EscapeCharacter
@backslashx1b.bsky.social
My anon outlet for thoughts on organisational design and digital service delivery.
Reposted by EscapeCharacter
Andry José Hernández Romero, I remember you, even if I do not know how to articulate my horror, rage, & sorrow at your treatment by my government.
No one has heard from you in 43 days.
As vigil, I’m posting a photo of you every day until you are returned from El Salvador.
No one has heard from you in 43 days.
As vigil, I’m posting a photo of you every day until you are returned from El Salvador.
April 27, 2025 at 1:02 AM
Andry José Hernández Romero, I remember you, even if I do not know how to articulate my horror, rage, & sorrow at your treatment by my government.
No one has heard from you in 43 days.
As vigil, I’m posting a photo of you every day until you are returned from El Salvador.
No one has heard from you in 43 days.
As vigil, I’m posting a photo of you every day until you are returned from El Salvador.
Reposted by EscapeCharacter
HANG IT IN THE LOUVRE.
(President of Mexico on International Women’s Day)
(President of Mexico on International Women’s Day)
March 9, 2025 at 4:19 AM
HANG IT IN THE LOUVRE.
(President of Mexico on International Women’s Day)
(President of Mexico on International Women’s Day)
Reposted by EscapeCharacter
Leaving Canada now… but a long black espresso coffee will forever be a Canadiano!
March 6, 2025 at 10:04 PM
Leaving Canada now… but a long black espresso coffee will forever be a Canadiano!
“From the very beginning of my studying I made it a rule that whenever, in any matter, I heard a sounder viewpoint, I abandoned the one I had since I know well that we know far less than what we do not know.”
- Jan Hus, visionary, 1369-1415
What "strong opinions softly held" really should mean.
- Jan Hus, visionary, 1369-1415
What "strong opinions softly held" really should mean.
December 27, 2024 at 4:10 PM
“From the very beginning of my studying I made it a rule that whenever, in any matter, I heard a sounder viewpoint, I abandoned the one I had since I know well that we know far less than what we do not know.”
- Jan Hus, visionary, 1369-1415
What "strong opinions softly held" really should mean.
- Jan Hus, visionary, 1369-1415
What "strong opinions softly held" really should mean.
Digital service development is a fundamentally creative proposition. If it were otherwise we would only be shifting commodities.
To have any value, creative services must be concerned with solving some real problem facing some real user.
Kindness is not optional. It is everything. #agile #advent
To have any value, creative services must be concerned with solving some real problem facing some real user.
Kindness is not optional. It is everything. #agile #advent
December 24, 2024 at 8:21 PM
A wise man once said "the purpose of a system is what it does". So what does a RACI actually do, hmm?
We must end this PMO delusion that separation of accountability and responsibility (and the C&I) is anything but power games.
Small, diverse, groups treated as functional adults. #agile #advent
We must end this PMO delusion that separation of accountability and responsibility (and the C&I) is anything but power games.
Small, diverse, groups treated as functional adults. #agile #advent
December 22, 2024 at 7:53 PM
Reposted by EscapeCharacter
Interviewer: Can you explain this gap in your resume?
Distributed systems engineer: Eventually.
Distributed systems engineer: Eventually.
Interviewer: Can you explain this gap in your resume?
Cryptography engineer: That part is cleared to make operations over my CV fit in the output register without carries.
Cryptography engineer: That part is cleared to make operations over my CV fit in the output register without carries.
Interviewer: Can you explain this gap in your resume?
Game dev: ah yeah I had fucked up a transformation matrix, so that section of my life was rendered outside the camera's field of view
Game dev: ah yeah I had fucked up a transformation matrix, so that section of my life was rendered outside the camera's field of view
December 22, 2024 at 2:57 AM
Interviewer: Can you explain this gap in your resume?
Distributed systems engineer: Eventually.
Distributed systems engineer: Eventually.
So you think you collaborate?
Or is it cooperate? Coordinate? All three?
In their 2020 paper, Castañer & Oliveira demonstrate that as far as org design goes we think these are about goals, time, decisions, and behaviours... but we aren't even close to shared definition.
In 2020 #agile #advent
Or is it cooperate? Coordinate? All three?
In their 2020 paper, Castañer & Oliveira demonstrate that as far as org design goes we think these are about goals, time, decisions, and behaviours... but we aren't even close to shared definition.
In 2020 #agile #advent
December 21, 2024 at 9:10 PM
"People just need to follow the process."
Nope. Elephant paths. People, like particles, do what is energetically favourable for them to do within the (normative) constraints of the system. If they aren't doing what you want, it's because your constraints don't make sense to them. #agile #advent
Nope. Elephant paths. People, like particles, do what is energetically favourable for them to do within the (normative) constraints of the system. If they aren't doing what you want, it's because your constraints don't make sense to them. #agile #advent
December 20, 2024 at 11:06 PM
RAID log
/rād lôg/
noun
1. A means to create the appearance of control
2. A record of the catastrophes before they happened
3. A device to accelerate the allocation of blame away from the PMO to the team
Deal with your problems folks, don't notarise them as they burn the house down. #agile #advent
/rād lôg/
noun
1. A means to create the appearance of control
2. A record of the catastrophes before they happened
3. A device to accelerate the allocation of blame away from the PMO to the team
Deal with your problems folks, don't notarise them as they burn the house down. #agile #advent
December 20, 2024 at 7:51 AM
One can (and should; it's fun) think of a system as the metabolism of energies and materials - from raw form(s) to more useful one(s).
