fabiochiu/medium-articles huggingface dataset:
Build a Simple Web Server using Go(Golang) for Beginners
By: Kunal Prakash
Tags: Backend, Go, Golang Development, Beginner, Golang

Type Handler

During my learning path of web server using go. Type Handler was the most important concept to learn. In Go terminology, Type Handler is an interface which have a method ServeHTTP which takes two parameters Response writer and pointer to Request.

type Handler interface {

ServeHTTP(ResponseWriter, *Request)

}

It means any type which have method ServeHTTP associated with it. Then it also be a Handler interface.

For more information godoc.org

Now, we are passing our underlying type “hotdog” as a receiver to function ServeHTTP which takes two parameter. First ResponseWriter and other one pointer to request.

By having http.ResponseWriter and *http.Request we have complete control on what we request to servers and response which we get back from servers.

func (s hotdog) ServeHTTP(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request){



fmt.Fprintln(w, "Hello World") }

So what it does?:- As I told you earlier any type which have a method ServeHTTP associated with it. That type also declare as a Handler type. Here type “hotdog” associated with ServeHTTP method which make our underlying “hotdog” type into handler type.

fmt.Fprintln(w, "Hello World")
Play with netcat and cURL to make HTTP request
By: E Ma
Tags: Backend, Front End Development, Web Development, Http Request, Https

HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol. It is rules for data communication in WWW(Web Wide Web).

Components of a request

In order to make a http request, we need to at least specify:

Request method — what is the type of request we are making. URI — which resource to apply the request, including protocol and host name. Header — additional information about the request, client to the server.

Use netcat to create mock server

To checkout the usage of netcat:

man nc

Create a mock server on port 1000:

nc -l 1000

-l stands for listen, tells netcat to listen to the specific port number you provided.

Use cURL to make a http request

To checkout the usage of cCRL:

curl --help

To make a request:

curl localhost:1000 -H multipart/form-data -F name=Daisy

-X specify the request method

-H specifies the request header

-F specifics the form data

Once your request is send, your will receive request detail in your mock service like so:
Nest.js Tutorial #1 — Introduction & Setup
Tags: Nestjs Tutorial, Backend, Introduction To Nestjs, Nestjs, Getting Started

Nest.js is a progressive Node.js framework for building efficient, reliable and scalable server-side applications.

From the official website of Nest.js we got this phrase. You can think about this is phrase is simply tell you Nest.js is build on top of Node.js. What feature that being offer in Node.js is available in Nest.js with more efficient, reliable and scalable. In short, what you can do in Node.js it should be able to do in Nest.js too.

When people talk about Node.js we usually talk about express.js as well. Express.js is a framework that help us a lot when develop application in node.js. Therefore, Nest.js by default is using Express.js also but offering more work in behind the scene for you. You will find out that developing Nest.js application is total different when developing Express.js application Nest.js will be much easy for you.

Since Nest.js is power by TypeScript and Nest.js team is inspire by Angular. If you are from Angular background, your will find out that the syntax or the way to do thing is very similar. Therefore the learning curve for you should be very small. Nest.js does offer us a cli that you will get it in Angular also. The cli help us create controller, module and many thing that can reduce your time to create the file and write the necessary import statement in the configuration file.
RabbitMQ — 失敗重試策略(死信隊列)
Tags: Dead Letter Queue, Message Queue, Rabbitmq, Backend

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Vapor — Routes groups and collections
By: Alexandre Cools
Tags: Backend, API, Router, Vapor, Swift

Difference between groups and collections

Groups

Grouping routes allow us to keep the same route prefix, it’s useful when we have many routes who start by the same sub-path.

Example:

/users — Get all users

— Get all users /users/{uuid} — Get one specific user

— Get one specific user /users/{uuid}/workouts — Get specific user workouts

— Get specific user workouts /users/{uuid}/workouts/{workoutUuid} — Get specific workout for a user

— Get specific workout for a user …

When we have some routes like this, it could be a good idea to create a group because all of this routes is for users, and all of them start by /users .

By creating a group, we’ll be able to define our starting path (in this case /users ), then our routes will simply be:

/

/{uuid}

/{uuid}/workouts

/{uuid}/workouts/{workoutUuid}

Also, in the future, if you want to rename your routes (because you’ve made a mistake in the name for example), you can update the value in one place and all of your routes will be updated (if you don’t have groups, maybe you will miss one or two routes, and then you loose consistency).

Collections

Collections are sub-routers. So instead of defining all of your routes in the routes.swift file (your main router), you can divide your routes in multiple routers.

It’ pretty the same as controllers, but with some advantages. Both controllers and collections allow you to separate your code into multiple files, but the difference between the two is that, with controllers, you have to register all yours routes in the routes.swift file .

While, with collection, you can define it directly on one line, and then define your routes in your collection file.

