The Seabourns

Leadership

Continuous services through connected devices

by Leave a Comment

Ray OzzieRay Ozzie has been a long-time pioneer in the computer world. He invented Lotus Notes, a collaboration environment from the 1990s. He invented Groove, then joined Microsoft as their chief architect.

He recently wrote a lengthy yet interesting memo as part of his stepping down as chief architect at MS. His article is here.

His key vision of the future: a post-PC world based on a combination of Continuous Services and Connected Devices.

Some excerpts:

Continuous services are websites and cloud-based agents that we can rely on for more and more of what we do. They’re always-available… They’re constantly assimilating & analyzing data from both our real and online worlds. They’re constantly being refined & improved based on what works, and what doesn’t.

Connected devices beyond the PC will increasingly come in a breathtaking number of shapes and sizes, tuned for a broad variety of communications, creation & consumption tasks. Each individual will interact with a fairly good number of these connected devices on a daily basis – their phone / internet companion; their car; a shared public display in the conference room, living room, or hallway wall.

It’s an exciting time to be alive, to be a follower of Jesus Christ, and to have the privilege of helping lead in the technology-enhanced mission to help everyone know someone who truly follows Jesus.

Os Guiness on Globalization at Lausanne Congress

by Leave a Comment

Os GuinessI recommend to you Os Guiness’ presentation on globalization at the Lausanne Congress. It’s 15 minutes long. You can skip to the 2 minute point to get past the introductions.

Additional panel speakers are listed on the bottom right of the page in “Join related conversations”.

Some notes from my listening:

His understanding: Globalization is the process through which our human interconnectedness has now reached truly global proportions.

The deepest driver in globalization is information technology. Particularly the 3 “S” forces:
Speed: Communicate at instantaneous speed
Scope: Communicate with the entire world
Simultaneity: Communicate everywhere at the same time

What is happening in the global revolution, centered in information technology, has been described as significant as the rise of the wheel, the invention of the alphabet or human writing. Something that is transforming human experience at all sorts of levels from identity, to families, to work, to communities, to nations, to notions such as evil to religions and even for the sense of the [future] prospect of the human race.

Globalization is the single strongest face of the world in our time. We will wrestle with it throughout our lifetimes as the context for our living and witnessing.

Disagreeing Agreeably

by Leave a Comment

Blogger Ken Keathley has written an excellent article: When Writing about Those with Whom You Disagree. His 3 rules of thumb:

  1. Describe your opponent’s position in such a way that he can recognize it.
  2. Know your opponent’s position well enough that you could argue it for him.
  3. Write as if your opponent and you were going to dinner together after you finish.

Number 1 builds trust through not exaggerating or distorting. No straw men which are easily demolished.

Number 2 builds understanding through study, not to destroy but to be able to present the opposing view also.

Number 3 builds relationship while disagreeing on an issue.

Good stuff.

Capacity to receive God’s blessing

by Leave a Comment

Peter and his friends had one net. God provided one net full of fish. But he did not provide more than one net full. (John 21)

The mother and her two sons filled every jar they had and every jar their neighbors had. It was not just a few, but many jars. But when all the jars were full, the flow of oil stopped. (2 Kings 4)

Peter, James and John went fishing when Jesus encouraged them to try again after a long, fruitless night. They “filled both boats so full that they began to sink.” Two boats. Two boats full of fish. But not three boats of fish, because there were only two boats.

I’ve spoken on this before.

God blesses us to the limits of our capacity. He stewards his blessings to not exceed our capacity. If we want more of God’s blessing, we must increase our capacity to receive.

Building capacity is the focus of our operational task in Campus Crusade for Christ. It’s the drumbeat we are marching with in operational areas. Capacity to sustain and increasingly accelerate everyone knowing someone who truly follows Jesus.

One of the things we are asking God to do is to help our staff around the world partner with donors to receive 100% of their financial need every month. There are four parts to seeing this dream become reality.

  1. Training in the skills of how to approach ministry partnership and growth in faithful trust that God will provide. One form of this training called DMPD is expanding around the world.
  2. A  donation process for the donor to send his or her monthly donation to the ministry. In many countries, this can be through a bank check or credit card. One way we are doing this in more challenging places is through mobile phones as I wrote recently. We call this the mGiving project.
  3. A financial process to receive the donation, receipt the donor, deposit the funds into each staff member’s accounts, and pay salaries and ministry expenses. We do this through the Donorwise and Microsoft Dynamics tools which we have packaged into the Financial ConneXion.
  4. A reporting process to inform staff of the donations so they can personally thank the donors and report ministry activity to their partners. One way we are doing this is through the TntMPD and Data.Server tools.

We are building the capacity by faith that God will provide the blessings. When the DMPD training was done in one part of the world, there was a 400% increase in funding in one month! We want to be ready for God to provide that blessing everywhere.

Staying connected to our users

by 3 Comments

I read that Google is going to modify Gmail so that users can choose to not use the threaded Conversation View. Since it’s beginning, Gmail has threaded conversations together so it’s easy to see all my communication on each “thread” or “subject line”. However, that is not the chronological (sorted by date) way that Outlook and many other email programs tend to show messages.

Google has pushed hard and held firm to the “new way” of threaded conversations rather than chronology.

But they have “thrown in the towel” and will offer users a choice.

This isn’t the first innovation of Gmail that Google had to adapt to more traditional users’ expectations. Remember the folders vs labels war of a year or two ago? Gmail’s original author staunchly refused to provide folders, wanting to help people adapt to the much more flexible labels idea. But after a couple of years of users’ complaints, Gmail added folders.

What does this have to do with us? I’m glad you asked.

I think it’s important to push the technology envelope with innovative advances. But most people are not early adopters, and if you want many people to use your tools, you need to make evolutionary changes rather than revolutionary changes. It must be easy for people to take a small step in using your tool rather than a large step. You can more effectively introduce a new way to work by advancing in a series of small steps rather than large jumps.

Software designers in Campus Crusade: Take note! Stay connected to your users. We’re about advancing the mission more than advancing the technology.

What do you think?