO file specified in the icon line of AutoRun.INF) is showing up.

4. Double Click the CD-ROM Icon. This should relaunch the application instead of opening a browser window.

5. Quit the application, and right-click the CD-ROM Icon. Choose EXPLORE from the menu that pops up. You can then view the contents of the CD and make sure everything that's hidden is supposed to be hidden. If you've done your job, the only visible clickable file is the Projector executable. There's almost no way to mess that up.

6. Have a beer. Good job.

Wrapping Up

If everything looks good, you can master the CD. The CD mastering company just called me and told me they need a physical CDR that has been tested and checked on the target platforms. That is, the CDR I send needs to be tested. Perfect. They duplicate it bit-by-bit. They can accept an image (ISO), but it costs $200 to turn around a check disc.

The format of the CDR: Mac side is HFS (Mac OS Standard, not Extended) , and PC Side is ISO-9660 Mode 1 (Mode 2 is called CD-ROM XA in Toast 7, Mode 1 is just called CD-ROM).

A reader points out that the Mac side of the disc will truncate long filenames to the much-hated 31-character filename limit.

Tested Platforms: PC

• Windows XP SP2 + service updates to 12/19/2005, AutoRun Enabled ... OK!
• Windows XP SP2 + service updates to 12/19/2005, AutoRun Disabled (and broken) on my notebook. Only Projector file visible, clickable. Acceptable.
• Windows 2000 Advanced Server + service updates to /12/1/2005, AutoRun Enabled. Icon didn't show, replaced with generic icon. label didn't show. Presentation launched automatically. Double-clicking CD drive launched presentation as it should.
• need to set up some virtual machines for Win98, ME, 2000 testing

Tested Platforms: Macintosh

• PowerBook 12" MacOS 10.4.3 ... OK!
• iBook 300MHz (bondi blue) running MacOS 9.2 ... No autoopen or fanciness of course. Flash Player doesn't even run on it anyway.

I Hope I Kinda Might Perhaps Won’t Write Like This Anymore, Maybe.

When I'm writing on a topic I'm not yet familiar with, I have a tendency to pepper my writing with wussy phrases like I have a tendency to and not yet familiar with. The passive voice...bleah!

I don't know [where this comes from]... [it might] be [some] charming artifact of my upbringing, as I was raised by genuine missionaries in a [somewhat] academic household. [Sometimes I wish that] my writing sounded more deliberate and less cover-my-ass. I'm better now, [but] [it still] creeps in [from time to time]. There's a fine line between being humble and sounding like a homesick puppy.

I was discussing this with another friend of mine, pointing out the I hopes and maybes that "swept the legs" out from under his otherwise fine prose. The solution: make use of a much-hated feature in Microsoft Word to retrain our writing reflexes!

How? Use AutoCorrect to replace wishy-washy expressions in your writing! Go to the AutoCorrect Options (under Tools) and enter phrase pairs like these:

• I HOPE becomes As the Lord is my witness, you can bet your SWEET ASS...

• MAYBE becomes if I had a nickel for every FREAKING TIME this happened I'd be a FREAKING MILLIONAIRE...

• A TENDENCY TO becomes abso-freaking-lutely kiss-my-ass and hope-to-die WILL...

The shock and horror of seeing these phrases sprout unbidden in your Word document---in that letter to your sweet old grandmother, for example---will quickly train you against using those wimpy phrases ever again. You'll find new ways to avoid them, because the probability of remembering how to turn off AutoCorrect is really low given the sheer number of "features" clogging up Microsoft Office these days.

Ah, the power of negative reinforcement! I love the smell of Microsoft in the morning! And there are other applications, like for the harried men on Match.com who must send out hundreds of "special" form emails every day:

• U R HOT becomes not only are you beautiful and intelligent, but in all my travels throughout this world I have NEVER come across a profile more delightful than yours. Come! FLY WITH ME!

Have fun! As the Lord is my witness, you can bet your SWEET ASS this is useful :-)

ASIDE: Maybe the hate is unwarranted on my part, but I can't stand AutoCorrect fiddling with my sentences and bulleted list items. It wreaks havoc when you're writing technical documentation with mixed-case capitalization. I'm also not a fan of automatic misspelling correction...how will you learn that you're spelling things wrong if it's doing it behind the scene? That's just the way I feel, so I usually turn it off after the irritation builds to the boiling point.

