The 5 Hour What?

 I recently experienced a job interview that lasted 5 hours. It sounds weird at first pass, but, given how COVID has changed so much about how the working world operates, it makes sense. Between social distancing and extra steps around mask wearing and the sanitizing of hands, businesses are having to figure out different ways of identifying and recruiting new talent. Even something as simple as a handshake is now only referred to in nostalgic remembrance. 

During the time that I have spent looking for new work, I have had a job interviews take some new and interesting forms. Phone screens are about the same as they were before the shelter in place way of life  I have had onsite interviews where there were modifications to the conference room to partition spaces for individuals to be seen through plexiglass during panel interviews. I have had socially distant interviews where there has been several empty seats in between participants. The most interesting twist on the panel interview I have experienced was a virtual interview that took five hours. It sounds intimidating and really arduous, but I found the experience to be very pleasant.

The interview was broken up into half hour increments and I met with people in different areas of the business that I would potentially be working with and people who current have the role that I am applying for. Even though I talked to ten people, it was not as stressful or pressure loaded like a traditional panel interview can be. The questions were more handled in a more conversation way and it made the whole process more organic. I think that I did better being interviewed in this format. It was more relaxed and even though I saw that same sorts of questions being asked, I was able to answer based on who was asking. From the side of the people doing the interviewing for the company, sometimes instead of listening to the answers to questions asked by others on the panel, they focus on the question they are waiting to ask. From the perspective of the person being interviewed, it can feel like a board of inquiry.

Even though it seems like a huge amount of time, the people who were conducting the interviews were only committed to a 30 minute intervals, so their working day was not horribly interrupted, and in talking to people from different elements of the business, I got a very good sense of what the culture is like. I can also make some different, informed decisions about if the company feels like a good fit for me. Considering that job interviews should be just as much about the candidate evaluating the company as it is about the business evaluating the applicant.

Since I think that the process of interviewing for jobs is heading toward this direction, here are some tips for getting yourself and your space ready for a remote interview.

1) Make the space your are interviewing in as comfortable and visually appealing for the camera.

I am not talking about cleaning up the whole space, but think about what the person on the other side of the camera. Keep it simple, clean and uncluttered. You don't want the person you are talking to pay more attention to what is behind you than what you have to say.

2) Test your camera set up before the interview.

Remember that you are trying to make a good impression to the person you are interviewing with. Technical problems will get the interview off on the wrong foot. 

It is not just if the camera or the internet work, but test what the other person will see. Most of us don't have a video studio we can interview from. Make sure the lighting is brighter on you than it is behind you. You don't want to look like a silhouette or have shadows obscuring half of your face. In my case, I have a window behind me when I am sitting at my desk. I closed the curtains behind me and I have an LED ring light that I clipped to the other side of the desk to make sure that the right amount of light is in the right places. It is also a good idea to check to see how well your microphone works. This will tell you if you need to use a different microphone than the one that is built into your computer. It makes sense. You want to make sure that the person on the other side of the internet can hear you. 

3) Dress as though you are meeting in person.

The adage is to dress for the job you want. Virtue interviews are not an exception to that rule. Not only does the visible part of you have an impact on the impression that you make, it also gets you in the right mindset for the interview. Some might think that they could get away with a dress shirt, tie and pajama bottoms. I would not recommend that. The frame of mind is a lot more important and, you can tell if someone is wearing the proper pants on camera.

4) Eat before and have water with you

It seems obvious, but being at home can cause some behavior patterns that are really different from the life of being in public. Sleep schedule and eating routines are usually the first to go. A light, protein loaded breakfast will help you stay focused during the interview and prevent audible stomach growling. Even if it isn't picked up on the microphone, it can distract you as you are talking. 

Having water with you in the room is a good idea. It is totally acceptable to sip water during the conversation and water will not leave visible stains like coffee might. I recommend a container with a lid. You want to drink the water, but the computer does not. This is especially important if the interview is booked for longer than an hour. Just because you have the water does not mean that you have to drink it all before the end of the interview. A bathroom break in the middle of the interview could leave a negative impression.