So it’s a bit nicer because you define all your sub routers in the routes.swift file, and then you can manage all your routes in yours sub routers without touching the routes.swift file.
Las 5 tendencias de RRHH
Tags: Management And Leadership, Team Building, Personal Growth, Human Resources, Recursos Humanos

in Change Your Mind Change Your Life
Building High Performance
By: Eric Peterson
Tags: Engagement, Self Improvement, Business, Team Building, Leadership

What does it look like at work?

Simple example. When setting up a meeting for the first time with a team member, what do we do?

We go to them.

In practical terms, if people feel more comfortable meeting in their office we go there. If meeting in an employee break-room is what they prefer, we go there. If an outside venue is appropriate, then maybe the local coffee shop is where we go.

Even today, many leaders think as I once did. Colleagues should come to our offices. We always have a good reason. For instance, we may have back to back meetings or we just don’t have time to walk a few minutes to meet them.

May be true, however, the message we send may make our team members and partners feel less valued. For some, always coming to meet us can be a real stumbling block in the relationship. If we want people to follow us because they want to, how we choose to engage cannot be trivialized.

We remember leading others is not about us. Simple to understand, yes. Hard to practice.

Gallup research shows that while people join companies, they leave managers and supervisors. Engaging Employees to Impact Performance

It takes real emotional energy and purpose to do this well. I’m still learning. We also accept the reality that others may not reciprocate. As leaders, we must have the courage to accept the risk.
Best games to play remotely during lockdown
By: Rhys Kentish
Tags: Remote, Startup, Team Building, Games

Best games to play remotely during lockdown

Photo by Sigmund on Unsplash

At Brightec we are colleagues but we are also friends. We value our connection as a team and whilst another lockdown means we can’t meet socially, or share lunch times in the same way, it hasn’t beaten our spirit. Since working remotely we’ve started a weekly catchup on Friday afternoons. The agenda is casual; we mostly play games as we’ve found it’s a relaxed and easy way to chat whilst having a focus which encourages more natural communication as it would around the lunch table. Here’s a list of our favourites:

Among us

Among us has recently taken the internet by storm. It’s free to play on mobile or paid on PC. In this game you are little space beans attempting tasks to either repair your spaceship or base. But, there is an imposter (or two) who will try to kill you. Your job as a crewmate is to try and discover who the imposters are. If you are the imposter then your job is to kill all of the crewmates. Once a crewmate discovers a body they will report and discuss all their findings during the round. This discussion is where the fun comes from with the imposter trying to cover their tracks or frame other people and the crewmates playing detective. This is truly a great game to help the team feel connected and laugh together.

Skribbl.io

Skribbl.io is a free drawing game. One person draws one thing of the three prompts and the other people try to guess. It’s best played on tablet or desktop and is especially fun when you are woeful at drawing (like me). We like to join a video call and chat throughout the game although admittedly it is mostly making fun of my drawings.

SuperTuxKart

If you’ve played MarioKart in the past you will love SuperTuxKart. This free to play game is available on Mac, PC and Linux. It’s a great little game which is basically a budget MarioKart. There’s a huge selection of maps and there are a few different game modes. It’s full of nostalgia and a great game to play whilst on a video call. The soundtrack is banging too.

Coup

Coup is a bluffing card game. The aim is to be the last alive. You don’t know what cards your opponents have but you gather information throughout the game to determine what people have. However, your opponents can bluff and fool everyone. This game was one of our faves back in the office but we found that Chris Brown made an online version of the game.

Jackbox

Jackbox is a collection of party games that work really well remotely. They have 7 party packs with 5 games in each pack. The prices vary but only the host has to pay. Our favourites are Quiplash, which requires you to come up with the funniest response to various prompts . We also like Trivia Murder Party where you answer obscure trivia questions interlaced with minigames.

Checkout our other suggestions here.

If you have any more suggestions of games be sure to leave a comment and let us know. We’re always looking for new ones to play.
Your Team Doesn’t Need Eleven Goalies
By: Matt Schellhas
Tags: Engagement, Team Building, Leadership

My answer is effectively the consequence of two beliefs about leading people:

In particular, my focus is on mastery. Autonomy will come in the day to day as I lead the team: delegating things effectively, generally treating everyone like adults, and cutting down on dumb process. Purpose will come from the company’s goals and my ability to set each person’s context within those goals. How the team is structured effects mastery far more, since the shape of the team influences how the work is distributed.

My goal is to line up the shape of the team with the shape of the work. To grow their mastery, each person needs to practice on something near the edge of their skills. They each need something challenging enough to learn from, but not so challenging as to overwhelm them.

