An Interview with Cali and Jody of the Results-only Work Environment (ROWE) - Free Pursuits
A results-only work environment (or ROWE) is a radical new way of working that focuses on results instead of face time. ROWE in practice means “each person is free to do whatever they want, whenever they want as long as the work gets done.”
The Case For A Four-Day Workweek - Environment and Energy
How often does Utah, of all places, get mentioned as a hotbed of public-policy innovation? Not often. But, last August, the state carried out a rather novel idea: Shift all government employees to a four-day workweek. No, this wasn’t the French approach. Workers would still put in their 40 hours; they’d just toil in the office for ten hours a day, Monday through Thursday, and then get Friday off. The experiment’s been going on for a year and the results are finally in—the state actually saved a fair bit on energy costs. Scientific American reports…
Bruce Schneier has a fascinating article over on Wired, based on a study by Magne Jorgensen, about how the act of undergoing risk analysis on software projects actually leads to over-optimism and over-confidence.
Potential explanations all come from behavioral economics: cognitive biases that affect how we think and make decisions. (I’ve written about some of these biases and how they affect security decisions, and there’s a great book on the topic as well.)First, there’s a control bias. We tend to underestimate risks in situations where we are in control, and overestimate risks in situations when we are not in control. Driving versus flying is a common example. This bias becomes stronger with familiarity, involvement and a desire to experience control, all of which increase with increased risk analysis. So the more risk analysis, the greater the control bias, and the greater the underestimation of risk.
The second explanation is the availability heuristic. Basically, we judge the importance or likelihood of something happening by the ease of bringing instances of that thing to mind. So we tend to overestimate the probability of a rare risk that is seen in a news headline, because it is so easy to imagine. Likewise, we underestimate the probability of things occurring that don’t happen to be in the news. A corollary of this phenomenon is that, if we’re asked to think about a series of things, we overestimate the probability of the last thing thought about because it’s more easily remembered.
According to Jørgensen’s reasoning, people tend to do software risk analysis by thinking of the severe risks first, and then the more manageable risks. So the more risk analysis that’s done, the less severe the last risk imagined, and thus the greater the underestimation of the total risk.
The third explanation is similar: the peak end rule. When thinking about a total experience, people tend to place too much weight on the last part of the experience. In one experiment, people had to hold their hands under cold water for one minute. Then, they had to hold their hands under cold water for one minute again, then keep their hands in the water for an additional 30 seconds while the temperature was gradually raised. When asked about it afterwards, most people preferred the second option to the first, even though the second had more total discomfort. (An intrusive medical device was redesigned along these lines, resulting in a longer period of discomfort but a relatively comfortable final few seconds. People liked it a lot better.) This means, like the second explanation, that the least severe last risk imagined gets greater weight than it deserves.
I recently sprang for a refurbished Dell Latitude E4300 laptop (2.4ghz CPU \ 4GB RAM \ 160GB 7200 RPM HD \ Webcam) from the Dell outlet store for $976 and wow — it is one fantastic machine. Easily the best laptop I’ve ever used and one which offers an insane value proposition which should suit most people. Why? A few notes:
Size & Weight: The E4300 is a 13″ widescreen. Having used both smaller (12″) and larger (14″) laptops I feel qualified to opine that 13″ is really the sweet spot on the size/usability continuum. 12″ laptops become consciously irritating when writing long documents or trying to compare things side by side. 14″ laptops are just too big/heavy to conveniently haul around. 13″ is just right. The E4300 is not particularly thin, but nor is it fat. Most importantly, with the standard 6-cell battery, it weighs a mere 3.3lbs! Impressive engineering.
Screen: The E4300 uses the newer ‘backlit LCD’ display, instead of the older cathode tube display. Backlit LCDs are lighter, brighter, and thinner. It’s a beautiful screen, easy on the eyes for long hours. Only the high end Sony Vaio’s have nicer screens, with the Latitude’s coming in a close second. Standard 1280×800 WXGA resolution.
Input Devices: Dell managed to squeeze what is basically a full size keyboard into the widescreen frame. It’s not the best laptop keyboard I’ve ever used (that honor definitely goes to Lenovo), but it’s definitely above average and completely serviceable. Surprisingly useful bonus feature: The keyboard activates a backlight in low-light conditions! There is both a trackpad and a touchstick. I don’t really use trackpads but I’m sure my wife will appreciate it and the touchstick — while not a Lenovo — gets the job done.
Performance: The E4300 has the “new” SP-series dual core intel processor designed specifically for mobile devices. This amazing processor gives you high speeds (up to 2.5ghz) while downclocking to lower speeds when not being heavily utilized. The end result is you get strong performance with a real-world 20%-30% increase in battery life. This thing zips around Windows Vista. The video controller is onboard, so graphic performance is modest, but more than sufficient for photoshop and watching DVDs (I’ve never understood playing games on laptops anyway). Mine came with a decent 7200rpm hard drive, but I plan on upgrading to an SSD when prices drop (which should offer a 10%-20% performance boost — extending the useful life of this hardware).