While the methods and use of technology may be changing how job interviews are conducted, the end goals are really the same as they ever have been. The perspective employee and the business are interviewing each other to see if working there is a good fit for both parties. Doing it over the internet is not any easier or harder than doing it in person, only different. The need for preparation and professionalism on both sides are unchanged. This is just another adaptation to how the world has changed.

Podcast Overload

It is the start of 2019 and a lot of people talk about resolutions. As I have written before, I am not one of those people. I think that everyone has the opportunity to change things about their life whenever they choose to. That having been said, when someone has a long term, say a year long, project, starting on 1 January is a good benchmark for measuring the progress over the course of a year.
Most people who know me in the walking around world know that I like podcasts. I like them a lot. I listen to topics ranging from technology, to space, to running to movies and other sorts of stuff. The term problem would be a strong one, so I will say issue instead. The issue is that I have quite a backlog of podcasts. 711 podcasts as of the morning of January 1.

Screen shot from my Overcast app.

That represents about 33.2 GB of space, or half the total capacity of my iPad Air 2. Some of the files go back as far as 2016.
Some people talk about declaring podcast bankruptcy, which is the simple act of clearing out some or the entire podcast queue and starting over. I really don't want to do that. Some of the files are for podcasts that have completed their run of shows, such as Canvas. I want to finish that run of show out and that act will help to reduce some of the total shows and memory space used. There are other shows, that I will stop after I finish a particular run of shows, such as The Horror Aisle, where my brother was one of the hosts. I want to finish out his run on the show.
The other thing is that it seems like I hear about new podcasts that I want to start listening to all of the time. One show in particular, Friends in Your Ears, seems to always suggest one or two new shows to try out. When people ask me how I find out about new shows, I always recommend that one as a place to start.
As for my strategy to get caught up on Podcasts in 2019, the first is to  keep current on the ones that I am listening to now. I am adjusting one of Dave Ramsey's baby steps for getting out of debt by getting caught up and staying current on shows, like one might get caught up on past due bills and stay current on those moving forward.
The second step is to work on completing the podcast runs of shows that have ended, or I know where my finishing point is. Then, the last pieces is to simply listen to a couple more shows than I download. Some shows are super short, while others are anywhere from 90 minutes to the occasional 3 hour show. Let's see how this goes.
As far as this project goes, my plan is to update my progress here on a weekly basis. It will not be the only thing that I write about, but it will be a recurring topic as 2019 goes. I will mention when a show ends, I get caught up, or when start a new one in a moment of weakness. This should be a fun experiment.

Voice Lessons

I have been seeking advice from a lot of people with regards to blogging. Specifically, how do you know what to write about. The consistent response that I get, to boil it down to a common thread, is to "find my voice." 

Finding my voice, basically, is to figure out what sort of topics I want to write about. This has been a hard thing for me to do. I have a dozen bits and pieces of blog posts written, on topics ranging from home ownership, to foster parenting, to training for a marathon. It is surprising how much of the Venn diagram of foster parenting and marathoning overlap. Pieces and parts of posts, but nothing yet that I feel like is worthy of posting. 

Something about the act of "finding my voice" that is very free feeling is that I can write about anything I want. Freeing and at the same time, a bit terrifying. It could be that the reason why I have an iPad with a pile of blog bits in front of me is that there is a part of me that feels like that I am not good enough to write something that is fit for others to read. When I look at the posts that I read and the podcasts I listen to or the videos that I watch as I eat breakfast in the morning, I often think to myself that these people are pretty talented to be able to put out stuff like this on a consistent basis. I look at that and I feel like I don't have what it takes to publish blog on at least a weekly basis.  It is a feeling that I am not alone in having. Feeling inadequate to be published has been talked about by a lot of well respected people in their fields. The term that commonly gets used is imposter syndrome. It is a feeling that has been felt by doctors, writers, actors, artists, musicians. Interestingly enough, it even gets talked about by world leaders in their biographies and obituaries. Even with the feelings of fear of negative criticism, sounding or looking foolish, or just being rejected by those who they hold in high esteem, these people of found the courage in themselves to just say it anyway.