If my team needs to make a pile of CRUD APIs, I’m not going to build a team of world class type theorists to do the work. They’ll get bored. Then they’ll leave. But someone fresh out of college, who still finds that basic sort of work a challenge? They’ll be happy to do the stuff others on the team consider drudgery. Vice versa, if my team needs to make a static analysis framework the new grad will probably be so lost that they don’t even learn much from the struggle.
3 Ways to increase workplace teamwork
By: Garrett Vita
Tags: Team, Teamwork, Team Building, Teambuildingactivities, Team Collaboration

Is there tension in your current workplace? Or are you trying to take your team to the next level but aren’t connecting? Teamwork is necessary for any organization to thrive and to have a positive culture. Having your team being able to work with each other effectively and in a timely manner is essential.

Here are three ways you can increase teamwork:

Pair team members based off their strengths and skills. Seems pretty obvious but many leaders don’t follow through with this. Many team members are put into roles that aren’t best suited for them causing projects and objectives to be stagnant and the team members to be frustrated with each other. When team members are put on the same projects with the same strengths they are able to be more effective. To identify team member’s strengths ask yourself these questions:

a. What activities are aligned with the team member’s personal goals?

b. What activities causes the team member to be in a “state of flow”?

c. What activities are fulfilling to the team member?

2. Pair team members based off their complimenting skills. Meaning one’s strengths and the another’s weakness. Many times when someone has a weakness in something, another person has a strength in that skill and vise versa. The key to making this successful is having clear communication and guidelines. Without these two, there will definitely be conflict. Let each team member know who is in charge of what, what to do in each situation, deadlines, and expectations.

3. Have a leadership roundtable experience. In this experience a facilitator stimulates a discussion between team members through selected prompts. The purpose of this roundtable is to sprout issues and creativity so leaders know how to address barriers and create solutions within an organization. It is an effective way for members to openly discuss progress in a safe environment. Types of prompts include: “How did that decision mold the direction of where your organization is today?”, “Discuss what the team has written and two new implementations for this idea.”, and “What do we need to address in ourselves to improve one of the circumstances we are currently facing?”

No matter how your team performs, there are ways to improve them communication and connection. Understanding the central issue is the first step improving teamwork.

Garrett

PS. If your organization wants to have a leadership roundtable experience or wants more information about, feel free to message me.
हिंसा क्या है? उचित कर्म और अहंकार को कैसे जानें?
By: आच र य प रश न त - Acharya Prashant
Tags: Violence, Anxiety, Peace, War, Spirituality

in Change Your Mind Change Your Life
औरतों का हर जगह शोषण क्यों होता है
By: आच र य प रश न त - Acharya Prashant
Tags: Violence, Women, Violence Against Women, Womens Health, Rape

in Change Your Mind Change Your Life
When We Find Aliens
By: Shashi Sastry
Tags: Predictions, Evolution, Future, Extraterrestrial Life, Aliens

We’ll be changed forever

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

Let’s say our search for signs of extra-terrestrial life finds something this year. What would be the effect on humanity?

There are many first-contact type movies, but I am wondering about the scenario where we detect the signs of life from afar, we don’t know if it’s aware of our existence, we understand it minimally, and we can’t go there any time soon.

For this exploration, let’s consider three situations:

The distant life forms are at an evolutionary state like on Earth about 500 million years ago. At about the same stage as we are now Unfathomably ahead

1. If the alien life is primordial

We may

Carry on, as usual, fighting among ourselves

Carry on, as usual, ruining the planet

Feel superior and unique, at least for a while

Look at the life-harbouring planet as a way out of a future extinction on Earth

Credit our Gods with even more than their hitherto powers and extend their scope vastly out into the cosmos

2. If the alien life seems very much like ours

We could

Feel a completely new sense of oneness as Earthlings.

Ruin our planet even faster, knowing it’s not so special.

Feel tremendous curiosity but little fear, knowing that mutual visits are unlikely any time soon.

Try to signal friendship in case they can help us out in future, wondering if they may be expecting the same for themselves.

Question and discard our religious beliefs and Gods as merely expedient in our evolution, knowing life is not such a unique creation.

3. If the alien intelligence appears to be very advanced

Perhaps we will

See ourselves a lot more clearly and mature rapidly.

Take care of our planet better, knowing there is much to look forward to.

Feel very small, backward and afraid of direct contact.

Try not to draw attention till we know more.

Quietly try to learn as much as we can through observation so that we can catch up.

Wonder if they are the Gods we believe in.

Knowing that an alien life form exists will transform humanity forever. Like isolated tribes of deep rainforests or remote islands are changed forever when they come in contact with us, we will never be the same again, for better or worse. Hopefully, it’ll be for the better.

Now that would be something to experience in our lifetimes. How exciting it would be, how life-changing. Can’t wait!

Hello, hold on, what’s that they are showing on BBC World News?? It can’t be, no, it is…wow, Hubble’s detected something definitely intelligent, and it seems to be coming from…..
Reasons you will hate 2021
By: Daniel G. Jennings
Tags: Satire, Predictions, Comedy Writing, 2021, Comedy

Yes, 2020 is a horrible year that could get worse. However, the available data shows 2021 could be terrible.

