Wrike – My Project Management Tool of Choice

Wrike.com is an awesome, awesome project management tool.  Blogging to pass on the love.

Why is it awesome?  Because it is light, makes no assumptions about my workflow, and is simple and intuitive.  Consists of tasks, arranged in folders (one-to-many), with dependencies (Gantt charts), integrated with email allowing for easy discussions and notifications, and time tracking to boot.  Currently, I use Wrike at JoMI along with FairSetup (my other project) allowing everyone on the team to, once a week, quickly review our activity and self-report on accomplishments/time allocation, which leads to short-cycle calibration within the team.

So far, Wrike has been particularly good at helping with the following:

• workflow management – when I have a multi-step workflow, easy to track progress
• prioritization – when people get overloaded, I am able to prioritize their (and my) attention
• memory – things no longer get lost
• rapport – making sure that we are all on the same page. This last one deserves more attention…

 

US Legal System: Problems and Solutions

I do not know enough to speak intelligently about legal matters, but, as an entrepreneur who engaged the legal system pro se (here ya go), I’d like to point out some “inefficiencies”, offer some solutions, and begin discussing my future role with respect to the judicial system.

Problems

At the end of the day, I am very happy that the JoVE dispute has happened, for it made me aware that not all is well with our judicial system and the streets are, in fact, not paved with cheese.  How so?

• Inefficient Process – why was I filing paper rather than uploading PDFs?  Why was there no online archive?  Why did I have to do so much printing?  Why couldn’t I reference prior pleadings and had to reprint them?

A Tiny Difference (Translation)

Let’s not compare modern Kiev with Hussein’s Iraq.  Let’s compare the then-America with the now-Russia.

My translation of: http://profile.ru/pryamayarech/item/79939-malenkaya-raznitsa by Dmitry Bykov.

“USA does not and cannot have moral grounds to lecture on following international norms and respecting other countries’ sovereignty. What about the bombings in former Yugoslavia or invasion of Iraq on falsified evidence?” – MID RF ominously asks, commenting on the suggested sanctions against Russia.  And it’s a reasonable question, a favorite argument of couch patriots and propagandists: how can you?.. Have you looked in the mirror?..  What about Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan?!  Let’s not, as was suggested in that same commentary, stoop to polemics by way of tear-jerking propaganda and remind anyone about what was was going on in Yugoslavia under Milosevic, or compare modern Kiev with Hussein’s Iraq, where people were being dissolved in acid.  Let’s instead compare something else: the then-America vs. the now-Russia.