In this videocast/podcast, I discuss things I’ve learned about teamwork and leadership during a series of interviews over the past seven weeks. I also discuss the book by Richard L. Daft, “The Executive and The Elephant”–your inner rational CEO and your inner drives and emotions that prevent you from doing what you want. I end with a request for information and speakers on sustainable packaging lines for the upcoming Packaging Automation Forum.
Here’s a lifestyle tip from presentation guru Garr Reynolds. If you ever give presentations and wish you knew how to do the right, Garr Reynolds through his book and blog Presentation Zen are a good place to start.
But that’s not why I’m thinking of him today. His latest blog post reminds me of a teaching of Jesus who told us to become like little children. Adults debate what he meant even today. But Reynolds watches kids, and has summarized “13 communication and life tips that children teach us.”
I’m leaving Saturday for Nuremberg and the SPS/Drives show. Only get one full day there–Tuesday–so I can be home for Thanksgiving. (Well, not home, exactly, but at my daughter’s.) I’m lining up appointments. Already sorry that my logistics don’t work out perfectly and I’ll miss what promises to be a very interesting press conference <sigh/>. Yes, Carl, I have noted your booth number and will stop by. Anyone else going? I’m free for dinner Tuesday night. Maybe a “tweet up” or something?
Can you believe, 1,400 exhibitors? Remember the day? I’ve never done this show. Really looking forward to it. Even if all my “junk” may be on display for the TSA (people). (Assuming you’ve read all the controversies, so far, about the full body scans. I’ve already been through one. Survived.)
I used to always ask suppliers of HMI or operator interface products or even other products if there was a science to developing interfaces. I’d often get blank stares. I’ve asked the same thing about developing dashboards–same response most of the time.
The world is changing. A couple of years ago, Emerson Process Management unveiled its Human Centered Design initiative. At the last Exchange user group, I got a tour of the “Usability Experience.” After the tour it was easy to see the benefits of designing things taking into account how people use them at work and not just what looks good to the engineer. Human-centered design is one of those ideas that looks like common sense in retrospect.
Jim Cahill at Emerson Process Experts today wrote, “I came across some information from Emerson’s Carter Cartwright, a member of the Fisher Valve & Instruments team, about another product released based on this HCD approach–the DLC3020f Fieldbus digital level controller. The objective of this development was to create a Foundation fieldbus-based level instrument that would improve level measurement and provide operators and maintenance technicians a simpler view into the operating and diagnostic information.”
Watch for the December 2010 issue of Automation World which will be online during the first week of December. We Iversen has a great description of the Emerson initiative plus what other companies such as ABB, Invensys Operations Management and Rockwell Automation are doing. (I just proofread it today.) There is some cool stuff brewing in the industry.
Sorry about the formatting lately. I’ve been using Dave Winer’s OPML outliner/editor to compose with for quite a while. But you can’t copy from Microsoft Word and paste into it. You have to save as .txt then copy and paste. So I thought I’d go back to OmniOutliner. It’s friendly with Microsoft, but it can’t handle text (at least I’ve tried various settings and nothing works). I haven’t figured out the magic formula.
Opto 22 has released a new product that it calls a sensor–but it’s a sensor and more. It is designed for energy management and the smart grid with built-in sensing capabilities, connections for additional sensor input and on-board intelligence. Opto has always been at the confluence of IT and control, and this is no different as it includes IT friendly networking and industrial-grade networking. It’s designed to help get energy information to the people who actually control how energy is used in near-real-time. See the product write up here.
Had a meeting with some of Omron’s new management team. Most have been in place for about three years, but I have not had an opportunity to meet them. I’ve always found the North American operation to be an enigma. And too many heads of marketing with too many changes of direction. Sounds as if the new team headed by Gregg Holst has been concentrating on the basics and getting the ship up and running with the wind rather than against it. They say that revenues are very good, and they are optimistic. Not everyone in the discrete automation space can say the same thing. Here’s a company to watch.
Check out this Web site. HylaSoft is working with a digital pen and some software they’ve written to capture writing as operators and clerks fill out forms and ship the digital image or ASCII text to a computer. This holds promise of making data entry easy and painless. Just fill out the paper form once and eliminate the next process of entering into the computer. Great for Hazop and LIMS reports, digital signatures and the like.
Interesting news on the Stuxnet front. The target keeps pointing at Iran. Seems researchers have found code that points to a couple of specific variable frequency drives that control centrifuges essential to enriching uranium into weapons grade at an Iranian site. Hmmm.
Blevins and Mark Nixon have updated the worksheet Website for their Control Loop Foundation book. I’ve found the book to be an interesting read, and have passed it along to my new boss to get him up to speed on the other part of automation. He’s been dealing with packaging machine automation for several years. This is a whole nuther world.
Interesting podcasts
Talk on an experimental site at the US State Department–Opinion Space–with a very interesting technology for handling thousands of comments so that someone can make sense of them. Love to see this on the Automation World Website.
Great talk on customer service “Everything fails all the time.”
Neal Ford at the Rails Conference on constraints–one of the best presentations you’ll hear this year.
Interesting discussion on reconfigurable robots, Kasper Stoy.
Finally, Emerson has joined the FDT Group. Are DTMs in its future?