The available evidence indicates you could hate 2021 even more than 2020. In particular, 2021 could be boring as well as dreadful.

Image by iXimus from Pixabay

Some of the reasons you could hate 2021 include:

Jim Carey’s Joe Biden impersonation on Saturday Night Live is horrible and it will get worse. Ex-President Donald J. Trump (R-Florida) will have nothing to do and TV producers will have nothing to show. Hence, Trump will be all over every TV channel next year. So pay your Netflix subscription now for Trump free TV. President-Elect Joe Biden (D-Delaware) appears to be as incompetent, out of touch, weak, craven, corrupt, cowardly, racist, insensitive, and as useless as Trump. Plus, Biden is boring. Coronavirus Lockdowns Stay-at-Home orders. Stay at Home orders. Mindless hype about coronavirus vaccines. Coronavirus vaccine denial. Big stars in silly propaganda advertisements telling us to take the coronavirus vaccine. The media will be full of whiny leftists attacking Biden. Republicans will try to impeach President Biden. Big corporations trying to show racial sensitivity through Black Lives Matter propaganda. Woke propaganda. Republicans will bore you to death with all their conspiracy theories about how Democrats stole the election. Rich people bragging about all the money they make from the booming Chinese stock market. Centrists ranting and raving about the brilliance of Vice-President Elect Kamala Harris (D-California). The Pod Save America and MSNBC idiots droning on and on about the brilliance of Joe Biden (D-Delaware). The Pod Save America idiots’ childish attempts to convince us that Joe Biden does not have dementia. The K-Hive cult members and their mindless worship of Kamala Harris. All the time we will spend worrying about the old man with dementia in the White House who could have access to the nuclear launch codes. Thank God there’s a 25th Amendment.* The media’s endless speculation about what ex-President Donald J. Trump (R-Florida) will do next. Listening to your kids complaining how boring homeschooling is. Listening to rich people bragging about all the money they are making on the Chinese stock market. Anti-mask propaganda. There will be no European vacations for Americans until 2024 and Americans will not be able to visit Japan until 2025. So enjoy your next vacation in beautiful Scranton, Pennsylvania, home of the Joe Biden Childhood Historic Walking Tour.

So yes folks, 2021 will be terrible and you will hate it.

*Note: We called the Pentagon and asked about the nuclear launch codes. The Second Lieutenant we spoke to said not to worry because the codes at the White House are phonies. The real launch codes have been kept in a safe at the Pentagon since the Lyndon B. Johnson (D-Texas) administration.
Bitcoin BTC Prediction Nov 17 — Dec 17, 2020
By: Shining Bull Astrology
Tags: Astrology, Bitcoin, Cryptocurrency, Predictions, Financial Planning

The Surprising Course Ahead for Bitcoin

Dear All. Welcome to this Bitcoin BTC price prediction.

The Dasha sequence is Moon-Ketu-Mercury.

The time frame is from November 17th until December 17th, 2020.

The activity of traders will nurture Bitcoin.

The weekend prior to this time frame, on November 14th and 15th, the Sun enters Scorpio. Meanwhile, Venus enters Libra and therefore Saturn’s 10th Aspect, as Mercury transits the same degree point that caused an upward trend at the beginning of October.

Jupiter enters Capricorn on Thursday, November 19th, initiating the earth sgn conjunction with Saturn as well the trine to exalted Rahu in Taurus.

The price climb will strengthen further on Tuesday, November 24th when Mercury transits Bitcoin’s Lagna at the same time that the Moon transits Bitcoin’s natal Jupiter.

Further positive gains can occur on Monday, December 7th when Venus transits Bitcoin’s Lagna while the Moon transits Magha Nakshatra.

But, on Tuesday, December 15th something will happen, such as miners instigating a mass sell-off, as the Sun enters Sagittarius while Mercury joins Ketu in transit and the Moon transits Moola Nakshatra. A sustained price drop will commence.
क्या ज्योतिषी भविष्य बता सकते हैं?
By: आच र य प रश न त - Acharya Prashant
Tags: Peace, Predictions, Spiritual Growth, Meditation, Spirituality

in Change Your Mind Change Your Life
Bring your own Kubernetes cluster to Azure — Azure Arc
By: Renjith Ravindranathan
Tags: DevOps, Arc, Azure, Kubernetes, Infrastructure

There are use cases where customers wants to bring on-premises resources to cloud and tap on cloud services to easily manage it as well. Microsoft Azure Arc helps you extend Azure management to any infrastructure and enables deployment of Azure data services anywhere. It actually simplify day to day monitoring and management of the resource from an operations perspective and you can leverage the goodness of cloud to on premise resources. Azure Arc is still in preview and currently supports Kubernetes, SQL Servers, VMs and HCI and additional features are being developed under the hood. Initially I thought to onboard my Raspberry Pi cluster to Arc, but unfortunately preview version doesn’t support armv7 or armv8 architecture yet. So in this article , we will setup a Kubernetes single node on a VM and integrate with Azure Arc.

