Speaking about Agile at PMI Event in Dublin
Posted on 28. Mar, 2011 by ger in Events
If you want to learn more about Agile & Scrum and you’re in Dublin on the 29th of March, I am one of the speakers at an event organized by the Ireland Chapter of the Project Management Institute (PMI).
The event is billed as “Agile Scrum – Everything you wanted to know, but were afraid to ask”. It promises to be a lively session.
Colm Ó hEocha will introduce Agile and the benefits. Ger Hartnett will be talking about what Scrum is and how it works with plenty of examples from Intel and Goshido. Richard Bowden will discussing some practical lessons learned from the use of Scrum on a number of different projects.
When: 2pm to 6pm on Tuesday 29 March 2011.
Where: Hilton Hotel, Charlemont Place, Dublin, IRELAND.
The event is free but you should register in advance on the PMI website.
9+2 things successful people do differently
Posted on 23. Mar, 2011 by ger in New Ways to Work
I’m usually wary of blog posts like “N tips to accomplish your goals”. All too often they’re filled with reheated motivational cliches. Heidi Grant Halvorson’s recent post on the Harvard Business Review Blog is different. Heidi recommends “9 things successful people do differently”. I’m going to add two more to her list.
First, here are some examples from Heidi.
Seize the moment to act on your goals
“… decide when and where you will take each action you want to take, in advance … Studies show that this kind of planning will help your brain to detect and seize the opportunity when it arises, increasing your chances of success by roughly 300%.”
Know exactly how far you have left to go
“Check your progress frequently – weekly, or even daily, depending on the goal.”
Be a realistic optimist
“Studies show that thinking things will come to you easily and effortlessly leaves you ill-prepared for the journey ahead, and significantly increases the odds of failure.”
Focus on getting better, rather than being good
“Many of us believe that our intelligence, our personality, and our physical aptitudes are fixed … As a result, we focus on goals that are all about proving ourselves, rather than developing and acquiring new skills.”
Mitch McCrimmon, one of the commenters on Heidi’s post, added a 10th recommendation.
Review and celebrate successes
“We need a sense of making progress, not just a feeling that there is so much more to do.”
Finally, to turn the volume up to 11, I’ll add another related recommendation.
Break a goal or project down into bite-size chunks
Richard Wiseman conducted a large-scale scientific study a few years ago into the psychology of motivation. The more successful participants broke down their high-level goals into a series of sub-goals. If you use this technique you’ll achieve small successes that build up to audacious accomplishments.
Learn more
- Read Heidi’s blog post or check out her new book Succeed, which is getting great reviews on Amazon
- Read Richard Wiseman’s book 59 Seconds
- Try Goshido, a new cloud-platform, which helps people: focus, communicate, and do their best work.
Can you recommend other good ideas?
Seminar in Edinburgh SCOTLAND cancelled due to weather
Posted on 29. Nov, 2010 by ger in Events
Due to severe weather conditions we’ve cancelled the event scheduled for 30-Nov in Edinburgh Scotland.
Slides from the Cork seminar Oct 2010
Posted on 28. Oct, 2010 by ger in Events
You can view the slides from our recent seminar in Cork, Ireland.
Here are some followup ideas:
- Contact us to arrange a visit to your company
- Try goshido
- Find out more about
Slides from our recent breakfast seminar
Posted on 23. Sep, 2010 by ger in Uncategorized
You can view the slides from our recent seminar.
Here are some followup ideas:
- Try goshido
- Find out more about
- Let us know if you’d like us to visit your business
iPad available for web & software developers in Limerick
Posted on 27. May, 2010 by ger in Uncategorized
The iPad is going to be big. If you’re a web or mobile app developer you need to get an iPad to test your software. If you’re not in the US that’s a bit tricky at the moment. So here’s the thing. Here at Goshido we’ve managed to acquire an iPad and we’re willing to share it with other software/web developers in Limerick Ireland.
When I was in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago it was obvious the machine has mass market appeal. While I’d expect the uber nerds at Web 2 Expo to be iPad-mad, when I walked into the flagship Apple Store at Stockton and Market I was astounded.
