Thought Processes

Bar

Bar

Soldato
Joined
9 Apr 2004
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Somewhat of a random thought but I am wondering if anyone else experiences similar.

The current problem I am facing is that I have the knowledge to take what I am doing to the next level and beyond. Some of it has come from others but the rest has been theorised myself. From what I have seen I am at the leading edge of the work that I do and as such there is not a lot I can review and refine. Now where in all of this does the problem lie?

Imagine that you can visualise the solution in your head. It makes perfect sense and you can see every little nuance and facet that is needed to make it work. The problem is this. It won’t stop improving and expanding. I work in business architecture and for those that do not know it involves understanding every aspect of a business and how it all fits together. The traditional model looked at data, functionality, application and technology. I look at all of that plus documents, customers, swot, pest, kpis, slas, processes, organisations, persons, roles etc etc – over 100 unique object types and their myriad of relationships.

What I need to do is put my brain in neutral and let this information distil so that I can extract it in a logical sequence and communicate it.

Question is how the heck do I do this?
 
oook that didnt make a lot of sense to me, but i think you mean you want to take a step back and see the bigger picture ?
grasp an overview of what your do at your work instead of working on those small objects you had mentioned?
 
Sorry, can't understand a word - sounds pretentious to be blunt.

You might want to read about NLP, sounds like it is up your alley - its like an applied system of learning.

If you explain what you want us to help you think (is that what you're after?) in simpler terms maybe we can help
 
I think you need to be a bit more specific if you actually want help. Solutions will be very problem-specific, and tbh it seems you're trying your hardest to be vague.


But still:
* Analyse what you're working on.
* Isolate the fundamental concepts.
* Write them down, and classify further points as subsets of (or logical progressions from) the fundamental concepts
* Sure, the thing keeps expanding and (hopefully) improving, but if you have a structure in which to classify these developments then you can better keep track of what is happening.

If you can't boil down your ideas into something like the above structure, then in 99% of cases you don't understand the concept as well as you think you do.
 
Its not the framework I need help with.

The biggest difficulty I have is explaining what I am thinking.

One of the people I have worked for in the past described me as "the genius you lock in a cupboard and for the love of God never let them speak to anyone".

Unfortunately I need to be able to communicate what I can do in an easy and clear manner.

How can I step back from it and organise it. Its not about knowledge its about being able to communicate.
 
Organisational Psychology

Might well be worth a look into.

A lot of the stuff I do touches on Lean and part of that is empowering staff appropriately and removing hierarchys. It also requires organisations to move away from a silo empire mentality and to more end to end view focusing on the customer.
 
Ah so it's people like you that make up all these management buzz words :D

Don't forget there are business trends, the fashionable way to run your business. I haven't watched it particularly closely but recently moved from self employment to employment again and I have noticed how the trends have changed and how all the buzz speak has shifted to new terms. Drill down, escalate, True North, etc etc. What happened to touch base and glass ceilings? We're just using different methods to reach the same goal. Sorry, target. ;) Maybe you're sat there waiting for the trend to turn so you can get your teeth into the next one.
 
If you're saying that communication is your problem - your opening post pretty much explained this. I couldn't really understand what you were trying to say other than you have a lot of tasks going on and possibly you need to prioritise or refactor those tasks?
 
If you've got communication issues look at this...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta_model

I've been studying communication a lot recently through psychotherapy and Neuro-linguistic-programming...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuro-linguistic_programming

A lot of communication is about confidence, congruence and objective.

Confidence allows you to be confident to violate social code to get when you want from communication. Congruence allows you to mean what you say, people actually pick up on unconcious cues more than other things, so its important to be 100% in the right frame of mind. Objective is about using your language and communication properly to achieve what you want, build rapport with people - know what people are looking for and how to influence what they think through their desires and existing mindset.

Fascinating stuff
 
Its very much linked to what you are saying CBS.

I think my biggest problem is focusing on a single aspect one piece at a time.

I am building a series of meta models to show the various frameworks but everytime I start I come up with all the new variations and the differing benefits for each one.

Suppose its an inability to not go off on a tangent.

Strangely I can communicate easily when it is anything else. It just seems when it is something highly complex I do a bit of a mad scientist on it.
 
If I have to explain something complex I will use familiar metaphors. Failing that I will come across with such confidence that no-one will question it just because they don't understand it.

You could try breaking things down into sections, and explaining how they each work. And then perhaps how they interact.
 
You could try breaking things down into sections, and explaining how they each work. And then perhaps how they interact.

Thats what I am trying to do but its the discipline and focus that I seem to be struggling with. I am trying to deal with it by sending myself random emails that I will then piece together but its so vast and the benefits are so many its a nightmare.
 
you need to find yourself relaxd to be honest in a mode where theres probably no other gonna anoy the living s*** outta you .... tell em where to go jot stuff fown and link it all together so you can see how all of it works in your head or go up like accending through a hire-arky structure ??
 
Bar said:
Thats what I am trying to do but its the discipline and focus that I seem to be struggling with. I am trying to deal with it by sending myself random emails that I will then piece together but its so vast and the benefits are so many its a nightmare.

What exactly are you describing and can it be compared to something that everyone is familiar with?

Remember, people are much happier to process simple blanket statements that are ambiguous than highly detailed models.

If you can explain it to people emotively then they are more likely to be enthusiastic about it.
Stop thinking about what to present, perhaps you should concentrate on how to present it
 
I suppose I look at a business a bit like a doctor looks at a body.

Its understanding what it is made up of and how it all interacts with itself. Then using that understand if I change X what will happen? How do I improve without doing damage.

There are so many variations and variables its untrue and the problem I have is that I am holding it all in my head. Its getting to the point where I am hitting knowledge overload and I need to download a lot of it onto paper so that I can step back and analyse it.

Its just difficult finding the right thread which will help untangle the whole ball of wool in a way that ensures I dont miss or forget anything.

^^all sounds a bit nuts but its the best way I can think of to describe it.
 
Bar said:
I r a business arkeytekting god!!1!

have a cookie?


Bar said:
What I need to do is put my brain in neutral and let this information distil so that I can extract it in a logical sequence and communicate it.

Question is how the heck do I do this?

go out, get drunk, pull something and don't think abou this for a few days?

:)
 
take a step back and decide exactly what you are trying to achieve. what exactly are your objectives? if everything is constantly expanding and growing there's no way you'll be able to keep up or you'll send yourself mental trying.

take a snapshot, decide exactly what you want to achieve at this specific point in time then pull your knowledge together from there. it's often not about what you put in but what you leave out. what level is your work pitched at? director level will require a broader overview than say a specific function, which may be narrower but more detailed in focus.

perhaps you could imagine it as a giant spider diagram, (get a big bit of paper and draw it) and just put the top level topics and relevant headings to get a framework. worry about the detail and interrelationships once you have everything sorted and know where you are going.
 
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