Orange is not a colour, it's a state of mind
July 17th, 2011 — Orange, Work
This has fast become a favourite photo of mine – featuring The Mister and orange! This is a professional shot taken by WE DO Photography who were at the inaugural WDCNZ for the day last Thursday where The Mister was speaking. He was pretty nervous but once he got up on stage, he was fantastic (as always) although I won’t tell you what his talk was, it was 40 minutes of totally geekery!! (node.js for those in the know!)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/wdcnz/5941653694/in/set-72157627203741560
July 10th, 2011 — Random thoughts, Work
I wrote myself a list in 2000 of what I like in a job, most to least. I think it related to the job I had at the time but suspect it was one of those reflective times when I was thinking about what motivated me with a view to finding the perfect job, rather than seeking to fix something in the one I currently had. Wonder how it maps to what I do today?
- focussed work on one project
- control, central knowledge of project – specialist position
- some hands on e.g. enough to know basic workings of a system
- technical involvement even if at a high level
- writing specs/guidelines
- control of work and workload
- implementation work – client side i.e. working with clients as they understand and use a new system and feedback/suggest modifications to development company
- self-delegation and responsibility
- processing feedback and requirements
- flexible work hours and telework environment
A process or system gives a sense of expectation.
20 March 2000
At the time I was working at Innovus which had recently bought out Extrados/Spunk Media so having our small web services company swallowed up by a larger corporate probably brought on my evaluation.
Now, as the Community Manager at Xero I’d say this list if applied practically is flipped on its head – I probably still value all these things but in reality:
Interesting. Would be good to see this again in another 10 years.
May 16th, 2011 — Travels, Work
We’re moving! There was even media coverage about it – my 2nd ever mention in the NBR!
But now we have visas, it’s all a bit more public – hoping to relocate in about 3 months. A different kind of exciting to New York which obviously tops all levels of exciting but very very cool to be in the centre of Xero’s entry into the US with the set up of an office, search for new staff and getting our brand and product out there. If I was to be honest, probably 49% exciting, 51% scary! Still SO many details to be worked through – still have to untie some of the red tape tied and knotted tightly around the visas and work permits and figure out all that other stuff we don’t worry so much about in NZ like how do you see a doctor, personal insurance in case someone trips over your bag at a cafe and sues you, social security, driving, paying for water etc etc so watch this space!
But thanks to our recent trip, there is decent coffee to be had, we’ve met some nice people and the site of The Big Orange Bridge does thrill me 
April 16th, 2011 — Orange, Work
We’ve all wheeled our Life chairs into the big meeting room at work to be cleaned this weekend. Mine is easy to spot! That’s pretty much how I feel – always a bit different, special, the odd one out! This photo someone took made me smile.
February 20th, 2011 — Tech commentary, Work
Attended Webstock again this year with a group from work (Xero was the main sponsor which was awesome!) – even though some of the talks last year were a bit blue sky for me, I was glad to attend again this year even though I was left feeling rather shattered after 2 days in a darkened hall with 800 other people just listening and taking stuff in – rather different from the day-to-day hum drum.
As a sponsor we got to host a couple of the speakers for a chat and lunch in our office and The Mister got to meet one of his internet heroes Steve Souders from Google.
He took Steve to Nikau for lunch an he was super-impressed by the kedgeree – and really touched that after I heard this, I got him one of the Nikau tea towels with the kedgeree recipe on it – he said it was the best souvenir he’d ever received! (Meanwhile I’m kidding around saying if we ever visit California he can cook it for us … I really had no idea who this guy was nor his internet infamy, so to me he was just a lovely guy who liked Nikau as I pushed in front of the line of people waiting for their 5 minutes of fame with him! I went to his Webstock presentation, didn’t understand a word of it (way too geeky) but felt I should support him as my new friend, told him as much afterward and he roared with laughter!)
