Six of the UEN Technical staff attended today's Brown Bag Lunch. We discussed blogging and linked to Scott Richardson's Web Log. There was a lot of encouragement for other UEN staff to start their Web Logs.

I brought up the issue of focusing on the newly created documents that are now posted on the UEN Technical web site.

This week we are going to think about and work on the first shared vision statement of: We work together to get things done.

This one statement is filled with significant ideas. "Working together" inspires thoughts of teamwork. I read a quote yesterday by Harry S. Truman that brings together the ideas of teamwork and getting things done. Here is the quote:

"You can accomplish anything in life, provided you do not mind who gets the credit."

The challenge for this week is to focus on the ideas of "working together to get things done." Next week at the brown bag we will talk about our observations. I'm interested to find out how focusing on this point will change our behavior. I'm also interested to know if this idea is ingrained in how we perceive ourselves and if it will make a difference in how we work with our stakeholders and other UEN departments.

Thanks to those who attended. I hope to see other UEN staff at the Brown Bag next week. It will be held on Friday, January 24, 2003, 12:00 Noon in the Technical Services Conference Room.

That's all for now......
12:53:39 PM    comment []

A new entrant into the blogging community. Scott Richardson works in the UEN NOC. Be sure to check out what he has to say.

I spent time yesterday exploring through Phil Windley's Web Log. He has a channel specific to OS X that I found helpful. Like Phil, I found myself recently in need of purchasing a computer for personal use and with my own money.

Unlike Phil, I am using a government purchased G4 Titanium Powerbook for my work needs. Barry Bryson talked me into this purchase last summer. I had been a Mac user in some past jobs but got away from it until recently.

After not too much consideration I purchased an iMac with the super drive and the 17" flat screen. I made my purchase at the University of Utah bookstore and they took great care of me.

Anyway, I read Phil's blog about uControl and decided to try it out. It was simple, as advertised, to get this program going. I only had one additional insight. Before the icon showed up in the Systems Preferences I had to reboot my powerbook. A mild inconvenience, but I spent a few minutes trying to figure out what was happening.

That's all for now......
11:55:49 AM    comment []