Web 2.0 for business and Educators

Started Wednesday 30th March 2011
Words 423
S.I.= 85%
Digital Revolution hiccups and Digital leaps
Have not really had as much time as I thought this last week.  I have stepped back into the Worlds of teaching at a School in Ely and been progressing my own business and a project for AN Other.

Last week saw the fifth Birthday of Twitter.  Yesterday saw a major glitch in the BBC Website which apparently was due to a faulty, mechanical, optical or software controlled it certainly revealed the problems for business continuity.  More on this later.

 Another special event happening is that Freeview Digital TV is starting for some people today on the Suffolk/Essex Border if their transmitter is turned towards Sandy Heath.  If your analogue signal (ordinary BBC 1, 2, ITV 1, Channel 4 and Five)  works now try scanning with Freeview box or Freeview TV.  Best position for aerial 12 m above ground apparently with no obstruction (does work with roof aerials if close to transmitter)

Friday sees the upgrade  of the Business functionality on Facebook.  This will give same types of activities you can do with a personal profile.  Business pages are still within your Facebook registration, you are not supposed top have more than one account.  In fact you can be deFacebooked if you are in this state of duplicity.  Recently there have been groups removed from Facebook for extreme political views reported in the press so they are monitoring.

The Business continuity issue highlighted by both recent natural disasters and the outage of the BBC Website. The e-commerce end was affected as well as the News feeds.  The BBC was no longer the most up to date news source at that time.  The possibility exists that further outages may happen since the components, if it was a switch, may all have been put in at the same time.  Buy a brand new house and you will usually most of the light bulbs fail at roughly the same time.  The local Business Continuity Network to West Suffolk and South Cambridgeshire has gone live with its' website Business Continuity Network .  Time to integrate my own survey of my practices if the worst comes to the worst and I loose my main desktop.

I attended a meeting last week in Ipswich where the focus was sustainable workplaces.  I am developing my areas of Business interest to enhance the skills to go with this and also the Web 2.0 and cloud implications that go with this.  I will be blogging on my WordPress sites about this over the next few days. 

Wellbeing on a Thursday

Started Thursday 10th February 2011 0503 GMT
Words 472
S.I. = 94.4%

We are going to the Gym, escaping the Zoo, are you journeying too?

Pausing and reflecting is always a good way of assessing your own personal Wellbeing.  The start of a new business or becoming self-employed is potentially a very stressful occasion.  So pausing and reflecting.

On Monday I blogged about a personal target of  making sure I attended a gym on a regular basis.  This is incredibly important from the point of view arranging your work/homelife balance when working as a home-based worker and business person.

Reflecting on the week is usually a Friday experience.  However, a trojan horse virus on Monday, the first ever that had managed to get past my Firewalls and McAfee programmes.  The holes in Microsoft Windows were  apparent.  Couple this event with BT having an upgrade on Monday night and no broadband until Wednesday morning I could have been in a position of not having an IT using business after only 3 days.

Luckily I have the skills myself to be able to allow business continuity so had back ups of data and alternative strategies of working via the cloud.  Thursday morning and I am just cleaning off the last Trojan off the main system.  The diversified (almost a farming term here) systems  were able to cope although at points my own coping systems  were running at almost 100% capacity.  Having a good work life balance allows the capacity to cope remain  greater than the demand caused .

So planning ahead to arrive safely at Saturday Evening is a good exercise considering the bouncers that have already been bowled. I can cope with these on the Cricket field having opened the batting and kept wicket for a number of sides when I was younger. Sport is definitely a good training for life as I am constantly being reminded.

The gym that I had my induction in on Monday has a very simple system where they encourage the exerciser to be their own personal trainer. The roll back of the general nanny state attitude that pervades British Society? Maybe. A simple colour chart on the wall matched to general time based workout cards educate you to judge what your body is telling you about your physical state while exercising. Inductions to gym where the trainer takes you the edge of your pain envelope have been the norm, but this would appear to not be necessary. Eight o'clock is a good time for me today to take a break and go to the gym,

On the dipity calendar you will see one event I am attending next week that fits very well with some of the IT experiences, This event is being run by Menta and Business Continuity experts. I am always willing to listen to others just in case I have missed the Elephant in the room.So planning ahead to arrive safely at Saturday Evening is a good exercise considering the bouncers hat have already been bowled. I can cope with these on the Cricket field having opened the batting and kept wicket for a number of sides when I was younger. Sport is definitely a good training for life as I am constantly being reminded.