We can easily setup a Kubernetes cluster using Rancher K3s. Please not that you need to have Azure Account and subscription to setup the following resources. You may create an account using the portal. The below code snippet is executed on the VM (Ubuntu-18.04).

curl -sfL https://get.k3s.io | INSTALL_K3S_EXEC="server --tls-san $(curl ifconfig.me) --write-kubeconfig-mode 644" INSTALL_K3S_CHANNEL=latest sh -

Once it has been setup, next step is to install Azure CLI and login to your azure account and register azure providers for Kubernetes.

https://gist.github.com/mysticrenji/d3a7b179be7ce578d29e8fc3a0c828f3

If the connection is successful, you would see the cluster in the Azure Arc.

Enable Monitoring in Azure Arc Kubernetes

To enable monitoring on Azure Arc resources, you need to have Log Analytics Workspace Resource created in the Azure resource group. Recommended to put in the same resource group where Azure Arc was created. You may the steps provided in this link to create it. Once its created, please use the below code snippet to enable the monitoring feature in Azure Arc

https://gist.github.com/mysticrenji/a9ec25604114d7305ad4d1727908b32f

If enablement is complete, the metrics from inside the Kubernetes cluster will gradually start appear in the app insights section.

We will be able check the metrics — CPU, Disk, Pod logs etc. from Kubernetes with Azure monitor — Insight. The metrics will be published in the log analytics workspace and also we can write custom query to fetch details and even configure alerts.

So we have covered the integration part of Kubernetes with Azure Arc and also the monitoring side. Hope Arc would go GA soon with extended support for other platforms. Like always, please share your feedback and share it.

References

Arc Installations

Enable Monitoring
Motorcycles are the answer to the U.S. Infrastructure problem
By: Hunter Rupp
Tags: Traffic, Climate Change, Infrastructure, Economics, Cars

If you ever watch any politician walk onto a stage to talk about their hopes and dreams of what they expect to get done during his/her next term, it is guaranteed at one point during their speech that Infrastructure will be part of their “ambitious” strategic moves.

Again and again, every politician talks about what they might do. Again and again, every politician fails to deliver.

Before I get into what failed examples have attempted to alleviate the issue of road congestion and what the solution should be, let’s define what Road Infrastructure is shall we?

According to IGI Gobal the answer to What is Road Infrastructure? goes as follows:

The installation of fixed assets including surface roads and railways and terminals such as bus stops, trucking terminals, railways stations. Operations of vehicles along these transport systems make the travel time to reduce and generation of employment in the sector which in aggregate influence the aggregate demand for goods and services that ultimately leads to increase in GDP and overall development.

Simply put, Road Infrastructure is the arteries to our economy. Getting all the necessary nutrients (goods and services) to where they need to go.

Now for a wake up call. In 2017 the United States spent $441 billion on improving and maintaining our infrastructure. And even that number is not enough according to most economists.

Let’s put this number into perspective. According to Fixr.com, a website dedicated to breaking down the costs associated with the construction of different building types, the average cost to build a home in the United States costs $423,800.

So if the U.S. Government had diverted all the resources allocated for infrastructure improvements and upkeep in 2017, we could have built an additional 1.04 million homes.

This would have helped the estimated homeless find a place to live nearly twice over.

Realizing what’s missing

As a car guy, I take joy in watching ridiculous car shows that may or may not bore others at times.

One show my wife even enjoys watching along with me is the Top Gear/The Grand Tour shenanigans with Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May. The pureness of their friendship shows through constantly in their episodes with banter back and forth that would challenge the best trash talkers in sports.

The best of this trash talk though is during their specials, when they are tasked to travel in some exotic location (usually 3rd world countries) with an under-equipped set of cars. A few examples of this include — driving station wagons through Africa to find the true source of the Nile River, driving lorries (a version of Semi’s) in Burma to build a bridge over the River Kwai, and driving some questionable offroad vehicles in Colombia to become outdoor photographers.

Top Gear - Africa Special

I would suggest taking a moment to watch the ones mentioned above, they are pretty good.
Are you proactive at shaping or reshaping your organisations culture to be future fit?
By: Katherine Ann Byam
Tags: Change Management, Change, Work, Culture, Human Resources

What is culture in a digitally transformed workplace?

If your business is digital first, as mine is, your culture comes through every piece of digital communication that happens between everyone.

Its not just in designing efficient meetings. Its not just sticking to a schedule and being on time. Its not just having clear routines and patterns.

Building a virtual culture comes in truly getting to know the people you work with. Letting them feel safe that they decide how to manage their time, and they feel comfortable to share the other missions they are working on.

A digital first culture requires a completely new approach from the traditional business environment.

How are you doing on digital culture management?