Voice Lessons has been created to provide a chance for me to find my voice for my writing. No theme, no particular topics of expertise.  Someone who doesn't try to talk doesn't learn how. It will also give me a repeating opportunity, in the short term, to be be brave about what I have to say and put it out in the world. Voice Lessons are going to only have the common thread in that the topics are just stuff that I wanted to write about in the moment. What will the end result of this? I have no idea. A result that I am hoping to find is that I will develop the belief in myself to publish what is in my head and my heart, even of no one likes what I write, or if no one even reads it. 

The reason I write is not to be famous, or well regarded. I am fairly sure that I will not get rich doing it. There are really two reasons for me. I get the chance to maybe teach someone something new to them or encourage them to be daring. I hope to encourage someone to try something new. Everyone's life is a story, of sorts. I think that sometimes people go through troubles so that in the future, they have the opportunity to use the problems of their past to help others around them. Sometime, when situations feel dire, it helps to hear from someone who has been in that experience that it gets better. The other reason is admittedly more selfish. I write so that the words and thoughts that are in my head can get out. Words that feel like they will poison me if I keep them in for too long. Writing is something that I have always liked to do. It could be that the fear of not being good enough is part of what kept me from really trying to do it more seriously.  

This post is the first of I hope many. From the outside, it will appear to be totally random. If someone decides to read this one, and whatever comes out of my fingers after this, they will go on a journey with me to see what becomes of my voice. What sort of a writer will I become? It will be a lot of fun finding out together.

This Week in Running (February 5th to 11th)

This was a great week for me to get back on track on my running goals as I prepare for the marathon at the end of April. Considering that I have not been as consistent with my posting, it may be hard to tell that I have a marathon coming up.

January was not the training month that I wanted to have, but, who really wants to spend half of a month sick. I got hit with the flu that has been impacting a lot of people all over the country. Considering how many people have ended up in the hospital, or worse, I think I got off easy. This is especially important since everyone else in my family have a higher chance of getting sick than I do and none of them caught it. Something to be said for hand sanitizer and using a Neti pot to making this go away. I did have to take a trip to urgent care to get a high powered cough suppressant, so that I could sleep with out waking myself, or my wife up. Now, I am on to February and feeling up to getting back on track. For the sake of brevity, I have been training for the Marathon using the Nike Running Club app with a marathon training program built in. I tell it when my race is and it sets a plan for it. The plan is adjusted based on how well I run over the course of the week as well as how I do on benchmark drills that are spaced out over the weeks.

Screen shot from my phone. This is how many
shows I had to listen to as of Jan. 29th.

Monday, February 5th. I ran 5.75 miles this morning with a time of 57:49. That puts my pace at about 10’03”. Not too bad for recovering from rebelling lungs. It was nice to run in my usual places and see how things have changed. In particular, there is a part of my route where there is some new houses being built and that have gone up so fast since I have been down. It will be nice when the street lights in that area are up and working, so I don’t have such a dark spot in my route. Typically, I run while listening to podcasts. Considering how many podcasts I have in my queue, you would think that I don’t listen as often as I do. Thing is that I am working through a backlog of shows going back to 2016. I have gone through and purge out the shows that have lost my interest, or episodes that are very event focused. So, what is left is still subjects that I want to hear more about. On this run, I listened to the most recent episodes of MacStories and Twenty Thousand Hertz. It made the time pass quickly. It was good to get my feet moving again too.

Tuesday, February 6th. This day had one of my most challenging drills to date. The schedule called for a 6 X 1000 meter speed drill. B as I call, I had to run 1000 meters as fast as I could, pause for about 90 seconds, than do it over again until I ran it 6 times. So, I ran full our for 6 kilometers (3.72 miles) over a time of 33:35. That is an average pace of 8’54”. My time on my fastest kilometer was my second interval, with a time of 8’06”. On this morning, I had Cortex playing during the run. I listened to a pretty good piece of the episode by the time I finished the drill. I was completely worn out.

