If it’s not working, fix it. That’s my take.
I had made some changes recently as part of my Spring cleaning for Sources of Insight. The problem is, while I think some of the changes were good, I think some of the changes were less effective and actually exposed other problems.
With that in mind, I set out to simplify the experience and make some more improvements where I could.
I’m also a fan of reducing the gap between what’s in my mind, and what actually exists. It’s an ongoing process of bridging the gap and hacking away at Sources of Insight and learning and responding until it’s closer to my vision.
3 Key Changes
Here are some of the key changes I made today:
- Sidebar Changes – To improve the sidebar, I sliced my Popular Posts lists in half, got rid of my tag cloud, and bumped up my Sources of Insight Amazon Shop (I’m always getting asked for book recommendations, and this is where I keep lists of my best book recommendations.) While the tag cloud was great for first impressions, it created a few problems. On my end, I had to remember categories and tags and I had to split hairs some times. On your end, it created two places to look instead of one simple list.
- Categories Sweep – It’s a longer list now, but it’s consolidated, and now I can fill each bucket with more value. It’s also easier to find lost gems now. I took a quick stroll down memory lane through my Life category and quickly found some long, lost pearls of insight. I need these nuggets at my finger tips because I frequently share these with the people I mentor. I test my categories list against actually use, both my own use and I get feedback from people that use my site on a regular basis.
- Vision and Mission - The vision in my head was always “world’s best insight” but I didn’t really spell this out on the site. I also didn’t clearly spell out that the focus is cross-cutting skills for life and work: mind, body, emotions, career, financial, relationships and fun. I added this to the description below the “welcome” and it feels better already.
With that in mind, here’s a quick recap of why Sources of Insight exists and what it’s all about …
The Mission
The job is —
Empower you with skills – to improve your mind, body, emotions, career, financial, relationships, and fun.
The Vision
The vision is —
World’s best insight and action for work and life!
The Approach
The how is —
Stand on the shoulder’s of giants — draw from books, people, and quotes.
That’s mostly the how. I also have best-selling authors stop by now and then, as well as unsung heroes and people with some amazing super skills.
Sources of Insight is a Mash Up of Real World Experience and Wisdom of the Ages …
I also share my experience and lessons learned from my day job at Microsoft, where I write guides that change the world in the technical space, and I lead high-performance teams. It’s a high-stakes, highly-competitive, highly-collaborative, highly-challenging environment … and It’s my stomping ground. I regularly test and explore patterns and practices for improving personal effectiveness, thinking skills, interpersonal skills, project management, etc. against impact and real-world results. I also coach people and teams around Microsoft, especially on my latest book, Getting Results the Agile Way.
My Door is Always Open …
If you have suggestions for me on how to improve Sources of Insight, please send them my way. Either use the contact form or leave a comment or email me at jdmeieronline “at” gmail.com.
Thank you
Photo by notsogoodphotography.
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