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Your story idea is great.  The characters live intricate lives inside your mind and you know them as if they were in your own circle of friends.  Plot lines mix with the daily grind of your life.  You are only one step away from being a rich and famous novelist.  Unfortunately, that step is gargantuan.  Your novel still needs to be written.  The task seems daunting.  Your word processor takes the form of Goliath and you find yourself without a sling or a stone.   Finding a million other things you could be doing with your time your hand hovers over the left click button on your mouse.  Slowly you move the cursor over the red box with an x in it and with depressing resignation you click.  One more opportunity is lost as you turn to other more important tasks like reading Digg or playing Mount & Blade.

As you may have guessed the “you” in this article is actually “me”.  I often interchange the two terms.  Like many aspiring authors I love the stories in my mind.  I love the idea of telling these stories to millions of adoring fans but I do not, however, love editing, rewriting, and the other tedious processes that accompany my story.  Writing, like any other craft, takes hard work and discipline to do a competent job.  If your goal is to be outstanding then the work grows exponentially.

With this in mind how do you get to the point where the wonderful fantasy in your (often sick and twisted) mind is adequately represented in thousands of words on the page?  I must reluctantly admit that I don’t know the answer to that question.  I do however, know that the first and most interesting step is to start writing.  Yes, you heard me.  The first step is to start writing your story.  If you are like me then you are passionate about your story.  Sit down and start typing.

Before you start typing make sure you have the right mind set.   You are not writing for your tenth grade English teacher.  No publisher is going to read your first draft.  The story flowing from your thoughts should be dedicated to your passion.  Completing a first draft story is immensely rewarding.  Reading the whole story for the first time is exciting.

I started my novel over a year ago.  With the story mapped out in my mind I sat down to type and hammered out chapter one in very short order.  You can read it here.  After completing the first chapter I hit a wall and lost my discipline.  Rather than give up, I decided to write short stories for a while to get my creative juices flowing.  Voice And Shadow, my first effort, is nearly complete.  My second short story, The Goat Eater, is in process.  Writing these stories is teaching me how to write and also gives me ideas on my novel.

Before you leave this page and start writing your first story there is one more important step.  Find a local writing group of passionate writers.  I started attending the East Valley Writing Workshop and my first meeting was fantastic.  I received both encouragement and critical advice about my story.  Not only that but I also met other people who had the same passion I have for reading and telling stories.  This meeting gave me a much needed boost of adrenaline.

Of course I would not be writing this now if it were not for my beautiful and supportive wife.  She always believed in me and always encouraged me to write.  She not only tells me how great I am but she gives excellent advice on my story.  Now it goes without saying, you cannot have my wife, but I hope you have someone in your life that encourages you like she does me.

Alright, enough chatter.  It’s time to go out and write.  Start up your trusty word processor whether it be VI, Word, Google Docs, or some bright and shiny Mac app.  Take the story in your head and write it down.  You may find that writing the story is far less daunting than it once looked.

So you are ready to present at an Ignite event.  You worked hard.  You created a fantastic set of slides.  You honed, and rehearsed your presentation.  You have compelling ideas and content. The world is ready to change to your ingenious way of thinking.  Nothing could go wrong… Or could it?  At Ignite Phoenix 6 I bombed my presentation titled “Fight Back - The Power Of The Purse”.  I didn’t just mess up here or there but actually failed to make a competent presentation.  My hope is that others will read this and learn from my mistakes.

Without further ado, here are the lessons I learned from my presentation at Ignite Phoenix 6.

1) Match your slides to your presentation

• I turned in my slides then worked on the presentation
• I believe it is better to create your presentation then find slides that enhance your presentation
• Creating the slides and presentation should be an iterative process.  My advice is to work on the verbal presentation then the slides.  Do this in several cycles so that your verbal presentation and slide set improve over time

2) Contain your nervousness

• I was extremely nervous this time around and it showed.
• Some time alone before the presentation would have helped
• a glass of wine would also help

Many of us sit on multiple teams with multiple responsibilities.  This inevitably results in a daily barrage of meeting requests.  Without careful consideration and planning our days can be filled with more meeting time than work time.  I call this meeting bloat.  My calendar recently contained over 10 hours of regular weekly meetings.  This was in addition to the over ten hours of impromptu meetings I attend in a typical week.  Depressed and agitated over this discovery I started paring down. It was time to conquer meeting bloat.

There are two main types of meeting bloat that decrease productivity.  Both of them have simple solutions that can be implemented quickly to increase your productivity.

Meetings where you provide no value add: (Use good processes to replace meetings or at least your own meeting attendance)

Few things provide the total vexation one feels when sitting in an hour long meeting where you are absolutely not needed.  Most no value add meetings are imposed on us when we send a member of our team just to “keep an eye on things”.  I was recently required to attend a meeting where data center managers spoke with system administrators to create landing plans for new equipment installs.  The reason for me being in this meeting is because my team was having a difficult time getting landing approval for new equipment purchases.  I attended this meeting as a snitch.  If they didn’t do a good job I had to report out.  It was a complete waste of my time.  In the end we came up with a process where each new landing was discussed and if it didn’t obtain landing approval there was a report out and tasks were assigned.  This allowed a local systems administrator to replace me in the meeting.  With a little process I was able to free up 1 1/2 hours per week.

