John Ott shared with us something recently that’s been ringing in my ears ever since he shared it:
Sometimes our loudest “Yes” in life comes from our loudest “No.”
I think he’s spot on.
It’s true. We do, in fact, have a RC Helicopter that now flies overhead as we blog, build software, and play video games.
I hope to soon attach a camera of some sort.
Suffice to say my inbox is full of intern applications, which is most excellent. A bunch of familiar faces and a few new ones. No doubt you’re familiar with the promised loot but little has been said of the quest required to actually earn it.
So let me clear it up.
Pizza Time!
Feeding the team is part of my job. It’s one of the best parts of my job.
I like my job.
/end
The challenge that many organizations face is one of fanboy-ism: The art of being totally and completely over-the-top dogmatic about some product and/or service that is offered. Urban Dictionary says:
Someone who is hopelessly devoted to something and will like anything associated with their particular thing.
We find the usual suspects in companies such as Apple and their Macintosh suite of products where people will spend days (and nights) waiting in long lines outside brick and mortars waiting to be the first to spend green.
The thing is that fanboys are a both a good and bad thing for a business.
When we released Simple Standard for the previous version of Standard Theme, we didn’t realize just how much many of our users would dig using it.
But when we rolled out Standard Theme 2.0, this particular customization was no longer compatible, but this month’s customization addresses that. Check out Simple Standard 2.0…
John Ott, Thrivent Leadership
Part of the business culture that we’re trying to create is one of continual improvement, both for our company as well as ourselves as individuals.
As such, we’ve begun inviting outside speakers to help coach us so that we can be more optimal at what we’re doing; these speakers might cover leadership, organizational challenges, technology, and even be from marketplaces and industries outside of our own. Our interest is growth, which means that we might, at times, bring in people to give us perspectives that might be completely contrary to our own.
Sameness is dangerous.
Yup. We’re looking for a design intern to join us for early next year.
Interested? Send Chris an email (because I get enough email already) and do something creatively-awesome to show us what you’ve got. You will get to work with the entire team and learn awesomeness from Jared.
What do you need to know how to do? If you don’t know what we “do” around here then you’re probably a bad candidate.
Iterative. Really.
I’m tired of people and businesses talking about how they take an iterative approach to their product development when they are doing anything but iterative.
If you’re ashamed of version 1.0 then you’re in the right spot. Stop boring me with excuses like “alpha” and “beta” – everything online is alpha/beta.
Grow a pair and launch. Iterate or die.
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