Energy is ephemeral, material is (more) persistent. System collapse can thus be defined as the point at which a system can no longer metabolise.
#agile #advent
Energy is ephemeral, material is (more) persistent. System collapse can thus be defined as the point at which a system can no longer metabolise.
#agile #advent
December 18, 2024 at 8:42 PM
Metrics are questions we ask of a system.
Questions need to be:
- timely: match your decision speed.
- actionable: if you can't process a response you wasted energy by asking.
- purposeful: if you ask everything and anything you're drowning the signal and jumping at shadows.
#agile #advent
Questions need to be:
- timely: match your decision speed.
- actionable: if you can't process a response you wasted energy by asking.
- purposeful: if you ask everything and anything you're drowning the signal and jumping at shadows.
#agile #advent
December 17, 2024 at 12:16 AM
The future isn't knowable, predictable, stable, or even a "the".
Budgets are bets, estimates are self-harm, and no amount of effort sunk in a Gantt chart is going to save you.
Converse more, visualise & share maps, sketch opportunity trees, and let go when evidence tells you to. #agile #advent
Budgets are bets, estimates are self-harm, and no amount of effort sunk in a Gantt chart is going to save you.
Converse more, visualise & share maps, sketch opportunity trees, and let go when evidence tells you to. #agile #advent
December 15, 2024 at 9:56 PM
About 50ish years ago we created the virtual, governed by the physics of the bit - and, so far, the physics of the minds that work in it. We're at a point of inflection though. The virtual space has begun to automate/commoditised thought. This will make people very, very, angry. #agile #advent
December 14, 2024 at 11:22 PM
For essentially all of human time we were entirely of the real (i.e. the physics of atoms) and our economics were driven by the real. Agricultural and Industrial revolutions automated (commoditised) food and energy production. To paraphrase, this has made a lot of people very angry... #agile #advent
December 13, 2024 at 10:25 PM
For essentially all of human time we were entirely of the real (i.e. the physics of atoms) and our economics were driven by the real. Agricultural and Industrial revolutions automated (commoditised) food and energy production. To paraphrase, this has made a lot of people very angry... #agile #advent
"That work of skill and knowledge, and above all work requiring judgment had to be done by the individual on his own, had always been axiomatic. This 'self-evident' truth was the basis for all individualist philosophy." - Peter Drucker, Landmarks of Tomorrow , 1959 #agile #advent
December 12, 2024 at 11:53 PM
It's astonishing to me how few people in the field are aware of Peter Drucker, let alone have read him. If you aren't familiar with the concept of Knowledge Work (that he coined) you aren't really managing work at all, or inevitably worse: mismanaging it. Invest in yourself and read! #agile #advent
December 10, 2024 at 11:39 PM
Our standard budget-for-business-case corporate metabolism falls apart each and every year. Failed software projects have been the norm for decades now. Scope creep, extensions, and crunch time are part of the vernacular and the BAU experience. All symptoms of that original error... #agile #advent
December 9, 2024 at 11:47 PM
Of the many (many) classes of problems in decision making about value, surely the most ubiquitous directly follows from our PMO accounting systems: the future doesn't care how much budget you allocated, it's happening anyway. Your annual is just a bet on how much you want to be in it. #agile #advent
December 8, 2024 at 9:41 PM
Of the many (many) classes of problems in decision making about value, surely the most ubiquitous directly follows from our PMO accounting systems: the future doesn't care how much budget you allocated, it's happening anyway. Your annual is just a bet on how much you want to be in it. #agile #advent
Impact, direction, value.
In digital services the domain of product management and designers, but also very often of execs and c-suites, and - since we're talking about something readily measurable and translatable into $£€ - the Finance Office. This is unfortunate for everyone. #agile #advent
In digital services the domain of product management and designers, but also very often of execs and c-suites, and - since we're talking about something readily measurable and translatable into $£€ - the Finance Office. This is unfortunate for everyone. #agile #advent
December 7, 2024 at 9:19 PM
Through general systems theory, I've come round to the opinion that the values that matter to any org, universally, are some expression of impact, adaptability, and sustainability.
And gesturing vaguely at the global shitshow since 2016, kindness above all three and all else. #agile #advent
And gesturing vaguely at the global shitshow since 2016, kindness above all three and all else. #agile #advent
December 6, 2024 at 10:18 PM
Love may not be love, that alters when alteration finds, but values *should* change over time and we should not fear to look inconstant by doing so.
Our values are an expression of belief which is a truth seeking exercise, given form by imperfect words. Let the journey change you. #agile #advent
Our values are an expression of belief which is a truth seeking exercise, given form by imperfect words. Let the journey change you. #agile #advent
December 5, 2024 at 11:37 PM
Where values-as-behaviours require much less interpretation and hence create clarity and alignment, that is equally their weakness.
When contexts change, and especially when subtle, the behaviours mislead you gradually... then suddenly. Clear into chaotic right? #agile #advent
When contexts change, and especially when subtle, the behaviours mislead you gradually... then suddenly. Clear into chaotic right? #agile #advent
December 4, 2024 at 7:43 PM
Expressions of company values can usually be categorised as attributes or behaviours e.g. "Transparency" vs "We work in the open".
The problem with attributes is they require interpretation to become actionable, and in interpretation lies misinterpretation and multiplicity. #agile #advent
The problem with attributes is they require interpretation to become actionable, and in interpretation lies misinterpretation and multiplicity. #agile #advent
December 3, 2024 at 8:42 PM