First week, new gig - drinking from the firehose

By the end of the week, "drinking from a firehose" became my massively overused one-liner to describe how the week was going. Still, nothing that was unexpected; new organization philosophies and theories, new terminology for familiar concepts, new "rules of engagement" for working with the technology infrastructure. Also, against my better intentions, it's been tough to keep up with my postings, but I believe that will come in time, together with a different viewpoint on the stuff I write about.

Collected thoughts from the week, from meetings but also re: tie-ins from the blogosphere ...

• I knew before that I heavily depend on technology tools and tricks to keep track of the many things I am responsible for, but going through an environment / job switch really points out how flexible these processes have become (and must remain). I only have a reasonable amount of rework to do, I don't design these things with a specific company in mind - this is actually the fourth generation for some of my older tools.
• This post by Rothman (nice series going on there, also check out here and here) about the myth of competent talkers; in a related "talker" item, I remembered a sound bite from earlier this week, something like "... in a conversation, do you wait to speak, or listen and respond?". Per Rothman's post, if someone is not making a clear point, invest the time in listening, instead of waiting to correct them or make your counter point - something I like to remind myself from time to time.
• I'm psyched at the opportunities / real business needs I am seeing for collaboration. A lot of the basics are there (or close), and it's postings like this that tee it up nicely (although, when I saw the headline, I thought I was going to get something about AJAX and the new development paradigms ... that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish ... how fun to be disruptive ...).
• Related ... an area where I will be expected to contribute some ideas and IT help will be R&D and product engineering. I have been exposed to some of this stuff IAPL, and some of the ideas expressed here (quite well) are going to surface, I'm afraid - the seemingly natural reticence of engineers to capture information in a sharable medium. Free exchange of ideas is often encouraged, and I think it does happen, but is verbal or at least not easily shared. I know that technology per se does not make change happen in these areas, but I still think that there is the opportunity to build a community with the selective use of technology, process, rewards, and encouragement.
• I noticed that people speak quietly in the halls ... I wonder how many people I will annoy <g> ...
• No, I didn't get anything close to this.
• Saw some examples of the Shocked by Complexity meme; nothing truly new, I've seen this at every organization I've worked with, and at times, despite my best efforts, have been guilty of creating same. Everyone likes the one-page description of the complex topic, as if one page = simple. It's a bit of an art to abstract to just the right level, to capture the idea/vision without going into too much detail. Unless, of course, you are working with / designing a reference guide (and if so, get over the shock, it's just a learning curve).
• This is cool. This is just funny.