News from Immigration Canada

Last Sunday Michelle and I got her passport back from Immigration Canada - with a visa inside. Unfortunately, they decided not to answer any of the questions we asked in the two letters we sent them. Actually, I don't think they sent us one thing that was personalized throughout this whole process. Anyhow, you'd think we would be excited - well the visa expires on April 25th. Just enough time to move - but we'd be rushed. Really rushed. It was overwhelming to think about having a new baby, trying to pack our house, arrange a move, and look for a job in Red Deer all at the same time.

We decided to just drive up to the border and ask them all our questions. I'm really glad we did, because it turns out that "landing" in Canada (which is what we had to do before April 25th) is not the same as "moving" to Canada. Which we can do whenever we want, because we "landed" on Sunday. Our plan is to have the baby, get into a bit of a groove with her, and move in late May. There you have it - the big news!

The Simpsons and Louis CK

I found these two movies really funny. I originally saw them like a week ago, but life's like that.

Lisa finds heaven at Springfield's new Mapple Store. (Thanks to Jeff G for this one)



Louis CK on the technology generation. It's so funny because it's absolutely true. They don't want me embedding it, so you'll have to be happy with the link.

On the Reduction of Errant Whizzing

I recently read through a presentation by Tom Peters, which I downloaded from his blog. It mentions a significant reduction in errant whizzing through the seemingly small act of etching an insect-like target into urinals. Tom calls slight changes which have proportionally large results "nudges".

I thought of this today when I visited the bathroom of the Black Drop. They have innovated in their bathroom space in a different way. Being counter-cultural (or anti-establishment, or something like that) they have placed chalk boards in their bathrooms, presumably to encourage graffiti rather than discourage it. Would-be vandals probably don't feel cheated that their work can be wiped away effortlessly.

Speaking of the Black Drop, I hope to hear from them after this post. If they have Google Alerts set up, they will get notified that someone (me) is blogging about them. I set up Google Alerts for my name. No one is really talking about me. At least not yet.

That is all for now.

I Want to Work at Twitter, Or...

What Makes for a Good Job

Recently I had the chance to read @dom's post about how twitter got started. It was both interesting and inspiring, and it illustrates a number of the things that make for a good job.

1. A Smart Team
I love that the Twitter team works together so much. They brainstorm, design, dialogue, and meet in big open warehouse type places. I want to be part of a team like that.

2. A Clear Vision
Part of what creates such a compelling team atmosphere is the pursuit of a clearly defined vision. Nothing brings people together like a common problem, and vision is the anticipated solution to a problem. It would be great to be part of a team pursuing a clear, meaningful vision.

3. A Continuous Learning Opportunity
If I were to work at Twitter it would put me alongside people who know WAY more than me about technology, creating software, starting companies, and a whole host of other things I'm interested in. I'd be surrounded by really smart people. No matter what the job, the opportunity to ask questions and learn from smart people is very compelling to me. Maybe that's why this job opportunity intrigued me so much. My dream job: working as part of a brilliant team pursuing a clear, meaningful vision with continuous learning opportunities.

4. A Sense of Achievement
Twitter's creators must be incredibly proud. Their brain child has millions of users and Venture Capitalists are falling all over themselves to invest in their company. I hope to find work which I can look back on and feel proud of. For me, the impact of not getting a sense of achievement from my work is that I have a really hard time relaxing. I feel a built in need to improve, create, learn, and grow something - and when I don't feel like I am accomplishing this at work, I take that desire home. I get restless and anxious and I try to work at anything that will show progress when I should be recreating, laughing, and enjoying life's truest pleasures: coffee, The Office, comic strips, sunrises, camping, fishing, crossword puzzles, friends, sunsets, gardening, etc. I can tell this is becoming a problem based on the movies I want to watch. My favorite movies, the ones I truly enjoy, are rarely acclaimed. They are cliche, funny, and predictable. Like Emperor's New Groove (yes, the cartoon). When I don't feel like I'm accomplishing anything, I try to relax and achieve at the same time; so I pick movies that are critically acclaimed, or that I think will make me smarter, or that I can blog about later. Also, I start trying to work on my lunch breaks. I go to the library, research business ideas, bring books to read, and above all, I find myself asking "What can I do with this time? What can I get done?". I feel restless. All that to say, I need to feel a sense of accomplishment at work so that I can enjoy my family and friends and my life.

