Ahead of the Curve

Letting Your Mind Wander for Clarity

Being a designer is a often a balance between form and function, creativity and process, art and practicality. Sometimes, it seems that no matter how focused you are on task at hand, the solution to a design challenge seems to be out of reach and you're left waiting for that "Aha!" moment.

Scientists are now saying that letting your mind wander is a good thing for mental clarity. If we remember those great stories of scientific discovery, some of the greatest "Aha!" moments have come when people were letting their minds wander. They suggest that the wandering mind isn't vacant or switched off, it is in fact hard at work.

In our fables of science and discovery, the crucial role of insight is a cherished theme. To these epiphanies, we owe the concept of alternating electrical current, the discovery of penicillin, and on a less lofty note, the invention of Post-its, ice-cream cones, and Velcro. The burst of mental clarity can be so powerful that, as legend would have it, Archimedes jumped out of his tub and ran naked through the streets, shouting to his startled neighbors: "Eureka! I've got it."

Check out this article by Robert Lee Hotz over at The Wall Street Journal, where he looks further into the daydreaming mind (here).  

Useful Tech: Use MindManager for CAD/BIM Documentation

 

Documenting matters! However, it can be a tedious and often laborious process. Over at RobiNZ CAD blog, you can see how using MindManager can speed up the documentation process.

Repeatedly generating User Interface terms like "Project Browser", "Application Button", "Quick Access Toolbar" gets a bit tiresome, even using ActiveWords,

Creating map parts for these means adding topics just takes a click and also allowed me to build in some "MindManager smarts" to cope with a documentation challenge. Due to some of our projects being done with Revit toolbar based 2009 and ribboned 2010 (different consultants) I wanted to show both common & version specific task details for process.

The Text Map Markers in MindManager can be used to filter topics for viewing allowing one map to store & display multiple version documentation. My map parts have the correct markers applied where an element only occurs in one application version.

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Measuring Your Investment in Training

Sometimes the numbers just get in the way

Return on investment (ROI) is a measure of the monetary benefits obtained by an organization over a specified time period in return for a given investment. Put in the point of view of employee training, ROI is the extent to which the benefits (outputs) of training exceed the costs (inputs) of what the training involves. Seems easy enough to calculate what your ROI would be for the case of training, simply plug your numbers into the equation and analyze what pops out.

But how do you effectively measure something with intangible outcomes (at least in the short term)? It's easy to include all the costs that go into training (i.e. development of courses, equipment and material expenses, the training program itself) but sometimes the benefits or returns aren't as apparent. This is something many organizations all over the world struggle with. And unfortunately, training for many is seen as an expense and not so much as an investment. There are however, certain areas in which the benefits of employee training can be ascertained in a qualitative view without the need of strict formulas and numbers.

Labor Savings
Savings on labor savings occur where, as a result of the training, less effort is needed to achieve current levels of output. It must be understood that savings means there is a reduction in the amount of labor applied to a particular job, not by using some newly available time to accomplish further output on the same job. Labor savings will only happen if the labor applied to a job can really be reduced, whether this comes as a result of redundancies, transfers of staff to new positions or re-allocations of work. Some examples of labor savings include:

• Reduced duplication of work and effort
• Reduction of mistakes on the job
• Less time spent correcting those mistakes
• Quicker access to information and ways to effectively use the gathered information to produce

Productivity increases
When training enables people to achieve more than what they normally would have done without it then the advantages are readily transparent. The organization experiences the desired result of more output with the same amount of personnel. Examples of productivity increases include:

• Improved methodology reducing the effort required to produce the same amount of work
• Increased skill levels which will lead to faster work
• Greater levels of motivation which in turn can mean increased effort

Other cost savings
Cost savings can be achieved in a many number of ways, not just through savings in labor, but in other areas as well. Examples include:

• Fewer system crashes and/or breakdowns, resulting in lower maintenance costs
• Lower staff turnover resulting in lower recruitment and training costs