It was great to meet some people for a couple of reasons. First, I was able to get real world feedback on the ideas that I’m working on, in particular the training business. It was also great to get out into the world and breathe fresh air, both in a real and a metaphorical sense. Deep huh?

Anyway, meeting these people was great to keep the motivation up as they were pretty positive about the ideas I was discussing with them. It got me to the point that I’m confident that people will buy the training offering and I now need to develop it.

So, as this update is a little late the motivation was and is still powerful and my measure of progress was Not too bad. I need to get some wins on the board this week I think. It’s time to get into the dirty details of product development!

Can you guess what language the update is in this week?

So, what’s been happening?  I’ve been busy beavering away at getting a basic website developed for one of my projects.  It did involve a necessary step in what I consider was ultimately the wrong direction.  I did technical work myself!  I know, I know.  Not the ideal situation but I couldn’t find someone to do it for the price of a case of beer so I resigned and did it myself.  I learnt more about web design and implementation than I care to share here or even really use in the future but it had to be done.  All I lost was a week of effort that I could be spending on other things…  I did get to listen to lots of podcasts and radio though and some goals were kicked so not all was lost.

Through my ditching and office activities I also heard/read a few good quotes this week:

1. Try hard, fail fast, learn and move on (or something like that) – Jason Calicanis, This Week in Startups podcast
2. Don’t mistake activity with progress (or something like that) – From the book Who Moved My Cheese (I think) by Dr Spencer Johnson

Heard any good quotes lately that have inspired, invigorated or enraged you?

So, in summary this week was very busy and at times frustrating.  More importantly, rather than just being active, I was making progress and this did wonders for the motivation.  This weeks Motivation = Powerful! and the Progress = Better than pitiful.

What does next week hold?  Well, I’ve got some introductions that I’ll need to prepare for.  I need to get 2-3 more people from each one to continue the networking and build those contacts.

I’ll let you know how it goes next Friday.  Au revoir!

ps.  Through the power of google translate I’ll be seeing how many numbers I can get up to in different languages.  Fun huh?

So, without further ado, what’s happened this week? 

Well, apart from finishing setting up a working space after the move to Melbourne, it was getting down to business in planning for the education and training business.  If you saw the last post, this was quite important as it helped communicate what I’m working on to my wife.  Well, that was a success. Oh, and as a small side benefit I managed to gain an understanding the market, the segments and a beginning of the different training offerings that would match the requirements.  The next step is to now get a pitch together and get out there and talk to people to refine my assumptions.

furcle didn’t get to much traction this week due to the above.  Next week I will outsource the development of the placeholder web page to start soliciting people to help with testing and feedback of the service.

So, the week gone Motivation = Not too bad and Progress = Pitiful.  I’m thinking next week will be much better!

Until next time!  And in the mean time, let me know if you’re having a win yourself.  Making any progress?

I know some people don’t like the use of the term partner for their spouse, boyfriend, girlfriend, defacto, wife, husband love of their life, soul mate or all of the above but I thought it looked good in the title. Now, I hope I haven’t scared you off yet, It gets better… I think.

This weekend gone, I got a bit of a grilling from my partner (wife). We were driving back from a nice lunch in the country to celebrate a birthday for one of our friends and I was feeling pretty good about the coming week. At some point, I’m not really sure when, I must have said something that started a bit of a grilling session. “Can you smell bacon” I hear you say? I would say just a fleeting whiff. One that you’re not sure if you imagined.

It all boiled down (boiled bacon?) to her not know what I was up to at the moment and how I was progressing. Now this raises three questions and probable answers for me:

1. Why doesn’t she read Ditch the Office to keep up?I like to think because it’s easier to get it from the horse’s mouth. I’m hoping that it’s not because Ditch the Office is boring. If you think it’s the later, let me know what you think would be more interesting. There’s a comments link at the end of this post.
2. Does Ditch the Office really keep people up to date?I don’t think so at the moment. I’ve made some improvements and will be blogging more regularly to keep people up to date, including a weekly progress and motivation post – look out!
3. How can I keep my biggest partner and investor up to date and involved?Make sure the old conversation machine keeps rolling along so she knows what’s happening. You, lucky reader, don’t need to be part of this one. There’s only room for the two of us in our bed.

Anyway, back to it. Since the move to Melbourne, I’ve started working on another idea – training businesses in the benefits of web and digital technologies.