sai sundar's thoughtworks

I write and review documents for a living. Over the hundreds of documents that I have seen and read there are a few things that drive me mad and that are a simple fix. If you want your documenting to be good or even great, these are some of things that you should follow

1. Page Numbers - my document will have page numbers of every page.
2. Revision History - my document will have a clean and clear revision history which will include a brief summary of the change made and the date the change was made.
3. Versioning - my document will have a version number that will match the revision history and revision date.
4. Header - my document will have a header that will clearly state the title of the document, the version number and the date the document was published.
5. References - my document will have references clearly marked
6. Fonts and Style - my document will be consitent with the use of styles provided by word and will ensure that the Font is consistent.
7. Table of Contents - my document will have table of contents that will have links that will be hot links - links into the document. The reader can click on the link from the TOC and be taken to the correct place in the document
8. Labels - my document will have clear labels for all the figures, tables and charts included in the document. There will be no orphans.
9. Reference and Glossary - my document will have a section that lists all the references and a glossary for new terms and abbreviations used.
10. Content- my document will have content that is not stated multiple times, is easy to understand and has been organized in a simple easy to read fashion.

Who is playing?

New Orlean Saints led by Drew Breeze is tee'd up against Indianapolis Colts led by Peyton Manning. Peyton Manning is a New Orlean local and his dad (Archie Manning) played 12 long seasons with the Saints. Archie Manning is ofcourse supporting his son, cause, Well blood is thicker than Gumbo. The Saints are the underdogs and most of the country is rooting for them after what the city of New Orleans have gone through. The opening of the Superdome which was a recovery area during the Katrina still gives goose bumps to many who watched it on TV and watched it live. While arguably Peyton Manning is a living QB legend and might be one of the greatest to have even played.

10 fun facts about Superbowls

100 million - expected to tune into watch the game, continuing making the superbowl the most watched Television broadcast. Still behind the finale of M-A-S-H that drew in a record 106 million viewers.
700,000 footballs are produced annually for official NFL use &
72 of them are used for the Super Bowl.
35% of people who attend the game write it off as a corporate expense.
20% antacid sales increase on the monday after.
17 average number of people at a Super Bowl party
6% of Americans call in sick the Monday after Super Bowl.
5% of Americans will watch the game alone.
2nd largest day for food consumption after thanksgiving.
1st superbowl solo artist to perform superbowl halftime was Michael Jackson in 1993.


Advertisement

Budweiser has been the exclusive Super Bowl beer advertiser for the past 13 years. Which leads to this, More drivers are involved in alcohol-related accidents on Super Bowl Sunday than any other day of the year (except St. Patrick's Day), according to the Insurance Information Institute. So please don't drink and drive.

Thanks to Janet Jackson nipplegate, all halftime shows now have a 5 sec tape delay.

30 sec ad spot is costing $2.8 MDD this year compared to $3 mill last year.
51 % estimated to tune into to watch the ads.
23 years - First time in 23 years no Pepsi commercial

The top five ads as chosen by the USA Today Super Bowl 2009, Ad Meter were:

1. Doritos' fan-made ad about "free Doritos" being seen in a "crystal ball", with different results for two co-workers. Joseph and Dave Herbert from Batesville, Indiana, creators of the ad, won US $1,000,000;
2. Budweiser's Clydesdale love affair with a dancing horse;
3. Another Budweiser ad seeing another Clydesdale playing fetch showing off after the beer wagon's Dalmatian fetches a small stick;
4. A Bridgestone ad with Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head driving in a toy car on a twisty road;
5. Another Doritos ad that shows the power of crunch with a woman being stripped down to her underwear, free money from an ATM and a policeman being turned into a monkey.
   

Every year in January the gym is totally crowded, not a treadmill to run on without waiting for 20 mins. Come Valentines day, it is a different story. Why is that the case? Why do we as human beings set Goals every new year (without fail) and then do keep up with the goals but go back next year and set in most cases, the same goals all over again.

Baffling isn't it. The reason we set goals year after year is HOPE (not wanting to sound like POTUS). We hope that the stars will line up, the planets will move in our direction and we will stick to our goals. I made some notes on how to break this habit and did some research. Here is a step by step on making a better attempt at Goals.

Step 1- Set the Right Goals

What are most goals geared towards? Most of the goals can be easily broken down into Personal (weight loss, stress reduction), Professional (Career, School, Jobs), Family (home, kids, vacation), Finance (retirement, pension, savings) and Spiritual goals (church activities, social work).