On the dipity timeline you will see one event I am attending next week that fits very well with some of the IT experiences. This event is being run by Menta and Business Continuity experts. I am always willing to listen to others just in case I have missed the Elephant in the room.  

Wednesday and Career Change

Started Wednesday 2nd February 2011 0021 GMT
Words 311
S.I. = 62.2 %

The age of the part-time worker?

The part time worker accounted for nearly 97% of the employment opportunities taken up last year.  The time of the portfolio career is now, it is already happening without consciously or voluntarily being adopted (see previous blogs).

The worrying part of this is that the banking system has become so entrenched in offering mortgage products that rely on full-time employment (usually with both partners workers) over the now relatively short period of 25 years.  People are living longer and will have no legal compunction to retire at 65 very soon.  The state assistance, we had probably better get used to calling it that rather a pension, already does not appear to be given for post Baby Boomers (anybody born after 1962).  Even state sector (now public sector)  pensions are not as attractive a deal to compensate for the "vocational" nature of the job.

Insurance products such Mortgage Protection and Payment Protection Insurance taken out for a rainy day (or months) increasingly do not do what they claim to on the wrapper.  The future may not look so bright for many who are trapped in the house as an investment rather than a home scenario at present.  This dictates how flexible you can be in the choice of what you do to raise your happiness index to a 10.  Many people are doing this and have been doing this for sometime, I am realising that I have been speaking to them as they have been around me for a long time.

So 21st Century Working here I certainly come!  A good starting point for this is the Teleworking Association  (link to blog), a not for profit type organisation of which I became a Director at last weeks' AGM.  So if I do mention it you will know I am only promoting what I preach and practice myself.     

A TGI Friday feeling!

Started Friday 14th January 2011  At 6.00 am GMT

Word Count =    432 Word Limit = 500

Success Index  S.I.  = 87%

S.I. Between 80 and 90 % thorough attempt at fulfilling Aspirational Target has been made

S.I. Between 90 and 100% means reader able to add their interpretation and take part ownership

S.I. Between 50 and 101% Aspirational Target has been met

S.I Less than 50% means wrong Aspirational Targets set as started with wrong premise

Friday review time.  Early morning Friday I find is the best time to review the week's progress against those aspirational targets I set myself on Monday.  If I have become distracted by the trivia of the process or experienced a systems failure I can at least have a fighting chance of  putting the working week to bed by lunchtime.  Then have a Friday become a  POETS day  (push off early tomorrow’s Saturday).  But it depends on how detailed or how long I consider what my aspirational targets should be on Monday.   It also depends if I am trusted to set the targets. Too many ingredients and too little  time means I won't be able to finish the plan in 5 days time. 

I have revisited as to why I started this personal blog on the 2nd December 2010.  The plan was to reclaim my second age of man. I now a have a clearer picture against the background of public sector cuts my personal goals.

   

My definition of what the word Education means has been revisited and clarified. I have told myself what it is once and written it in lemon juice so I will not have to repeat it to myself a second and third time.

I have reflected on why I have a dislike of the service economy (two links). I think I now have a 6 year plan to enhance my own Wellbeing.

My Wellbeing was enhanced further this week by an event that had parrallels to an event pre-1979. Ipswich Town (my local Suffolk team) beat Arsenal by one goal.  This is the first FA Cup final I can remember watching on TV because of it's relevance to me.   A good result but it is only the first leg of the League cup tie.

So the next step. I have decided to add to my mission statement that I am going to aspire to work in a Business Civilisation as opposed to a Business Empire. A book that I bought for the title and not the name of the author  contains some of the threads of my personal business ethos.

And finally I tried to avoid being a little cynical in this blog as a critical friend observed this trait. I had already observed this trend before he mentioned it. Since somebody else is aware and I would not want my intent to be misinterpreted I had better change the tone..  So at the risk of being a little catty I include this final link for today.

For more posts visit Blog 2pointfiveageofman.net

For more posts visit Blog kritirecharge.co.uk