We often acknowledge the importance of a culture in driving an outcome, yet many older organisations fall into a culture trap, because the old culture no longer fits the new world, and organisational memory makes it harder to transition.

We know that creativity requires some constraints to be effective.

Creating a framework — boundaries if you will for the team can antithetically give more freedom, and more empowerment. If it is clear what the real deliverable is: outcome not time, this opens the door to thriving interpersonal relationships that champion the people who champion the goals.

Preparing to redraft your digital culture

The first principle of reshaping a culture is deciding what the future outlook of doing nothing looks like, then examining how the organisation needs to be seen to achieve the outcomes it wants. Increasingly in today’s reality, the organisation needs to want what’s good for the society and the planet as well,

Your mission and vision is important, yet it needs to be contextualised with the kind of environment you want to create it in. How does this organisation with this target mission, and this target environment behave?

The behaviours of a thriving culture

How does your organisation attend to its customer service? How does it treat its employees and other stakeholders?

What are the skills of an organisation that achieves these goals, and behaves so responsibly? What types of standards and policies does it set? How does it innovate? How does it hire and train its people?

The primary role of your culture is to:

1 — Create space for your teams to find their stride in psychological and other safety, while achieving on the organisations goals.

2- Inspire innovation, continuous improvement and an appetite for lifelong learning.

3- Inspires collaboration, curiosity, creativity and problem solving among its communities.

Have you done enough for your digital culture? For support with this challenge, get in touch with me here, or on LinkedIn 🎤 Katherine Ann Byam, MBA 🎙️ | LinkedIn.
Here’s Your Job Aid For The New System. You Should Be All Set Now!
Tags: Staffing And Recruiting, Organizational Change, Change Management, Training And Development

The field of organizational change management (OCM) has made great strides in demonstrating the value of engaging OCM resources as soon as an organization commits to a significant change. Despite this progress, the organizational change management team (OCM), which includes learning and development resources, often walks into an already baked project schedule. The outcome is a planning process and system implementation timeline that did not adequately account for the education effort required to get people on board.

First, the learning and development team need an opportunity to determine the scope of the training effort. How much time is there between testing, pilot, and launch? Has enough cushion been provided to develop training materials, re-tool them as necessary, and ready people to do their jobs with the new system? With a pre-baked timeline and no OCM input, learning and development resources often find themselves continuously “in the red,” doing their best to deliver quality training within an unrealistic project schedule (I have been known to refer to this as the training sandwich! Been there and done that!).

Second, training resources need time to evaluate existing training materials and to determine whether they need to be customized or augmented. Organizations often make the mistake of assuming that the training content delivered by the software company, such as job aids, as part of the negotiated contract, will meet their training needs. However, this generic content, while often good, typically lacks larger organizational context and related business processes, as well as interactive, engaging methods required for effective adult learning. The more complex a system is and the more integration it has with other systems and processes, increased the need for customization of out-of-the-box training content in order for it to be relevant and effective.

Finally, the effectiveness of training efforts can be greatly increased when OCM resources and stakeholders have access to a “play” or training environment. However, without early OCM input, upfront negotiations with software companies often overlook this need. Ultimately, every company introducing a new system wants adoption, but some often fail to make the necessary investment up front to support hands-on, interactive learning opportunities.

Handing folks a job aid and checking the training box can lead to frustration and perhaps cause people to just give up on a new system. Rather than jeopardizing the outcome of your system investment, engage organizational change management in the early planning phase to ensure that adequate time is allowed for training development and delivery to successfully move people to adoption.

Contact ChangeStaffing to learn how our organizational change management consultants can help your organization deliver effective training.

A special thanks to Mara Kershaw, a Strategic OCM Consultant and Coach, for her thought leadership and for collaborating with us on this blog.
16 Things That Are Wrong When You Ask “What’s wrong?” and I say “Nothing.”
By: Becky Mandelbaum
Tags: Funny Story, Periods, Funny, Humor, Lists

Becky Mandelbaum is the author of The Bright Side Sanctuary for Animals (Simon & Schuster, 2020) and Bad Kansas, which received the 2016 Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction and the 2018 High Plains Book Award for First Book. Her stories have appeared in One Story, The Sun, The Georgia Review, and elsewhere. Read more of her work at beckymandelbaum.com.
The Complete Library of My Stories
Tags: Collection, Libraries, Ｍedium, Stories, Lists

If you have a collection of the stories you wrote, I would love it if you could share the link in the comments!

