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Thanks Antonio! No talent at all (as was made clear to me at school), but I do try really hard.
Commented May 29, 2011 on King's College at Neil Davidson's drawings
King's College
I pushed myself well out of my comfort zone with this. The end result is a bit disheartening - so little down on the paper after so much effort - but I learnt a lot from the process. You can see my other drawings on flickr. I'm on twitter too.
Hi Gareth,
Thanks for the encouragement. I get disheartened because I compare my efforts to things like this:
http://ruskin.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/collection/8999/per_page/50/offset/0/sort_by/cabinets/object/7908
Perhaps I should choose different comparisons though!
Neil
Commented May 25, 2011 on King's College at Neil Davidson's drawings
King's College
I pushed myself well out of my comfort zone with this. The end result is a bit disheartening - so little down on the paper after so much effort - but I learnt a lot from the process. You can see my other drawings on flickr. I'm on twitter too.
Marga,
Flickr have a process for it, so I marked the images as moderate and the reverted my account. In fairness to them, they did this very quickly.
Neil
Commented Aug 5, 2010 on Warning. This post may contain nuts. And breasts. And bottoms. at Neil Davidson's drawings
Warning. This post may contain nuts. And breasts. And bottoms.
I just got an e-mail from flickr saying that my account has been changed to ‘restricted’. Presumably because there are ‘bare breasts and bottoms’ in some of my drawings: I can see both sides of the argument. On the one hand, flickr is a private company, its terms and conditions aren’t too ...
Yes!
Commented Jun 23, 2010 on Don Norman at Business of Software 2009 at Business of Software Blog
Don Norman at Business of Software 2009
Imagine you’re on the first slide of your powerpoint presentation and want to move to the next slide. Your remote control has two buttons. They are unmarked, but one button points up and one button points down. Which button do you press? Now, spend five minutes watching this video of Don Norman ...
Kathy,
That's a fantastic compliment, coming from you. The older I get, the less value I place on raw talent and the more on hard work and determination ('grit' is the technical word, I think).
I've got no talent, so it's all about practicing, and refusing to stop until, one day, I'll be good. And lots of reading about the subject (oddly, I've found 19th century books to be the best, perhaps because the Victorians believed in graft too).
I'll blog about it. Soon, I think.
Neil
Commented Jun 6, 2010 on Julia Kay's portrait party at Neil Davidson's drawings
Julia Kay's portrait party
I joined a flickr group called Julia Kay's portrait party. It's a place where the members of the group sketch each other. Neat idea. Here's one of my contributions:
Neil Davidson is now following The Typepad Team
Mar 15, 2010
Ubaidullah,
Glad you enjoyed it. You can send typos to me at neil.davidson@businessofsoftware.org
If you enjoyed it could you post a review on Amazon? You can find the links at http://dontjustrollthedice.com
Commented Oct 27, 2009 on Don't just roll the dice - a usefully short guide to software pricing at Business of Software Blog
Don't just roll the dice - a usefully short guide to software pricing
In 1938, two young engineers were ready to launch their first product. They'd struggled with what to build. After considering amplifiers, radio equipment, air controllers, harmonicas and even muscle-building electrodes for housewives, they'd finally decided to create an oscilloscope. Not wanti...
Andy,
For the CPM I Googled around. Social networks seem to have the lowest CPM (eg see here
Thanks for the feedback about the page numbers!
Neil
Commented Oct 22, 2009 on Don't just roll the dice - a usefully short guide to software pricing at Business of Software Blog
Don't just roll the dice - a usefully short guide to software pricing
In 1938, two young engineers were ready to launch their first product. They'd struggled with what to build. After considering amplifiers, radio equipment, air controllers, harmonicas and even muscle-building electrodes for housewives, they'd finally decided to create an oscilloscope. Not wanti...
Thanks Patrick!
I e-mailed the HP corporate archives and they sent me a copy (which I can't distribute unfortunately). You can find contact details here.
Neil
Commented Oct 21, 2009 on Don't just roll the dice - a usefully short guide to software pricing at Business of Software Blog
Don't just roll the dice - a usefully short guide to software pricing
In 1938, two young engineers were ready to launch their first product. They'd struggled with what to build. After considering amplifiers, radio equipment, air controllers, harmonicas and even muscle-building electrodes for housewives, they'd finally decided to create an oscilloscope. Not wanti...
