It’s been awhile since I’ve blogged here on Evolving Web. This is becoming a personal blog for someone who has invested a lot of his “person” in his work as of late.
I’m vowing to change that this year and this post is a start.
All my life, I’ve wanted to be a writer. In some ways, I always have been one. But, it’s strange. Commerce seems to often validate when we can call ourselves something.
Two years ago, with my collaborator Tonianne, I wrote the book Personal Kanban. This year, it won a Shingo - known by some as the academy award of Lean. And, despite the fact that I had written this book now two years ago, I feel I can finally call myself a writer.
Now, I can also call myself a publisher. 
This is part of my analytics screen on Amazon. Modus Press has a catalog now. Small, but growing. Small, but greater than one or two. Small, but increasingly noticed. There are five authors represented in the list so far.
Today, as I write this post, I lie on my bed in Saigon. In a few days Toni and I will do what has become routine. Together with over 100 other people, we will be responsible for changing people’s lives for the better. Our field of process improvement may sound stolid and overly professional, but the ramifications are purely human.
By the end of our class, in this case together with our friends Mary and Tom Poppendieck, we will help people understand, control, and improve their work. Most of what we do is “work” and we tend to do too much of it. Unfortunately, like any addiction, we can’t get it under control unless we understand it and our relationship to it.
It is hard not to feel successful today, we just published Beyond Agile, we have a healthy portfolio of books, Toni and I were honored by the Shingo board of examiners, and our calendar for the year is filling up. I lie on a bed in one of my favorite places on earth, preparing to walk the streets and eat the food. Soon Tonianne will show up at my door and we will head out.
I strive to find the apparent balance Mary and Tom have found. They schedule a set number of trips a year and are scrupulous with their personal time. If you look at their website, see their calendar? There’s time set aside specifically to write.
What comes next in this space? I think Evolving Web will still focus on the social aspects of work, as it always has, but there will be more personal missives like this one, more images of these trips we are blessed to take, and more discussions of food. In short ... more Jim.
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