To prevent no value add meetings create processes where you abstain from the meeting but require the meeting attendees keep good notes and have clear report out responsibilities.  In some cases you can use a SharePoint list or something similar to track tasks and issues.

Meetings where there are too many people invited: (Fewer invites make more productive meetings.  Good meeting minutes enable fewer invites)

I once sat in a meeting where fourteen people from at least three countries were debating the color of a line separator on a web page.  I also frequently attend meetings where a complete team meets to discuss a project that only a small subset of the team is actively working on.  Each time this happens I calculate in my head the total time wasted by inviting too many people to the meeting.  The solution to this problem is very simple.  Whenever organizing a meeting decide who is essential to the meeting and who is not essential.  Only invite the essential people.  Everyone else can receive meeting minutes, tasks, and updates without attending.  Be sure to take detailed meeting minutes with clear tasks and ownership.

Organizing this way has two benefits.  The first is direct time savings.  The second is that you will have more efficient meetings with fewer distractions.  If you lead a team of ten people.  Consider creating a core team of three or four members.  Meet regularly with them and invite other team members as appropriate.  If you are designing an application there is no need to have a graphic designer sit through two hours of business logic discussions.  On the flip side, your database administrator does not care about the new graphic or color scheme.

Sometimes I am amazed at how short sighted a company can be.  HTC had the opportunity to make me a very happy customer.  Instead they chose to leave me angry and I have no recourse but to blog, tweet, and respond to posts recommending people do not buy a Nexus One or any HTC products.  I bought a Nexus One phone for $530.  The phone is very nice.  The problem is that it is extremely brittle.  This is the second HTC phone I’ve owned and both are made with inferior quality parts.  The Nexus One fell out of my car (a distance of about 1 foot) and the power button is completely unusable.  There is no damage to the case or screen and the phone looks brand new except for the power button.  The cheap plastic power button is the only damage on the phone.

I called HTC expecting a Warranty repair but they refuse to do it.  At best they can fix it for between $55 - $335.  That is the best estimate they will give.  The drop should not have caused the damage it did and it should be repaired under warranty.  I could understand if the case or screen were cracked.  That would show severe stress from a fall and would not be covered under warranty.  However, I small fall that does not damage the case or screen should not damage the functionality of the phone.

After speaking with a “supervisor” I was told that he will “escalate” my issue.  I asked about the process and he said he will “send it in” (not sure what “it” is) to the repair center.  When pressed further he said he will get back to me “when they get back to him”.  He cannot give me any estimate in hours, days, or even weeks.  This is horrible customer service and leads me to believe that nobody at HTC is taking this seriously.  Unless they cover my phone this will be the last HTC I ever buy.

Fact # 1 - I dropped my phone from the bottom of my car to the ground (about 1 foot)

Fact #2 - The screen and case are still in new condition

Fact #3 - The power button has a tiny chip and will not depress

Opinion # 1- This fall should not have broken the power button.  The button is cheap quality and should be much better on a $500 phone.

Fact #4 - HTC will not repair the phone under warranty at this point

Fact #5 - HTC will “escalate” my issue but cannot give me any time frame when I should hear back from them

Fact #6 - Ben [last name removed] (A warranty Supervisor) has the authority to repair under warranty but refuses to do so

Fact #7 - This is the second poor quality HTC phone I’ve owned.  My T-mobile Dash fell apart and had to be replace once then fell apart again (not from dropping)

Opinion #2 - HTC has very poor customer service and support.  They should fix my phone or replace it as the fall should not have done the damage it did.

Pam Slim, the author of “Escape From Cubicle Nation” will help you leave the corporate world and follow your dreams.  This is a noble and worthy goal for many.  However, working in the corporate world has many advantages.  In my job I work with many talented people from all around the world.  On a daily basis I may speak with a resource planner from Israel or a System administrator from India.  I work with people from Malaysia, Costa Rica, Russia, and China.  I also have huge resources available for training, advancement, and mentoring.  These are all things I love about my job.

Just as not everything is bad about the corporate world not everything is good either.  Huge corporations are inherently bureaucratic. Security concerns require that much of the IT equipment works against your productivity instead of for it.  Standardization, which makes an environment supportable often meets the lowest common need while offering low performance.

If there are benefits and detractors in any environment why not try to emphasize the benefits and minimize the detractors of Cubicle Nation?  My newest passion at work is to do just that.  I want to find novel solutions to minimize the impact that various corporate constraints have on my productivity.  This effort will combine technical, process oriented, and cultural changes to make a super productive environment. I will chronicle this effort here on this site with progress reports and how-to articles.  If anyone is out there in cubicle nation going through the same process please contact me.