Blog

8 months ago

Greg Thomas

The Effort is what Matters

Right now we are boiling everything down to fast something can get down and how little effort we need to put in to get it done. We have reached the future that Wall-E predicted. When I used to hire Junior Developers, we knew what we were getting – blank slates with some level of computer knowledge – so how were they evaluated? Their effort.  How much time did they put in, how much were they willing to put in – those were the metrics of someone who wanted it, wanted to be there, and hungered to learn and grow. Effort

8 months ago

Greg Thomas

Fix it for Who Comes Next

You might be working in a dumpster fire, but this doesn’t mean you have to leave it that way. You can make things better starting on Day 1, incremental change can push the ball forward and then have someone else pushing for what’s next. If you can improve someone’s experience by 5% with each action, it’s worth it. Just ask them.

8 months ago

Greg Thomas

Rocks and Weeds

There is only one way to get weeds out of the ground – pull them. You might use chemicals or some other miracle compound, but at some point, you’ll need to pull what is left so it doesn’t take root and grow again. Same with Rocks – the only way to move them is to pick them up and put them somewhere else. You can roll them, use a machine, push them up a hill, try to give them a kick, but inevitably, you will have to pick them up. Both are very labour intensive tasks, the question is whether

8 months ago

Greg Thomas

Long-Running Jobs

There are jobs that cannot be made to go faster. They can be optimized, they can be tweaked, they can be upgraded. They can have all of these wonderful things done to them, but at some point, they can only go so far, and then what is left for them to do is the job itself. The grinding work. The back and forth. The inputs and outputs. Many years ago, a colleague of mine took a screenshot of a job that ran for over 24 hours (there was probably some room for optimization), but beneath it all he wrote was

8 months ago

Greg Thomas

When are these Steps going to Start Working?

You watch the Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn (and more) ads on the steps and the small bits you need to do each and every day that will eventually get you there. And you can do all that, but then eventually ask yourself, “When will it start working?  When will I see the change that I need to be looking for?” There is no guaranteed answer, and the only one you can truly ask yourself is – “Do you believe enough in the steps to keep going to see what might come?” That’s the only answer.