Apple have chained 30-ish demo iPads to tables just inside the front door. Invariably they’re all being used. When someone walks away there’s a scramble for the machine. A member of staff is roaming constantly from one iPad to the next, spraying screen cleaner and scraping off the the layers of fingerprints. iPads are very susceptible to fingerprints.
The blue-shirted sales staff answer the same questions again and again, ‘Sorry we have no ipads… That’s right we have no stock of any kind… We get shipments every day except Sunday… We don’t know what we’re getting until we open the boxes.’
The trick is to go in at just after 11am. Apparently that’s when the shipment arrives. Even then they’ll only have one type of wifi iPad. The 3G ones are hens teeth. I visited the Apple Store four times to try get one for Mobanode and three of the four times they were sold out. When they did have stock they didn’t have the one Mobanode wanted.
To be honest, at first I was a little disappointed with the device. I have since changed my opinion. I’ll go into that in more detail in a later blog post.
However, from a web app point of view, the browser is excellent, the same browsing experience as a netbook or desktop (maybe better because you can touch the web). People will be using your software/web app on ipads even if it is not optimised for mobile screen sizes.
While many people are very impressed with the performance of the iPad in general I’m wondering about the JavaScript performance in iPad Safari. Our web application Goshido, uses jquery, and it performs very differently on the iPad. The feel is just not right. Effects are not as smooth and some of the navigation that works great on a desktop is less-than-great on the iPad. You can’t see that on the emulator (brilliant and all as it is). At the end of the day, it’s like trying to build a sandcastle with dry sand, software must be tested on real hardware.
Now I don’t know if the problem is our software (most probable), jquery (we’re not using the latest version), or Apple’s implementation of JavaScript (surely not). Whatever it is, we need to figure it out soon.
At the very least you need to make sure your product doesn’t have a similar issue.
So here’s the thing. If you’re based in Limerick Ireland and you’d like to borrow our iPad for a day to test your software, let us know. There’s no charge, all we ask is you bring it back in one piece. Email us (info at goshido dot com) or tweet (@goshido) if you’re interested.
Goshido on TodayFM
Posted on 15. Feb, 2010 by ger in Uncategorized
You can hear Frank Hannigan on TodayFM’s Sunday Business Show (14-Feb-2010) discussing Goshido and fundraising with LinkedIn. TodayFM is a national radio station in Ireland.
You can also download an MP3 file of the show. The segment with Frank starts at 26 minutes into the show.
Goshido in the Irish Times
Posted on 23. Jan, 2010 by ger in Uncategorized
The Irish Times covered Goshido’s recent fundraising round.
Guest Lecture in UL “Multimedia and Computer Games”
Posted on 25. Nov, 2009 by ger in Uncategorized
I’m delivering a guest lecture on the 26-Nov-2009 in the University of Limerick. I’ll be talking about what its like to work in agile projects from the developer, tester and manager perspectives.
I’ll be using the slides from my talk in Enterprise Ireland earlier this week.
The lecture will be part of the 4th year “Multimedia Industry Perspectives” module. Most of the students are from the “Multimedia and Computer Games” course but there’s some from “Computer Science” and “Digital Media Design” as well.
It looks like there’s a fairly big room in the University of Limerick and they tell me visitors are welcome too. If you’d like to attend, the lecture starts at 10am in the Kemmy Business School, room KBG14.
Speaking at Seminar on Agile Project Management
Posted on 18. Nov, 2009 by ger in Uncategorized
Agile management techniques are getting a lot of traction in game development at the moment. GDC 09 had a number of sessions on Scrum in particular.
On Monday 23rd November I’ll be speaking at a seminar on agile project management. Lero (the Irish Software Engineering Research Centre) organised this free seminar and Enterprise Ireland are hosting it at their offices in Dublin, Ireland.
Dr. Kieran Conboy (NUI Galway) will be talking about the current state of knowledge regarding agile development. Dr. Xiaofeng Wang (University of Limerick) is going to examine a set of (mis)understandings of agile software development using real world examples and ideas from complexity study.
I’ll be talking about my experiences using agile techniques to manage a number of successful projects in both large and small companies. I’ll also discuss how agile techniques can help you manage non-software projects.
I understand there are a good number of people registered already. To register, contact Enterprise Ireland. Hope to see you there.