x-y coordination

It's that time of year when I try to get bit organised, and have grand plans and aspirations. Inspired by  the Weekly Blog Club celebrated in a recent great post by Dan Slee I'm going to try to write more here. And as part of the process of getting organised I'll start by finishing and publishing a number of half written posts lurking in various spaces across the chaotic system that serves as places I shove electronic files. (I'm in the process of bringing order to that chaos, and starting to understand the beauty of Evernote.) So here's a post I drafted in August having read an article called The Millenials by Tamara Erickson in the Summer 2012 RSA journal. 

It is about ways that members of Generation Y are transforming the way we work, with their technological proficiency, aptitude for teamwork and willingness to embrace multiple perspectives.

Having been born in 1975, I think I pretty much have to accept that I am one of Generation X, not one of the Millenials. However I was struck by how much I think I'm struggling with the same things that Tamara suggests the Millenials, or Generation Y, are changing. She suggested that: 

They are redrawing the line between what is institutional and what is personal, raising questions about which applications can be used during traditional work hours and what access to external sites will be allowed from internal machines. Over time, they will push us to remove the barriers; the boundaries will disappear. At some point, corporations will no longer provide employees with computers and mobile phones; their employees will simply plug in the ones that they already own.

Working at Brewsmiths coffee shop today

Thankfully I work in an organisation without daft restrictions to social networking sites and other web 2.0 platforms, so I can use them powerfully to benefit my work. However I still face the question 'when do you have time to do this?' from colleagues who don't use online to enhance offline, and haven't blurred that boundary between what is work and what is personal. 

I am already plugging in the devices I already own. I'm a year into having an iPad and wouldn't like to go to a meeting or event without it (you never know what you might want to look up). And increasingly my PC sits on my desk with the power off as I plug in my MacBook to work more quickly and easily than I can using cumbersome Windows programmes, and to produce more beautiful documents. I tried using Word once this week for 30 minutes. It crashed. I save my work to Dropbox, I forget to back up to the server (it feels archaic, and exclusive - how can my colleagues in the council or in other places and organisations access stuff I save on our server?). 

I think (hope) that I also have this characteristic of folk younger than me: Ys select and use technology to make their lives easier, both inside and outside the workplace. They manage technology – and its role in their lives – in ways that are helpful and productive, whereas for many adults, it can seem intrusive or anxiety-producing.

And I now share this way of working with Generation Y folk: Using new technology to support them, Ys have become highly accomplished at ‘time shifting’: doing things when it is most convenient, rather than when they are scheduled to occur. As a result, fixed work hours will eventually disappear, replaced by a focus on achieving a specified result by a particular date, regardless of how time is managed within that span. I can't wait for this day - hurry up Millenials!

Tamara got me thinking with this: Ys are expert at multitasking and are quick to make the most of the rapid-fire information that characterises today’s world. They also tend to be good at coordinating, as opposed to planning or scheduling. They will bring this practice to the workplace and, for a number of activities, it will prove more efficient and agile.

I'm definitely don't rely on or stick rigidly to schedules or plans, rather I use them loosely to give some structure, which enables others to have sense of a what and a rough when. And then as new learning emerges, and context and focus changes my rough plans evolve. I think I'd rather have co-ordinating as a strength if it's OK to have that and be less good at planning. And if these things are the case then - brilliant:

Ys perform tasks collaboratively, sharing information openly and solving problems through communal wisdom. Bringing ideas together is an essential component of the innovation required for today’s competitive environment, and Ys tend to do it well.

... Ys tend to play by network rules. As the cost of communication decreases, businesses are becoming part of a complex network. The rule of network economics is that open systems – those that allow others to play – are the ones that win. Ys will encourage us to develop strategies based on the principle of allowing all participants to benefit from the transaction.

Tamara states that Ys are heavily dependent on peer networks to identify the best, most trusted sources of information. I think I'm in this place now, the people I follow on twitter are amazing filters for me.

And I hope that I can be part of a group of people who know how to build their own reputations as both knowledgeable sources and insightful reviewers. I think there are a lot of people out there who are a bit older who have pioneered some of the changes described in the RSA article, I wonder if they too feel impatient and want these new, younger, thinkers to start to occupy more spaces so that traditional ways of working really shift. In the meantime, I might just try to turn 30 again!

Image credit: by Merlin2525 from Open Clip Art Library

This post is written with a huge amount of appreciation to the many brilliant people (perhaps mostly Generation Xers) who have encouraged, inspired and supported me to learn how work in these different ways over the last three years. They include Sophie Ballinger, Toby Blume, Nick Booth, David Wilcox, Paul Webster, Sal Hampson, Dan Slee, Andy Mabbett and John Popham.

Funny Money

In 2000 I bought a book called Funny Money: in search of alternative cash by David Boyle. Around that time I was really interested in Time Banks and Local Exchange Trading Systems, having been introduced to them through a training day organised by Groundwork Black Country, who I worked for then. I remember being really inspired hearing stories about Edgar Cahn and the US Time Dollars and Time Bank which he founded.

I don't think that we ever got any alternative currencies going through Groundwork, and at that point in my life I was mostly still socialising with people I knew from university - a number of whom had become accountants. They clearly thought I was talking nonsense when I mentioned this sort of thing, and I remember debating it with a friend who graduated in International Business and being told in no uncertain terms that there was no way that the economic system we have would change, and these sorts of things wouldn't work. Not being well-versed in economics (or business), I didn't have a particularly strong position to argue from, I just remember feeling incredibly angry about the economic system and passionate about alternatives which promoted what seemed to me to be a much more equal world. It's strange looking back and realising that these conversations took place before Freecycle had even started. I'm so pleased that what I was so angry about is now written about by people who know their stuff and expose a lot of the myths around economics - for example in People First Economics (well worth a read).

You can therefore imagine how delighted I was to meet up today with a good friend from Bristol who has already swapped her pound sterling for Bristol Pound notes and hear how the local currency works. Hundreds of independent businesses have signed up to accept the Bristol Pound, and the whole system seems really easy to start using. But what made me tingle with joy was when my friend explained that she had eaten in a restaurant that doesn't (yet) take the Bristol Pound, and accidentally left the tip in Bristol Pounds. The waitress happily picked it up and said 'brilliant, I can get my lunch tomorrow with that from my local shop'. Wow!

My friend's Bristol £5 and £1 notes - beautiful

I'm feeling inspired to re-read Funny Money, and related books that have been gathering dust on my bookshelves for the last decade ... and perhaps look harder at the opportunities for introducing alternative currencies in some of the projects I'm involved in, such as East Coseley Big Local - especially as the Local Trust are exploring alternative, community-based economic approaches. We've also discussed time banks in relation to some community asset based health improvement work I'm doing - it feels as though these ideas are grabbing peoples' imaginations and feel possible.

I'll start by proudly showing people the Bristol Pound note which I exchanged today with my friend Carrie, and use it as reminder of what is possible when people come together and believe they can make change.

You can follow the Bristol Pound on twitter: @BristolPound
There's also interesting work being led by Localise West Midlands