It’s like looking through a box of long lost belongings or a shelf of old books. You never know what you will find!
5 ways to decide if it’s worth your time… or does every title need numbers?
By: Susie Chillcott
Tags: Writing, Numbers, Lists, Thoughts And Ideas

So apparently we like a list. Particularly an ordered one that’s numbered. An awful lot of blog posts feature them. Some of my recommended medium reads today included 5, 7, 10 and 39 in their titles. Things like (ok I’m making these up) 10 ways to earn 10 figures, 7 books that will change your life etc etc…

It’s partly because it’s a recognised fact in marketing circles that numbers work. The algorithm bits and bots discovered that including numbers in a title improved the hit rate. Do a quick google on numbers and blog writing and prepare to be dazzled by science. Apparently it’s all to do with things like structure, organisation, scan ability, order and value. Resistance is futile if you include a 2,4,6 or 8 (other numbers are available) in your title. And the world will be at your feet. Maybe.

Ok, being totally fair to all your list(less) number people out there, here are 5 things to think about next time you read a number post …

1) Is the number ridiculously big or small? This either means it will take ages to read or that it’s not really a list at all and the writer just heard numbers were good.

2) Is it real? Or is the “list” just random writings shoehorned uncomfortably together into a cobbled up, jumbled mess?This is annoying and confusing.

3) Is it original? Have you heard it before? 10 things to do before you die. (Breathe is one of mine).

4) Does it spark your curiosity? Read on dear reader.

5) Ok I’ve failed here … there isn’t a number 5 … please see points 1 and 2 and maybe 3 above.

Disclaimer: I have used numbers in my writing and will probably continue to do so. But I can’t help feeling us writers are overdoing it. Numb3r5 are getting a bit t1red and overdone. I wonder what we’ll come up with next. 🤔
Secrets to a Successful Video Interview
By: June Coffey
Tags: Interview Preparation, Interview Tips, Recruitment, Career Change, Interview

5 Dos and 3 Don’ts

Photo by visuals on Unsplash

I personally underestimated how much I depended on reading body language when I am in meetings. It is a big part of communication that we are all currently missing. We all take the little things for granted.

Unfortunately, video can only give a little bit of the body language part to an interview. I find even though most of the interviews are done via video, many of us still do not know the etiquette of a good video meeting.

I have had candidates not take a job because they did not feel like the interviewer respected the interview simply because they were not looking into the camera. Do not let that happen to you.

Since 99% of all of the meetings are still completed remotely, we have looked into what helps make it a successful video interview.

Dos:

Figure out your technology.

Download the platform (Zoom, Teams, Google Meet, etc.) you are interviewing in and test the platform you’re interviewing in with a friend. Make sure you have a strong internet connection. Make sure your laptop or phone is fully charged.

2. Mimic an in person meeting.

Set the laptop or phone up so that the camera is eye level straight ahead of you. You do not want it so close that all your audience will see is your eyes and your forehead, and not too far away. You want the camera to see your shoulders and up.

3. Ensure you have good light.

Natural light is best but don’t have your back against it or you’ll just be a shadow!

4. Dress the part.

Interviewing for a start up, go business casual. Interviewing for a management consulting role — suit and tie.

5. Good posture

This is an interview so body language matters. Make sure you have good eye contact. If you are taking notes, let your audience know ahead of time.

Don’t:

1. Be late!!! Check in 5 minutes early

2. Only change your shirt.

If you have to get up to get anything, they will see what you’re wearing!

3. Have anyone else in the background (people or pets). You want to let the interviewers focus on you.

Hope this helps. If you have a phone interview coming up, read this first:
Increase Revenues by 25–95% with 1 Simple Shift
By: June Coffey
Tags: Sales, Improvement, Recruitment, Revenue, Clients

Sounds too good to be true, right? Increase Revenues by 25–95% with 1 simple shift? I thought so too until I started looking into it.

We have been focused on a rebranding exercise in our firm because due to the Global Pandemic, we had to pivot our business. What got me thinking when I was learning about branding is how we really need to over-deliver during this time to get a client. But what have I done for my current clients? How have I added value to them?

Turns out, this is a super important question. If you increase your customer retention by 5%, you increase your revenues by 25–95%, according to a study done by Fred Richheld at Bain & Company.

The math makes sense. Think of how high the usual new customer acquisition cost is, and the effort to gain a new customer. It is almost astronomical! It takes on average 7 touchpoints before the customer even considers becoming a customer, then all the song and dance you have to do just to get them to sign. It is a lot of time, resources, and effort.

Once they become a customer though, how have you made them feel the love? I know I am guilty of disappearing until they actually need me again or if they encounter a problem. That is not good customer service, and I am not over-delivering in the slightest.

My plan, that we will start executing this month is to have a company-wide client appreciation day each month. We will give our clients something to add value to their day to day business lives.

I wanted to write this, so you do not make the same mistakes that we did as I’m sure some of our clients are feeling neglected.

Shift your focus to your existing customers, make them feel the love. Your revenues will thank you.
Dec 29. I called an ex.
Tags: Relationships, Phone Call, Letters, Lessons Learned, Rant

Dec 29. I called an ex.

It’s funny hearing how well one’s ex is doing. Their job sounds great, their family sounds ideal and functional, and that holiday party they went to sounded like a lot of fun.

