Clippings

Wired Citizens

Government's different now," said Ressler, who now runs GovLoop full time. "Why shouldn't citizens be able to report emergencies on Twitter? Or take a picture of a pothole on their cellphone?''
via washingtonpost.com

From a Washington Post article in the next generation of government employees. Trying to contact VDOT from your car is way more difficult than it needs to be (and most inquiries or complaints are ignored anyway). Have raised this exact issue with Fairfax County and gotten nowhere. Have mostly been told to take a number and sit down. We'll get to it when we can.

Journaling as an Essential Leadership Discipline

At today's New York Times, Sheila Lirio Marcelo, founder and chief executive of Care.com, reflects on a lesson she learned from an executive coach after she became a vice president at a firm.

Q. So what did you learn from the executive coach?

A. The first thing she gave me advice on, and I give it to everybody, is to journal. Write things down. When you come out of a meeting, or you come out of an interview, or you just finished running a session, what’s on your mind? How did it make you feel? How did you make people feel? What’s going on? Again, it was raising my self-awareness around my management style. I think that was critical.

I haven't often seen the need for self-knowledge and reflection in leaders acknowledged so directly.

More of that Bionic Stuff

Q. WHAT EXACTLY IS BRAINGATE?

A. It’s a way for people who’ve been paralyzed by strokes, spinal cord injuries or A.L.S. to connect their brains to the outside world. The system uses a tiny sensor that’s been implanted into the part of a person’s brain that generates movement commands. This sensor picks up brain signals, transmits them to a plug attached to the person’s scalp. The signals then go to a computer which is programmed to translate them into simple actions.

via nytimes.com

From Twitter user @CreatvEmergence.