imnotbored.net

No, not down sized. Not semi- retied either. Though to be honest, somedays days I do notice my pants riding up a little higher and I ahve to fight to keep myself from starting conversations with the phrase ” When I was your age…”

My employer simply start to run out of space for the number of people it needs to get work done. After a year of planning and preparing the compressed work week was an option, and I jumped at it. I now work my 37.5 hours in 3 days, and get 4 days off. Yeah, you read that right. Four days. 96 leisure filled hours. If you have this option, and you can make it work with your family life, I say go for it. After two weeks of the newschedule, I feel like a chump for having worked 5 days a week most of my life.

The gym isn’t so crowded at 7 am, and the insomniacs and geriatrics are generally very nice people. When I go get groceries at 9 am, the aisles are empty, and the staff are smiling and happy. There are no line-ups in the liquor store at 1:30 in the afternoon. To be able to do the things you love to do (in my case music, reading, computer programming, cooking) during  the day  rather than when you come home grumpy and tired is great. I keep looking over my shoulder, thinking I’m playing hooky and I’m going to get caught. Then I realize it was the companies idea, and I laugh.

The schedule is not without it’s scary points. On the third day of my first rotation, I found myself wanting to start a barbershop quartet that sings tunes exclusively about diseases and natural disasters. My advice, boys and girls, is that if you find yourself at your desk writing lyrics for “The Bubonic Plague Rag,” it is high time you took a break and got some fresh air.

So….if you like to sing and your off Mon, Tues, Wednesday, lemme know. The barbershop quartet is due for a comeback.

What happens when the simultaneous subsumes the sequential?

Moore’s Law has given us cheap,fast, and readily available storage and communication.
The Network Effect has provided a means of sharing what has been stored.

So, if a simultaneous global information infrastructure makes filtering and reacting skills and tools of greater value than planning and implementation strategies, what happens then?

Will our functional concept of the future be eclipsed by the presence of the present?

My bet is that it will. Likely within the next decade.

Organizations with centralized, hierarchic management relying on review, ratification, and head office approval will lose ground. Agile, decentralized networks of smaller firms/groups/movemements will not necessarily take over, but will simply not need the laborious 20th century methodologies and infrastructures to exist and succeed. Understanding a situation or event will be more valuable than managing it.

There are hurdles. The ubiquity of the cell phone as a powerful platform for change holds great promise. The existing network speed, range, lack of inter-operability and expensive data rates are a drawback.

I’m optimistic. I’m patient. We’ll get there.

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