interesting article: How to Run a Meeting Like Google

Meetings get a bad wrap. Regardless the size of your organization meetings are viewed by most as a time suck and preventing the person attending from actually doing their job.

I came across this article which I found interesting. The article is a few years old actually but still relevant.

I love the Dilbert reference

The Dilbert cartoon in which several people sat around a table while the meeting organizer said, "There is no specific agenda for this meeting. As usual, we'll just make unrelated emotional statements about things which bother us…"

Takeaways:
1. Set a firm agenda.
2. Assign a note-taker.
3. Carve out micro-meetings.
4. Hold office hours.
5. Discourage politics, use data.
6. Stick to the clock.

end of jet lag?

Something I recently came across...

If there is anything to help lessen the effects of air travel bring it on!

FlyRight was developed by Ted Ray, a Licensed Acupuncturist and Herbalist in Mountain View, CA. It is an all-natural herbal jet lag remedy in an easy-to-use liquid form. FlyRight helps you adjust to new time zones, avoid jet lag, and protect you from airborne pathogens.

Hitting your Productivity Targets without GTD

In my quest to find the perfect project management system I stumble across: UNO (Universal Organizer) from the site "Geekpreneur". Who needs GTD?

It took David Allen about 250 pages to explain his Getting Things Done productivity system. You’ll have to read each page at least twice to understand it, spend several hours wondering how to make it work and fiddle around with 43 folders before realizing you don’t need a book to teach you how to procrastinate.

I plan on trying this for the next project I am involved with.
Give it a look:
Easy Organizing with UNO

There must be a pony in here somewhere!

Joke- This is a great one for all of the eternal optimists

There are twin boys of five or six. Mom was worried that the boys had developed extreme personalities -- one was a total pessimist, the other a total optimist -- their parents took them to a psychiatrist.

First the psychiatrist treated the pessimist. Trying to brighten his outlook, the psychiatrist took him to a room piled to the ceiling with brand-new toys. But instead of yelping with delight, the little boy burst into tears. "What's the matter?" the psychiatrist asked, baffled. "Don't you want to play with any of the toys?" "Yes," the little boy bawled, "but if I did I'd only break them."

Next the psychiatrist treated the optimist. Trying to dampen his out look, the psychiatrist took him to a room piled to the ceiling with horse manure. But instead of wrinkling his nose in disgust, the optimist emitted just the yelp of delight the psychiatrist had been hoping to hear from his brother, the pessimist. Then he clambered to the top of the pile, dropped to his knees, and began gleefully digging out scoop after scoop with his bare hands. "What do you think you're doing?" the psychiatrist asked, just as baffled by the optimist as he had been by the pessimist. "With all this manure," the little boy replied, beaming, "there must be a pony in here somewhere"

Words to live by

A must read/see--- "Last Lecture"

I don't know if any of you have seen or heard about Randy Pausch. Randy is a professor at Carnegie Mellon. Randy was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and given 6 months to live. It has now been 7 months.

Professor Pausch decided to give a "last lecture". The lecture was recorded and virally taken off via youtube.com. Over 10,000,000 people have viewed the "last lecture".

The story is incredibly moving. ABC is actually running the entire lecture tonight at 10:00pm (pst).

In this day and age it is very refreshing to see someone speak from the heart and with no agenda.

I have seen the lecture and cannot recommend it enough.