Again with the random notes I took, sometimes something the presenter said, sometimes a thought that popped into my head while they were speaking – read no further if conference notes aren’t your thing, I just wanted to write them down somewhere. I did feel a bit like I did last year where I didn’t ‘get’ it – I didn’t emerge having identified a particular theme or trend as others did, I wasn’t wowed by any new inventions, I thought after hearing a couple of things that I might change my ways but doubt that will happen – this all sounds like I was disappointed but I wasn’t! Well, perhaps disappointed in myself for not getting more out of it seeing as everyone else was raving that they did (or perhaps it’s like The English Patient that everyone crooned about, yet I felt like the only person in the world who didn’t enjoy it).
February 5th, 2011 — Travels, Work
Just had 2 days in Taupo at the Xero Partner conference – a couple hundred accountants and others from add-on software that works with Xero – gathered together to hear presentations from government, small business, software services and our team on what we’re building this year.
It was a great end to a week spent chaperoning Jason, one of our accounting partners from South Carolina, USA. He’s got such a cool southern accent and this was his first trip to New Zealand so we got to see our life and quirks through his eyes – the steering wheel on the wrong side, biscuits are cookies, light switches go the wrong way, no freeways between cities, everyone mumbles, mussels are huge, flat white is a type of coffee and you can go bungy jumping without insurance! It was a full on time for Jason with the Xero team and he barely got outside the office and didn’t get much of a look around Wellington – although here we are on the waterfront before dining at Shed 5.
He made some small video diary entries while he was here and is posting the all up on his blog – thriveal.com (yes, one features me driving the car!)
December 19th, 2010 — Woollen things, Work
I finished the latest Xero cardie during the week especially for the Granny who was going to be in town from the Auckland office to take it back to her granddaughter. It turned out very neatly given that I hadn’t used this pattern in a while. I’m also very impressed with myself – got some craft scissors, orange card and orange ribbon for a little ‘made by’ tag for it.
The cardie was received with much excitement and even though it must be stinking hot in Auckland it was taken to a family gathering today and tried on for a photo for me. Here’s Tereina – doesn’t she look gorgeous?
Apparently she’s on the cat’s chair and he looks most put out!
December 17th, 2010 — Woollen things, Work
This morning the newly convened Xero Stitch n Bitch group (so far just Mrs H and me) saw the completion of the rather complex knitted iPad cover that Mrs H had enlisted my help on. We’ve had a few lunchtime sessions in the back meeting room at Xero.
Since starting a couple of weeks ago I’ve helped decipher a rather abbreviated pattern downloaded from the internet to knit a seamless ‘pocket’ with 2 cable needles, read a grid of dots and letters that represents an apple shape (without explaining that it was instructions for every second row), learn how to make an enormous knitted button hole using a crochet hook rather than casting on (including teaching a left-hander how to crochet in the process), and casti off with a darning needle using something called Kitchener Stitch requiring no sewing!
The pattern has a clever reverse-stitch/colour combo in order to achieve a kind of hologram effect when holding the cover horizontally to reveal a perfect Apple apple logo. You can’t really see the shape when holding the cover at a different angle, you can see there’s a pattern of some sort but not a recognisable shape. Very clever!
The recipient (Rod) was very chuffed with it!
December 6th, 2010 — Work
Had a birthday morning tea this morning with the 3 of us that started at Xero together 4 years ago – it was a great idea and great to catch up with people you don’t normally get to see – especially Larissa as she’s in sales and is normally travelling around the South Island. I note I didn’t do a Xero to post year but in the 1st 2 years I wished that the next year we’d be in the New York office – and that happened this year! Well, briefly. I’m hoping that’s what next year has in store for us again Happy Xero Birthday Jiff & Larissa!
November 25th, 2010 — What I've been doing, Work
Simon brought a grow-your-own-Xmas-tree into work today – the first time he had one I was very taken with it! Didn’t realise that was 3 years ago. This year’s was a bit bigger and I set up my camera to take regular photos of it to make a time lapse seeing as we now sit opposite each other.
The photos weren’t taken very regularly and despite the bluetac holding the camera in place I still didn’t get the tree in the same place each time!
However, The Mister managed to make a time lapse video out of it with sound track and it makes me laugh!
