Blog entry 1: What do I hope to achieve by Blogging?

As some people know I’ve not been particularly keen on blogging, so, since this is a blog, indeed my blog, that raises the question: Why?

In a future entry I’ll write about why I don’t like the word why but for now lets rewrite the question: What do I hope to achieve by writing a blog?

Well, I first got thinking about blogging about 18 months ago when I was at XTC (Extreme Tuesday Club) when Chris Matts asked “Do you blog?”

So, I’ve spent 18 months thinking about this and now I have a need. For about 5 or 6 years now I’ve been writing magazine pieces. Mainly these have appeared in ACCU Overload. They started with technical pieces and moved through an enquiry phase and into a research based new paradigm phase (influenced by my MBA course). Lately have become more opinion pieces.

After six years its time I tried something new, a forum that is more opinion based may just be what I’m looking for.

Next I’m quite taken with the idea of personal journals, or diaries if you prefer, or learning diaries if you want to give them a longer title. My interest in these was started when I kept one as part of my MBA course. Since then I’ve kept a professional diary quite regularly. I use it as a sense making and thinking mechanism in work.

I’ve always said that the advantage of a private diary over a public blog is that I can say things privately that I can’t say publicly, e.g. my boss is ??? However, I’ve also noticed a tendency in my own diary to sometimes become a frustration vent that can be less than constructive. So, this blog is an experiment: What advantages does a public blog have? Well, I’m about to find out.

(I suppose a legitimate question is: what makes me think that anyone would want to read my ramblings? Well my website is now taking over 10,000 hits a month so maybe some people are interested in my views.)

So now I blog. This is Entry One.

What is this blog to be about?

I’ve been politically active in the past but I’m not any more so I don’t think this will be a political blog.

There will be lots of software development stuff in here, that’s my background, although its something I’m trying to get away from - I’ll write another entry about this and identity sometime. When I write about software development I’ll probably be writing about Agile development and Lean software, I’m a big fan of both of these.

There will be some business stuff - I’m interested in business so I’ll pull that in.

Now there is an intersection here. Two in fact.

The first is Change. This is the real problem that both software developers and businesses face. How do I change my development team to Agile practices? How do my customers need to change? How must my business change?

Second, there will be a lot of stuff about Patterns. I came to patterns through software development (you know, Gang-of-four stuff) but my current interest is in applying pattern techniques to the business domain. When I say “business patterns” I don’t mean the kind of “IT business patterns” that some people propose as “business patterns” - I mean IT free patterns of business strategy, operations, etc. Take a look at my business patterns page if you want to know more.

There you have it, another blog is born.