Dov,
Thanks for the translation! It's quite a hard idea for people to get their heads round, and some people can get extremely defensive.
Note that I'm *not* saying you don't need sales people though, just that if you have sales people you should question the assumption that they must be motivated by pay.
Looking forward to meeting you in November.
All the best,
Neil
Commented Oct 8, 2009 on Are sales people different from you and me? at Business of Software Blog
Are sales people different from you and me?
"Sales people are different from you and me." "Yes, they want money more." A year - a few months, even - ago, I would have agreed with this. It's common knowledge that sales people are motivated differently to the rest of us. You need to keep them hungry, drive them with low basic salaries and h...
Cory,
Sorry, I wasn't clear - they've been selected to speak. I'll put the presentations online once the Pecha Kucha has taken place (mid November),
Neil
Commented Sep 25, 2009 on Pecha Kucha finalists for Business of Software 2009 at Business of Software Blog
Pecha Kucha finalists for Business of Software 2009
This year's Pecha Kucha finalists have got their work cut out for them. Twenty slides, twenty seconds each, it’s the haiku of presentations. Here they are: Jurgen Appelo, Chief Information Officer of ISM eCompany on “Managing agility: from complex to simple” JD Brennan, Distinguished Technolog...
Grok2,
If you can find salespeople who are motivated intrinsically (i.e. by the need to do a good job, to help customers, and who enjoy selling) and pay them a good wage then I don't see why not).
Of course, it depends on the type of culture you want to develop / have already developed.
Neil
Commented Sep 23, 2009 on Are sales people different from you and me? at Business of Software Blog
Are sales people different from you and me?
"Sales people are different from you and me." "Yes, they want money more." A year - a few months, even - ago, I would have agreed with this. It's common knowledge that sales people are motivated differently to the rest of us. You need to keep them hungry, drive them with low basic salaries and h...
Derrick,
I think I understand the problem fairly well. And I think our sales management is reasonably strong, but I'd definitely prefer its energies were spent helping our sales people, not policing them. Our sales people are good, but not knowing what your salary is going to be will cause anxiety for almost all people.
And I do think that what large parts of the industry does is a mismatch for Red Gate (and possibly downright wrong).
I'm not alone, by the way. DEC didn't pay its sales people commissions; the SAS institute (the world's largest privately held software company) doesn't pay commissions; my local Apple store doesn't). There is also a fair amount of academic research that shows that people don't tend to be motivated by money, and that paying commissions distorts behaviour in unhelpful ways. Google, for example, Hertzberg, or Jeff Pfeffer's work (eg here and here ).
Neil
Commented Sep 23, 2009 on Are sales people different from you and me? at Business of Software Blog
Are sales people different from you and me?
"Sales people are different from you and me." "Yes, they want money more." A year - a few months, even - ago, I would have agreed with this. It's common knowledge that sales people are motivated differently to the rest of us. You need to keep them hungry, drive them with low basic salaries and h...
Cameron,
We came up with salaries that were higher than the base rate but lower than the previous base rate + commission. We looked at what we felt was a reasonable salary (benchmarked against other companies, for example) to influence our decisions.
If you have a high performer you can pay him more money, just like you'd pay happy paying a high performing software developer more than a low performing software developer. But you have the freedom to decouple this from just the amount of stuff the sales person sells. Sure, this is one factor, but you can take into account team behaviours, attitude, work ethic, whatever you like. It becomes a (evidence-based) judgement call, just like it is for everybody else in the company.
Neil
Commented Sep 22, 2009 on Are sales people different from you and me? at Business of Software Blog
Are sales people different from you and me?
"Sales people are different from you and me." "Yes, they want money more." A year - a few months, even - ago, I would have agreed with this. It's common knowledge that sales people are motivated differently to the rest of us. You need to keep them hungry, drive them with low basic salaries and h...
Thanks Ross! A lot more practice to go ...
Commented Sep 2, 2009 on Vacuum cleaner at Neil Davidson's drawings
Vacuum cleaner
Thanks for the encouragement Marine!
Commented Aug 30, 2009 on Vacuum cleaner at Neil Davidson's drawings
Vacuum cleaner
Anybody else having issues with the video? Works fine on Firefox 3.5.2 on my Mac.