Wednesday, February 7th. This was an indoor training day. I have been using the Nike Training Club app for my Cross Training work. The routine for this session is called Back It Down. I have been running consistently for about 3 years, but, I have basically ignored my core and upper body strength and I can really feel it whenever I do one of these workouts. It only took a little over 24 minutes to make me sweat like it is summer time. All of it was focused on upper body and core strength as well as balance. I listened to music on my iPhone during this since there is a lot of talking during each part of the workout.

Thursday, February 8th. This was a benchmark day. About every couple of weeks or so, the Nike Running Club app has me run a 7 minute warm up, followed by an all out sprint for 3 minutes and a 5 minute cool down. I have done a few of these before, but, this was the first one I have done in a while where I wasn’t sick or it wasn’t freezing outside. I also run these with music on since this is a guided drill with a lot of talking. I covered a total distance of 1.63 miles with a 9’18” average pace.

Friday, February 9th. This was a big day. A problem I have had with my training, even before I got sick was I had a tendency to skip my long runs on the weekends. Between being tired from the long week as well as getting up with my youngest to that my wife can catch up on her sleep, it was my training that suffered. I decided to let the schedule decide when my long runs would happen instead of moving it to the weekend and letting it not happen. Friday was the day for the long run, so I let it be. I got up at 3 am instead of my usual 4 and got out there. I ran 12.5 miles in a time of 2:09:08. That is an average pace of 10’20”. It was great get that short term goal done. During this run, I listened to the Accidental Tech Podcast and Do By Friday. Two very different shows, but they both kept my spirits up as I covered the distance. 

Art from the Nike Running Club app recording my run
on Friday. I felt rabbit fast that day.

I felt really good getting those accomplishments done for the week and I feel like this marathon coming up is not impossible. I even hope to improve on my time from last year.

2018 (That is going to take a bit to get used to.)

We are at the beginning of a new year and it is a time of renewal. It is a time where people set new goals for the year. Some people’s goal come in the form of resolutions to do things like work out more or eat less. I am not the sort that waits for New Year’s Day to make changes, so resolutions are not part of my normal vocabulary. If I want to change some thing, I just start making the changes. I plan on talking about goal setting soon, but today is not the day for that.

My Best Nine from 2017 according to Instagram

2017 was a really difficult year in a lot of respects. We had a house fire in early March. While the actual fire damage was fairly minor, due to my wife’s very quick thinking, There was several thousands of dollars in damage as well as the time my family was displaced from the home. No one was injured in the fire, but, it did put the family in a bit of a tailspin until we all returned home a few months later. 

About a month after the fire, I competed in my first full Marathon. I picked one that was close to home, but at the time of the race, we were living in a hotel about 25 miles from where we live, so I had to drive a farther distance to the race than planned. That was not the only “home field advantage” that I lost or forfeited. I have lived in my town for over 10 years. I knew that the area where the race is held is windy all of the time. I did not take that into account when I picked what I was going to wear during the race. As a result, I froze over the whole course, wearing only a t-shirt and shorts. I would have benefitted well from a long sleeve shirt if nothing else. I ended up finishing the race with a time of 5:12:47. Not a bad time at all for my first marathon, but I will have to admit that I was disappointed with my time, initially. I had it in my head that I could estimate my time based on the times I have had during my half marathons. That could not be farther from the truth. Running a marathon is a lot more than double the physical requirements of a half marathon. There is a sizable mental aspect to the event. I learned about myself as well as how to prepare for a marathon. When I finished, I thought a lot about if I would do another one. In time, I decided that I would and that is part of what I will be talking about in the weeks ahead.

As far as my running for this year, I ran a total of 1,036 miles over the course of the year. Not bad, but I do plan to go farther this year. I am also planning on working more on my upper body strength. I think that will go a long way toward helping me improve on my overall race performance. I will be writing about that as well.

While 2017 was not the year that I wanted, it does not define what 2018 will be. I would like this to be encouraging to whom ever read it. Another project that I am doing this year is posting a picture a day on Instagram. If you are interested in seeing what I post the, please follow me @1pairofshoes. That is my handle on Twitter as well, but, I kind of just post wha comes to mind there as well as retweet the things that I find interesting. Beware!! Happy New Year!!

My iPad Experiment

My iPad Air 2 along side with my old school iPad.