Battery Life: The aforementioned SP series processor works its magic here. Using the six cell battery, I routinely get 5-6 hours of typical usage. At 2.4ghz speed in a 3.3lb package — that’s really impressive.
Build Quality & Reliability: The Latitude E4300 is Dell’s laptop line targeted at business folks and professionals. Accordingly it gets a stronger chassis and less plastic than it’s consumer counter-parts (e.g. the Dell XPS M1330). Everything about the laptop seems solid. Nothing squeaks, flexes, or seems out of whack. Windows never freezes or bluescreens.
Refurbished: I’ve never purchased a refurbished computer before, but after my ideal configuration came out to almost $2k new, I became curious. I did some research both on and offline — there were a few horror stories but most (about 85%) of the Dell refurbished experiences were good! Importantly, Dell offers a 21-day return period so that took away my anxiety. I’m happy to report another satisfied customer. Aside from some tiny scratches on the outer screen cover (not noticeable unless closely inspecting) — it was truly like new. It’s impossible to determine why the previous owner returned it — everything works fine! Another benefit is refurbished laptops are shipped the next day, so you don’t have to wait for them to be “built.”
Dell: I don’t usually buy Dell (preferring IBM/Lenovo and HP) as I’ve generally associated them with cheaper/inferior products. But a number of IT folks whom I trust have recently told me that they believe Dell’s laptop line is really improving. In fact, a number of IT services companies have recently switched to Dell laptops for their field techs. I decided to take a chance and the experience was flawless. I haven’t had to call support yet, but I’m told that its serviceable.
Warranty: I thought it was worth pointing out that when buying refurbished, $99’s gets you three years of next business day onsite repair. That’s quite a deal and a nice offer to stand behind. I definitely took the plunge on that one for peace of mind.
Value & The Competition: If you want the same combination of flashy performance in a tiny (sub 3.5lb) package there are really only three options: Lenovo, Sony, and Apple. Weirdly, HP has nothing in the ballpark. Sony was off the table for me because — while they make some beautiful VAIOs — they just aren’t hardy. Someone should track down all the VAIO owners with cracked or separated frames or screens and put together some sort of lawsuit. That left Lenovo and Apple. I have too many useful PC programs for an Apple and they’re too expensive anyway. The comparable Lenovo options are ridiculously expensive as well, and usually lack DVD drives. I briefly considered the Dell XPS m1330, until realizing its power hungry processor gives it a mere 2-3hrs on a 6-cell. After much research the choice was clear!
Conclusion: Overall — this is a great laptop suitable for a wide audience. It does everything well and has none of those bonehead annoyances that can ruin an otherwise good experience. At under $1k (refurbished) its really a steal. Highly recommended.
Jason Hiner has a fascinating article at TechRepublic arguing that Google’s approach to software development is fundamentally incompatible with enterprise business requirements:
Google’s organization and corporate culture are radically decentralized. There’s not a lot of structure, process, or bureaucracy. The focus is on innovation and freelance creativity. That can make it a great place to work if you’re an engineer and it makes Google great at building Internet widgets and exciting new features for its search platform.
[. . .]
However, when IT departments do mass deployments of applications for business-critical tasks, they expect a high level of service. They expect the software to be bug-free, and if they do run into problems then they expect to be able to quickly connect with a customer support representative to resolve any issues immediately, if not sooner.
In order to pull off this type of experience that corporate IT demands, a software maker needs excellent attention to detail, strong processes and systems in place, and software that is “good enough” to provide a seamless experience for users. Again, delivering fully-packaged, mostly-bullet-proof software is not part of Google’s DNA.
Jason makes some interesting points here and on some level — I follow his reasoning. On the other hand, Google Apps has been a pretty big success by most accounts. Perhaps Google is a little more organized/process-driven than we’re giving them credit for?
Forrester has rolled out new cloud-computing survey results which turn some existing assumptions upside down! Among the findings:
Larger firms are more interested than smaller firms in leveraging external IaaS capability. This flies in the face of conventional wisdom that the SMB market will be the most eager adopter of cloud computing, because it will enable them to avoid extensive internal IT investment and skills. Firms are slightly less interested in internal clouds than in external IaaS. By a margin of 10 percent, companies of all sizes prefer to focus on external providers rather than implementing a cloud internally. This is really surprising, for two reasons: (1) it indicates that companies feel they have enough information to make a decision, which is somewhat surprising given how early in the process we are; and (2) despite how early in the process it is, most companies are not opting for the “safer” choice, which is creating an internal cloud. Interest in production app placement in external clouds is nearly as high as for test/dev. Again, the conventional wisdom is that companies will migrate test/dev to clouds as the initial use profile, because test/dev is often a pinch point in provisioning, requiring resources quickly and for indeterminate durations; the thinking goes that this type of use profile meshes well with cloud computing characteristics but also sidesteps other issues associated with external clouds like security, data privacy, and SLA needs.
Who knew?