Commented Aug 18, 2009 on Seth Godin on why marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department at Business of Software Blog
Seth Godin on why marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department
At last year's conference, Seth gave an inspiring talk on the title of "Why marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department". Make sure you watch it until the end, where he gives a preview of his (then upcoming) Tribes talk. Here it is: You can see more videos from BoS 2008 h...
Ncu,
I haven't read Bob's previous book. Anybody read both and like to comment?
Neil
Commented Aug 3, 2009 on "The Web Startup Success Guide" - a book review at Business of Software Blog
"The Web Startup Success Guide" - a book review
Back in 1999, after quitting a job I hated that involved working on products that sucked and with and for (with some exceptions) people I didn't respect, I found myself in the small life boat that was Red Gate, with Simon as co-navigator, a small contracting revenue as a paddle and no hat. Bob W...
Brian - I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow.
Commented Jul 23, 2009 on Badly drawn stapler, and other office equipment at Neil Davidson's drawings
Badly drawn stapler, and other office equipment
Twenty years ago, Mr Balkwill, my English teacher, used to set us essays ('write a story about anything you like'). We'd struggle for a week, hand them in, Mr Balkwill would read them, grade them and give them back. I got Cs and Bs; no matter how hard I tried try to act on his vague but well-m...
Kyle / Jamie,
Both correct! Thanks - it wasn't as disastrous as I'd hoped then.
Neil
Commented Jul 23, 2009 on Cup, watch and mystery object at Neil Davidson's drawings
Cup, watch and mystery object
I'm trying to draw things at slightly odd angles to understand perspective. As you can see from the drawings of the cup, watch and mystery object (bonus points if you can guess what it is) I'm not there yet. Not surprising given that perspective wasn't discovered until 1413 (although Giotto got ...
But what's he done since ...?
Commented Jul 18, 2009 on Humbled, but hopeful at Neil Davidson's drawings
Humbled, but hopeful
I see this silverpoint by the 13 (yes, thirteen) year old Albrecht Dürer and feel humbled: And then I see Michelangelo's first painting, finished when he was twelve or thirteen: But then I see this picture that van Gogh drew when he was 27 and feel the tiniest ray of hope.
Nice quote Jason!
Neil
Commented Jul 17, 2009 on Humbled, but hopeful at Neil Davidson's drawings
Humbled, but hopeful
I see this silverpoint by the 13 (yes, thirteen) year old Albrecht Dürer and feel humbled: And then I see Michelangelo's first painting, finished when he was twelve or thirteen: But then I see this picture that van Gogh drew when he was 27 and feel the tiniest ray of hope.
Pinal,
Agreed. I don't have the talent to become a great writer, or to draw staplers unbelievably well, but with hard work I think I (and anybody) can become reasonable, or even good.
Neil
Commented Jul 17, 2009 on Badly drawn stapler, and other office equipment at Neil Davidson's drawings
Badly drawn stapler, and other office equipment
Twenty years ago, Mr Balkwill, my English teacher, used to set us essays ('write a story about anything you like'). We'd struggle for a week, hand them in, Mr Balkwill would read them, grade them and give them back. I got Cs and Bs; no matter how hard I tried try to act on his vague but well-m...
Michael,
I think you're spot on.
But I also notice that this is the first time you've commented on my blog ...
Neil
Commented May 19, 2009 on Pesky customers, and one way of handling them at Business of Software Blog
Pesky customers, and one way of handling them
Employee: “Boss, this gentleman’s got a Word document he’d like to print.” Boss: “Damn him. Microsoft? Microsoft?! What sort of person uses Microsoft software? Why doesn’t he use a Mac? Out! Out! Tell him to get out!” Employee: “But he’s the tenth person today who’s asked for that. And we are...
Alex,
What browser are you using? Is the image still broken (it might have been a temporary problem)?
Neil
Commented May 11, 2009 on Why there's nothing special about the business of software at Business of Software Blog
Why there's nothing special about the business of software
Software businesses should be infinitely scalable, right? You've done the hard work. You've built your product, your money making machine. All that's left is to turn its frictionless handle and churn out uncountable quantities of dollar bills. After all, the cost of shipping your creation's swea...
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