Optimizing and Procrastination

This has been a great week. It kicked off with surprise tickets to a real basketball game in Boston (Celtics versus Sonics), which was super fun and enlightening. Watching a game at court-level is a completely different experience from TV; you really get a sense of the speed, precision and adaptability of the players. A little of that energy rubbed off on me for the rest of the week, as I humped it through project work, had great client meetings, and fulfilled some long-standing personal engagements. I got an extra boost on Tuesday, when I got my every-six-week haircut at what is now my favorite place in Danvers; afterwards I went to the mall and got great service from the female store staffers. I realized that they were admiring my haircut as I followed their eyes. And if that wasn't enough, I lost five pounds this week without even thinking about it. It's been a very productive week on many levels.

Today, however, I realized that there's possibly another level of productivity I could attain, after talking with a friend about personal identity.

Buddy S. was cheerfully filling me in on the positive psychology reading she's been doing. One neat tidbit was how people see themselves as having a job, a career, or a calling: people with jobs do it for the money, people with careers do it to climb the ladder to higher levels, and people with callings do it for the love of it despite money. I commented that I thought I was somewhere between career and calling. I was silent as I reflected on how I seem to be searching for personal meaning in the work that I do, and that perhaps this was a source of inefficiency.

On a whim I asked S. if she had a strong sense of identity, as she's a very productive person. "Yes!" she said immediately, and proceeded to rattle off half-a-dozen things. "Wow!" I exclaimed, impressed by the speed and surety of her answer, "I'm not even sure I could do that."

"Sure you could! Maybe it's not voice that works for you, but I know if you sat for 3 minutes you could bang something out."

And certainly I could, but the ability to just say who you are on a moment's notice was really intriguing. So I tried it, muttering something like:

I'm David Seah, and I like cats (note: Kat was sitting right there, looking at me expectantly). I like nutty quirky people, and people who are inspiring and like to make things. I like things that have artisan or craftsmanship like quality. I like to find the essence of things.

Ok, we knew that already, but the interesting part is this: the exercise made me realize that I had a huge desire to collect and organize the statements I was in the process of saying, and this caused a delay in speaking. Ordinarily, I would have taken the time to do some internal organization before saying what was on my mind, but since time was a factor, I consciously overrode that desire so I could speak more immediately. I think being able to speak extemporaneously like this is a valuable skill, so I'm going to practice it more to get used to the idea.

Later on, I began to wonder if this "processing delay" is introduced by some kind of computational overhead in my thinking process. If that's the case, then I should be able to turn it off for faster reaction time.

The thought-to-action model might be something like this:

1. Brain conceives of high-level Goal to pursue
2. Brain partially converts goal into series of steps to be done
3. Brain analyzes steps for completeness to create optimal execution plan
4. Brain executes optimal execution plan by dispatching commands to the Body
5. Cool shit happens

A cognitive scientist might help me out here :-)

Anyway, I'm thinking that Step 3 is the culprit: it creates a transactional model for action that requires optimal planning---and by extension, all necessary assets ready and available---before any execution will occur. Planning itself is not a bad thing, because it saves later headaches and ensure that energy is used in the most productive and optimal fashion. And isn't being optimal in our use of resources productive? Efficiency is awesome, yes?

Up until 10 minutes ago I would have agreed, but I now believe this is a case of premature optimization. Optimization itself is always desirable in an end product, but performing it before you fully understand where the bottlenecks are is a recipe for wasting time and energy. In the real world, it's like arguing what the best way to do something is before anyone on the team has really done it; at some point, you have to try something and see what happens. Trying to be efficient before you have real experience just slows you down for no reason. In real-life work, it makes sense to just learn by doing, and make incremental improvements in the process as you gain experience with it. Make your best guesses based on what you do know, but don't encumber the process with "it will be more efficient if we do it this way" conditions. Instead, focus only on the "it will work" conditions.

As programmers, we're taught to value efficiency, and oftentimes that includes productive laziness: how to get the maximum benefit from minimum effort. A lifetime of programming experience teaches us where the high-payoff situations are likely to be, and this makes us seem like magicians when we pull off something particularly elegant. Experienced programmers know that these moments are relatively rare in the day-to-day work of building software: you either know a trick right off-the-bat or you see the opportunity in the course of experiencing the system as it's coming together. But what makes steady progress possible is the commitment to building the system brick-by-brick, knowing that each piece will function in a reliable manner. After you get the system built, then you can do some productive optimization work.

Tying this back to procrastination:

The processing delay I noted in the "who am I" statement was an echo of a "work optimally" desire, before I knew what I was going to say. If I was building a software system, I would just build something and find the answers in the process of building, not worry if it was "optimal" or "efficient". It just has to work first! And perhaps this attitude is what I need to cultivate in my approach to all my projects. In other words, Do It Now, Optimize Later and Learn By Doing.

This may not help for chores like doing laundry or taking out the trash, but it might help get some of my other projects moving.