February 2010 – ORGANIZING CREATIVITY

Memory Landmine with Background Image

2010-02-28

Landmines in productivity are things you place somewhere where you stumble upon in the future, at best in the moment when you need to remember something. But if it stays there for too long, you begin to ignore it. So here's a simple solution for those working on the computer.
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Effective and Ineffective Workgroup Meetings

2010-02-16

A comparison of meetings that work well and those that do not -- on multiple criteria.
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Crimes of Translation

2010-02-15

There's a place where creativity is not needed -- in translations. At least beyond expressing what the author meant. Unfortunately, at least from English to German, there are a lot of failed "creative" people at work here. A rant with soul-shredding examples.
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PostDoc RoadMap

2010-02-04

How do you plan your post-doc phase? Here's a suggestion. (Update: Looking at it four years later, I think it's too detailed and optimistic. And it needed better feedback.)
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Recommendation: TEDTalk – Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity

2010-02-04

Incredible talk -- not only the content but also the performance.
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Organizing Creativity Book available at Amazon.com

2010-02-03

Yeah, it's here!!! (Update: I strongly recommend having a look at the second version -- it's much, much better.)
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Who is strong enough to kill his children?

2010-02-01

A few words on editing text -- why you need a good "no-bullshit" editor, and a safe place for your kids.
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Wanting to appear competent vs. being competent

2010-02-01

When feedback about a presentation was ... completely misunderstood and turned into a real fuck-up, I began to think about competence and how some people seem to chose appearance over performance.
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This is a private blog showing my opinions. If you have an issue with what I write here, either don’t read it or talk to me directly. Don’t waste your time — or mine — dragging my employer into matters where they hold no authority.

The institution I work for, or rather the people officially representing it, have already distanced themselves from this blog. I find this unnecessary, as I’ve clearly stated in the «About this Blog» section that this is a personal blog.

Frankly, I have nothing but contempt for those who lack the backbone to address their concerns directly and instead resort to passive-aggressive tattling to others. Such behavior strikes me as not only cowardly, but also spineless, gutless, and wholly unprincipled. Moreover, these efforts are as pathetic as they are futile.

That said, I might listen if you present compelling arguments and evidence, as constructive feedback is always welcome. Who knows? We might even both gain something valuable from the interaction.

A comment for those seeking to use this site for personal gain: Given the increase in requests, let me be clear. I write on this blog because I want to. It’s my hobby, my playground. Sometimes people point me to interesting products/services and I write about them. But any request regarding ads or sponsored placements ends up the trash without a reply. And if you think something would be of interest, differentiate yourself from the spammers by referring to a posting — in an intelligent way. (I get enough auto-generated mails to identify them immediately.)

BTW, posts can get updated after I published them if I spot spelling errors (not a native speaker) or think a different wording might improve precision and clarity.

This blog is not focused on a single topic, or method. As long as it is relevant to improving creativity (or allowing it in the first place), it's fair game.
Some postings on this blog deal with freedom, as I think that we need freedom of thought, of speech, of association, etc. pp. to solve mankind's problems. Thus, some postings may seem a bit remote when it comes to organizing creativity. Freedom is, however, the bedrock of creativity.
The heterogeneity of the postings can make reading this blog a bit cumbersome, at least if you are only interested in one topic. You can either use the search function (above), or use the categories or the tags to narrow down the postings you see.

ORGANIZING CREATIVITY