I have been hearing a lot about the idea of using an iPad as a replacement for a laptop. From what i have heard and read, there seems like there is a split between camps as far as those who believe that the iPad is a tool for creating content and those who think it is a toy for consuming stuff on the internet. Even as I wrote this, I found myself writing in terms of using a computer versus using an iPad. It occurred to me that this made it seem like I had a bias coming into this experiment.  So, why am I doing this? I want to see what the true limits are for this technology at this point and how I can work with it. Just like trying to learn a new language, something that I have some experience with, I think that the best way to learn something new is through immersion. So, for the month of July, I didn't touch my MacBook Pro and instead, I did everything I normally do over the course of a month using only iOS. There are a couple of exceptions to mention up front. I do have a Windows machine at my day job that I am required to use. The combination of some specific software that I have to use and the restrictions that the company that I work for has pertaining to using personal devices on the company network prevented me from extending this project further. I haven't used my work computer at home and I have only used it for work tasks. Ironically enough, my work computer weighs more than my MacBook does, so I really don’t feel motivated to take it home under normal conditions unless I have to. 

Hardware:

I listen to a lot of podcasts. I listen to a lot of podcasts about tech stuff. I listen to a lot of podcasts about Apple tech stuff. Generally, they all have been referring to things in terms of the iPad Pro. The information that they share is great, however, I do not have the latest and greatest in iPads. I would like one at some point, but I cannot cost justify replacing my iPad that is working great for one that would work faster and possibly could  do some more stuff. When I listen to the podcasts, I find myself experimenting around the subject that are talking about to see if my iPad is up to the task. For this experiment, I have been rocking an iPad Air 2, an iPad mini, 4th generation (the first with the Retina display) and an iPhone 7. It could be said that I am living the MultiPad lifestyle, frugal edition. I am only using the software keyboard on the devices. They all have cases, but there sole purpose is to protect them from drops, smacks and my kids. The only reason that I am using the most current iPhone is because it was recently replaced after my  iPhone 6s was damaged in a house fire. 

My MacBook, with another project in progress from a few months ago.

In contrast to what I use that runs iOS, my MacBook Pro is a 13 inch, late 2011. It is from before the retina display was introduced to the line up, so, the screen resolution is not like what my iPhone or my iPads display. Part of the reason why I wanted to try this is that my MacBook is 6 years old and I can envision a day when it will not run the latest version of MacOS. As far as I know, it will run High Sierra when it comes out, but I can see how more of the resources get used up on the most basic of tasks, with each OS update. When I get to that point, I will need to look at what I can seriously afford in comparison to what my real needs are in a computer. 

One thing to bring up on the software side of things, I am running iOS 10.3.3. This is important to keep in mind as I am talking about the tests over the month of July. I don't have a need in my professional life to get a beta account with Apple, so what I use is what is available to anyone out there. With iOS 11 likely coming out in the next few weeks, there are a lot of things that I will talk about here that will probably not be consistent with how iOS 11 will work. I have not see iOS 11, in person, yet, so it is important that I am only writing this from an iOS 10 frame of reference. 

Preplanning:

I knew heading into this project, I would need to think a lot about how I do things that I do on the Mac and make that translate to do it on the iPad. I did add a couple of apps to get me going and make my transition a little easier. I didn't add anything that I would not have under other circumstances, but, this was a push I needed to make the additions. One app I added was 1password. I needed a password manager and this is one one I have been hearing the most about. However, I did not give myself enough time to fully implement 1password, so I had to refer to my old, less secure, methodology. I did get it set up on all of my devices. I also looked to see if my bank had an updated app. They have one, but it is clunky and not terribly helpful. There are a couple of things that I need to contact my financial institution about. Besides the state of their app, I would like to know when, or if they will get Apple Pay. There were some additional apps that I could have bought to make my iPad configuration close to my MacBook. I could have bought an Office 365 subscription, but, I really don't use Word or Excel that much at home, unless I am doing a work project. That is a purchase that I will likely make in the future, but I determined that it was not mission critical for this experiment.