… “Oh, how am I?

(Not as good as you obviously) I’m doing good, things are actually quite exciting…I get to sleep in different places every night… oh last night? I passed out drunk in my brother’s empty childhood bed.”

… “oh and tonight?

Well I am downstairs on the sofa with an extremely hairy adopted cat who’s trying to smother me.”

… “How’s my family?

They’re great, I hardly see or talk to them. So things are back to normal now that I’ve moved back in with them.”

… “No let’s definitely keep in touch, that way I can remind myself how sad my life is after you say goodbye.”

Lesson Learned: Take the advice given on relationship forums. Do not call your ex unless they ‘forgot’ ugly and bulky furniture in your apartment.
For Frances | 01
By: Zoe Mills
Tags: Series, Letters

November 24, 2020

Dear Frances,

That’s you, by the way. That’s who I need you to be. I can be who you need me to be, too. No matter what, we aren’t who we are, and this isn’t real. That’s what we’re doing here—pretending.

Maybe, instead of being people, we can be two houses on a long street lined with so many fruit trees that the pavement is slimy with pulp. And beautiful people live inside of us. And at the end of the day, they are so happy to come home and we are so happy to house them. This is the kind of thing not-real people can be.

I think, with both of us being not-real, we could be terrific friends. It could be easy. I won’t have to remember your birthday and you’ll never have to find parking outside my apartment. We can have our own secret club where I care about you and you care about me. You can tell me about that enormous strawberry you bought. Or that rock in your shoe, how mountainous it was. You can tell me anything and I’ll listen because that’s the way things are with us.

And all this time, you’ll be Frances and I’ll be whatever you want to call me. If at some point I become me, or you become you, we can just pretend it never happened, and carry on.

And we’ll do it this way, with letters, because all the most sincere writing is done this way. It was in a letter that Virginia Woolf wrote, “Nothing happens here except that I write and write, and curse and burn.” And only in a letter did Anne Sexton say “I love you, I wish we were real”. A line which I misread as “I love you. I wish we were well”.

I don’t know, my eyes just didn’t see it right. Plus, it just made more sense that way. The same way it made more sense that Alanis Morissette’s song-worthy ex gave her a cross-eyed bear rather than a cross to bear.

Isn’t a teddy bear the better gift? Wouldn’t you rather be well than real?

Answer me soon, my very good friend.
One Nature to rule them all — Letter #8
By: The Other Day I Thought Of
Tags: Nature, Philosophy, Letters

Dear Francisco,

It’s good to receive your reply! And please, don’t appologize for the delay. What is time after all? (Another theme for the future!)

Well, I think you’re right… After eight letters, I believe we’ve scratched the surface of this Natural/Unnatural dichotomy. We reached some conclusions and add some food for thought for future interactions.

And for those that read our posts, I believe it’s time for a wrap up, don’t you think?

All the best,

Ricardo
An Open Letter to Myself on My 23rd Year
By: Julianna Carbonare
Tags: Femininity, Reflections, Letters, Love Yourself, Birthday

Julianna,

Look at you!

You look into the mirror and it’s always been you — still is you. But you feel different. Your eyes recognize themselves a little better. Your body feels more like yours. You know your way around your heart with more ease.

How did you get here?

The journey to the 23rd year brought many trials and triumphs. You felt pain like no other. For a while it seemed like you just kept hitting every challenge marker that could possibly arise at once. But underneath all of that, was the greatest inner blossoming that your soul has experienced thus far.

You look into the mirror and you see the strength that rose to every challenge. The part of you that always trusts itself to pull the shards of glass off the floor and piece it all back together. You look into the mirror and you also see your softness. The part of you you’re most proud of — because you know being soft in a hard, cold world is an act of rebellion.

Your heart is so full today. With your solar return has come the newest, most beautiful chapter of your life to unfold thus far. You did the work this year, learned all the lessons, felt the pain, learned what there was to learn underneath it, and now it’s the season of receiving.

This new season of life has already brought so much. An abundance of love and care. A grand infusion of creativity that feels like its surging through your body almost nonstop these days. A connection to your body and impressive trust of your intuition.

A year deeper into womanhood and you are so aligned with the woman you always imagined yourself to be. Defiantly feminine, divinely guided, energized, incredibly loved and overflowing with love to give, growing in wisdom, and feeling so, so good in your own skin.

You should be so proud of yourself. This year you’ve learned that choosing love and joy does not mean bypassing all that is heavy, dark, or difficult. You now know the value of pain in its contrast to pleasure. And with that, there is no fear of the life — death — life cycle of living a human life.

Here’s to you and your fearless embrace of the full spectrum of human emotions. Your way of being unapologetically and authentically you, in all moments.

It’s just the beginning, with so much more to come.

Keep loving and trusting yourself.

xoxo,

Jules

P.S. For memory’s sake, here’s your song of the year.