Basically, I want to work as part of a brilliant team pursuing a clear vision that provides continuous learning opportunities and a sense of accomplishment.

There, I said it. If you know of any opportunities like that, let me know.

PS That job I linked to above might still be available.

Starting a New Blog

I haven't even reached 100 posts yet and here I am considering starting another blog. Here's how it happened: Lately I've been following a few fairly high profile HR bloggers, namely Punk Rock HR and Brazen Careerist. There is a whole social network cloud of blogs and bloggers adjacent to and around both these sites. To see what I mean check out the blogroll and the comments section of either one. It's more or less a collection of the same individuals.

I started wanting to be a part of this community. I feel like I often have worthwhile things to say and I could increase traffic to my blog by commenting on more popular blogs. But then I started thinking too much about what I post up here. Like maybe HR people wouldn't want to read about our new baby girl (side note: in a few short weeks this blog is bound to become baby central; I'm getting really excited about meeting my daughter!) I don't like over thinking my posts; I really want this to be an unfiltered place for reflection on whatever topic interests me.

On the other hand, I have been thinking for some time about the possibility and plausibility of generating a little side income from my blog. So rather than commercialize this one, I considered starting a new overtly commercial, more focused blog. I think I'll call it Strategic Management.

To be honest, I don't think I have enough free time to seriously consider starting another blog. Good content on a regular basis is what makes a blog worthwhile. I'm having trouble posting with regularity on the blog I do have, and I don't even think about quality or audience or anything like that. But I am going to keep the idea in the back of my head for the future.

The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H.

George Steiner's book succeeded in shedding new light on a subject that was, for me "all part of a school syllabus and television past." Thanks to the history channel and Schindler's List (and our culture's propensity for reducing things to the lowest common denominator) I had a very one dimensional perspective on WWII, Hitler, and the holocaust. I can't say this book reshaped my understanding of those events, but it gave me a new and unique perspective on them.

Steiner describes the places so well you can really feel what's it's like to be there. I enjoyed the structure of the story; many chapters and characters have only the thread of A.H., and the possibility of his existence, connecting them. I think this allowed Steiner to set a variety of scenes, further highlighting his ability to really put you somewhere, and still keep the book focused.

I'm going to have to read the ending again. It would have been nice to be in the dark until the end, because it's quite a climax.

Learning From Tim O'Reilly

I mentioned in my initial post about Twitter that one of the first people I started following was Tim O'Reilly. It's been one of the best following choices I've made. I've only read two of his blog posts, but I learned something from both. And not the kind of things that just make you think "oh, that's kind of interesting". The type of things I will try to remember and apply in the future. Things that, in a small way, shape who I will be in the future.

The first was posted shortly after Bernard Madoff's giant Ponzi scheme hit the news. Tim's post included a quote from Herman Daly differentiating between a growth economy and a steady state economy. The idea that stuck with me is that we need to transition from an economy based on using things up to an economy based on taking a fixed amount of things and constantly remaking and improving them. In Daly's own words: "Growth is more of the same stuff; development is the same amount of better stuff (or at least different stuff)." This idea builds on what I learned from The Story of Stuff: that a linear system with a limited amount of resources is unsustainable.

The second was a little more recent: an explanation of Tim's "work on stuff that matters" mantra. In particular I like the second principle: create more value than you capture. In summary, he insinuates that creating and capturing value are more or less mutually exclusive activities; if you're focusing on capturing every last cent of value, you'll find yourself creating less and less. On the other hand, if you capture some of the value of a constantly evolving value creation string, you'll actually end up capturing more value in the end. And you'll have a stronger sense of accomplishment.