Initial impressions:

At first, I really had to force myself not to go to my MacBook as the month started. It has been my go to place to do this kind of work for several years. That urge only lasted for a couple of days. It was easier to go the iPad to do stuff after I turned the MacBook completely off. I have had my iPads for a while, so I knew how they worked, up to a point. It was really easy to get a rhythm and a process down for doing things, like balancing my bank account, or writing in my journal. Since everything is connected to iCloud or Dropbox, getting at my information was easy. Hardest part was getting used to the software keyboard on the iPad. I have pretty large hands and I learned how to touch type in school. Even working in landscape mode was difficult while typing on the iPad glass. I got used to it in time, but, I do plan on getting a keyboard cover for my iPad. 

What I really liked:

The first thing that really jumped out was that things loaded so fast. Once I got multitasking down, which was no small feat, I was able to use that for a lot of my stuff. I did not put Workflow on my iPad on purpose. I am not opposed to it, but, I didn't want to try to teach myself how to use it during this experiment. Something else I did was start to expand my use of Pages. I have it on my devices, but, my career path has always put me in front of Word and Excel. As I said earlier, I could have put Office 365 on my iPad, but, I really didn’t know how much I would need to access the documents that I have already written. New stuff that I wrote at home, wrote using Pages. As I used it more,I actually came to like how much simpler Pages is to use. I may end up sticking with it after the experiment is up. Even as I have been preparing this blog article to post, I have been learning some things about using Pages on the Mac that I would not have if I had not done this experiment. I still have a lot of learning to do to get Numbers down as well as I understand Excel, but I will get there. There wasn’t any need for spreadsheet work over July, I that was a part of the immersion process that I needed to get into.  

The biggest thing I stumbled across doing this experiment is that if pushed me to use my iPad in ways that I had not learned without the necessity. Initially, I didn't use my iPad in landscape mode nearly as much as I should have. Things like using the iPad in split screen mode did not seem to work as well as I would have thought after hearing about it as much as I have over the past several months. At one point in the month, I started to think that somehow, split screen was limited to the iPad Pro and I had just missed that fact for all of this time. Turns out, I just need to figure it out. While it doesn't work on everything, I have learned which apps I have that will do the true split screen and which ones do the 1/4 split. As my knowledge of what the limits of each of these apps is, the more flexibility I am finding in using the iPad as a replacement for my MacBook.

Something else that I really liked is something that didn't really jump out at me as I started to write this is the fact that my power supply for my iPhone and my iPad was one and the same. Packing around my iPad is easier than my MacBook, which was completely expected. But, I did not consider that I would need to take less around with me in my bag. As far as cables in my backpack goes, I have one iPad power block,  one lightning cable, a short USB to MicroUSB, for charging my headphones or my block speaker, and the proprietary cable for charging my Fitbit. I would like to reduce my cable count to reduce further, but that is something that will come over time. 

What bothered me about it:

One of the things that some of the apps that I needed to use was not available in split screen at all. That is not necessarily a fault of Apple’s, but, I think that using only the onboard keyboard prevented me from switching apps as easily as I do on my MacBook. I will need do some additional research to see if there is a website that lists which apps work in true split screen, 1/4 screen or not at all. 

Also, I have big hands and, while I have one of the smaller MacBook Pro models available on the market, trying to touch type on the iPad keyboard was a bigger challenge than I would have liked. When I start looking seriously at keyboard covers, I will need to visit some at the store before I purchase one. I have also noticed that I really started to fill up my iPad as I worked on this experiment. I have added about 10 new apps to my iPad and, even with iCloud and Dropbox in use, I am down to about 10 GB available on my 64 GB iPad. I will take a serious look at which apps I have on there that I really need. 

End results:

After the experiment, I have determined that I could use my iPad, which is the make and model that some people would describe as the one for “consumption” as a replacement for my MacBook. There are some things I need to do, mostly in the form of changing my personal workflows for completing tasks, but that is something that I am confident I can do through experimentation. It was not a seamless transition from one to the other, but I don't think that would have been a realistic expectation. I need to consider that I did not preplan enough. 

What is next?