The problem with most goals is that they are written to make it sound more as a habit change, but not really a goal. For example, Get in shape is not a goal, while Losing 20 pounds is a better Goal. A goal should be : SMART

S - specific, significant
M - measurable, meaningful,
A - attainable, achievable, acceptable, action-oriented
R - realistic, reasonable,

T - time-based, timely, tangible, trackable

For Each category set one or two goals.

Step 2: Make your Goals Public

In order to ensure that you push the onus on yourself on setting your goals make your goals public. Let your closest friends and family know what you are striving towards. If your goal is to quit smoking, if your friends care about you, they will not smoke in front of you and might even kick your butt if you light a butt :D.

Telling your friends and family also helps because it might be an awkward dinner table conversation if you are totally straying away from your goal. This one thing can be a HUGE Motivation factor. You don't need to share all, but some you can. And if you are doing good achieving one, its a cascade effect - you will do good on your personal goals as well.

My 2 big goals of the year

- read one book every 2 weeks

- run the 7/25 San francisco Half Marathon

Step 3: Track your Goals

If you have followed Step 1 and 2 you should be able to track your goals. If you see yourself slipping you will be able to know what are the reasons why you are not able to keep pu with your goals?

You can use sites like daytum or joesgoals, while i still think some of them provide neat UI features - if you are decent with excel that will be the best bet. You then have the option to slice and dice the data as you like.

From Daytum - the books i have read for this month.

From Daytum - my mile tracker for the year. Also shows me the dates and miles i have run on those days.
The intent of this post was to make my goals more public and find out how others are doing for their 2010 goals. Looking forward to seeing your progress and comments on this topic.

For Those reading some of my thoughts and ramblings know that I love reading productivity books, tips, tricks and have tried a few of them as well. While most of the productivity tips are usefull only if you make it into a habit or incorporate it into your routine, there is no denying the fact that you have to make any technique "yours" for it to work.

After reading about the Pomodoro Technique, Getting Things Done these are some of the best learnings that i have successfully implemented and created my own flavor of getting things done.

Step 1 - Brain Dump
- Make a list of all the projects (anything that needs to be done) that you can think of.
- Define goals or outcomes for projects that are not errands.
- Add a context to your lists (someday, priority, urgent, phone, email, surf, recurring ) etc.
- I have a physical inbox that i capture all bills and mail and have it on calendar to process my inbox as well.

Step 2 - Pomodoros
- I dont use a timer but i break these tasks into 30 min activities.

Step 3 - Calendar
- I extensively use google calendar and break my day down into chucks of 30 mins and everytime i have a 30 min thats open i go to my list and process one item at a time.
- All recurring activities find a spot on the calendar, so i dont have to worry about it anymore.
- One of the recurring tasks is to review the project list.

One of the keys to getting this to work is to stick to your calendar and make sure that your tasks are well defined. Like any process to work RINSE AND REPEAT.

A common problem for those of us who have profiles on Social Networking sites like Facebook,Linked In is to draw a line between Professional and Personal Relationships.
There is little or no doubt that Relationship Matters and it's not What you know but Who you know. Lets take a look at the two most common scenarios that I have had to deal with.

What do you do when a coworker requests to add you on Facebook?

So you go out for a couple drinks with a bunch of coworkers to celebrate an official accomplishment. The next day you get a friend request on Facebook. You can choose to
a) ignore and have a few awkward moments at work
b) accept and have your coworker look at your personal life
c) set up a limited profile (sans the personal spice). but if your coworker is slightly net savvy they would know right away that the profile is a little bare.

Solution: DO NOT post anything on your profile you dont want people at work to see. If you live by this rule, you would not have an uneasy feel when you a get a coworker friend request. And who knows having your coworker on facebook might help them understand your personality and improve your working relationship as well.

What do you do when a high school friend requests to add you on LinkedIn?

This is not half as bad as the Scenario 1, but things can get a little messy when your friend decides to write you recommendation about how he helped you with your Math Assignment in School. Well firstly that is not something you would like on your LinkedIn profile. If your friend does send you a recommendation, I would send him a friendly reply declining the recommendation but thanking him for the thought. Similarly, I would refrain from sending recommendations to people that I haven't worked with or wouldn't recommend on a professional capacity. He might be a great guy to hang out with but that is not what LinkedIn is for.

Finally, setting up personal rules such as limited profiles on facebook, or a general rule that I will not add coworkers on facebook might help if you stick to without prejudice. Similarly on LinkedIn, connecting only to known people and reducing the noise might help you fulfill your goal for using the tools. At the end of the day, what you get out of it is totally dependent on how you want to use it. The tool is only as good as the toolsman.