At some point in the future,I will try this again. It will, most likely, be on the same iPad, but, there will be some changes to my process before I begin. On the hardware side, I will need to get a  new case with a built in keyboard. I have been doing some research in to this and they are getting harder to find since the iPad Air 2 model was discontinued. My field trip to the store will have to happen sooner than later. The other thing that will change is that I will probably not involve my iPad mini in the next test. While it was my first iPad and I still use it, the 16 GB of memory makes it really limited as far as what I can do with it. On the software side, iOS 11 will be out before I do this and I will spend some time in advance getting familiar with that before I take another stab at it. I am sure that it will be successful, but I am interested to see if it will be easier than the month of July went. As far as when I may repeat the experiment, I think that I will spend a couple of months working with iOS 11. I will not completely cut myself off from using my MacBook, but, I am going to look at things from the vantage point of teaching myself as I go.

Deciding Between Digital and Paper Notebooks

This may end up just being a scary look at how I make decisions. Since I am writing this around Halloween season, I guess this could be considered a scary story. If you read this to the kids, and they, in turn, have nightmares, I take zero responsibility.

I have a day job where there is a huge part of the job where taking notes is an important thing. There are a bunch of meetings, many of them more time wasters than product makers, but there are nuggets of important information that can leak out of these meetings. There are also bits of information that present themselves accidentally at times. 

There dilemma that I find myself stewing over is what, from a tools stand point, do I use to take notes. I have read and really like Mike Vardy’s idea of “The approach is more important than the app.” I don’t think that is my problem. I have a pretty solid method of identifying quickly what information to write down and what to let fly by, but, I have a bit of hang up about what to write in. 

This is the issue of collecting the information digitally, such as an app on my phone or my tablet, or writing things down, by hand in a physically notebook with paper. I am not making a decision as to what to buy, i already have all of the tools in place to do both, i think I am trying to settle on a process and stick to it.

What I have been doing most recently has been to carry my iPad to every meeting that I go to, open Evernote, set up that note so that I have documented what the meeting is and when it is. After that, I sit, listen intently, and wait for that nugget of data to drop before I can type it into my iPad. Often times, there is no nugget to fall. When that happens, I digitally recycle my note with a new date, and or topic and continue. 

The benefits of this process is that I can write what is happening and it is easily read later when I have act on something. Anyone who has had the challenge of reading my own handwriting can testify that it is a big challenge. My parents thought I was going to be a physician based on my handwriting. I guess engineers don’t have great, artsy script either.

Also, I have lost bits of paper from time to time, but, the only time I have lost my computer is when my house got broken into. Since the notes that I write are ported to a cloud based software, I can open them on pretty much any computer with an internet connection. 

The internet connection is possibly one of the drawbacks. In my case, my personal devices, i.e., my phone, my iPad, or my personal computer, if I took it to work, are not allowed on the work network. As such, any notes that I take on my iPad will not be saved until I get my iPad on a wireless connection. This means that I have to wait until I get home before I can save the notes. With that, there is some risk. The iPad could be stolen, or broken, or some other cataclysmic event could make my notes go bye-bye. 

The other method that I have used in the past is to carry a physical notebook with where ever I go. I can stop, whip out the notebook and write down whatever information that I need to. I doesn’t matter if I have an internet connection, or not. I don’t run the risk of my paper notebook running out of batteries, and, if my pen, which is a favorite, gets lost, I can feel pretty confident that I can find one to use to write down what I need to write down.

The downside to the paper notebook is the whole crappy handwriting thing I talked about earlier. The other thing about the paper notebook that could be problematic is the possibility of losing it. I have been working hard toward only having the things that I need and use in my life, so, the minimization of clutter helps promote finding my stuff when I need it. I have a bag that I keep my critical gear in, an my notebook is in that bag. Then again, my iPad is in that bag, unless I am using it or charging it.

I could minimize the damage caused by losing a notebook by typing my notes from the day into Evernote and use that to make the notes searchable and recoverable. It is also a good Idea for me to review my notes when I have the best chance to be able to read what I wrote down and turn it into something useful. I also will give myself the best chance for my action items to actually make it into my task management system. 

So, it sounds like I might have a plan. Let’s see how this goes. I would like to know what you use and how that works. Please leave me some notes in the comments.