Mark R.’s Post

Thanks for having me Tom Allen - you're the first person to give me homework of reading political manifestos! Great to join you and #Computing to talk about the seismic shift the UK has just experienced. Let's hope some of those promises become reality.

Please do check out and share Vote for Policies (for those of you in the UK). It's a very careful and considerately designed tool that helps you understand the promises that each party standing for election in the UK are making in their manifestos (or contract). You indicate to the tool which areas of policy are most important to you (eg health, education, the economy, or all of them if you're feeling brave!) and it will show you each of the manifesto pledges without revealing which party they're from. You can then choose which you prefer from the selection, and right at the end it will tell you which party you're most strongly aligned with on each policy. It's a fantastic tool if you're not sure who to vote for, and equally good if you want to challenge your own understanding of actual manifesto pledges. It's important to say - this isn't a tactical voting tool and is completely independent. Please do try it, and share it with anyone who might be feeling overwhelmed by all the noise of election season.

🚀 "Language is not just a means to an end; it's a constitutive force in teamwork." In the latest episode of the Teamcraft podcast, my supremely knowledgeable co-host Dr Andrew MacLaren delves into the fascinating world of language and communication in teams while I tag along for the ride. In this episode, we explore: 🔍 The evolutionary roots of language and teamwork  🗣️ How language shapes team dynamics and performance  📚 Key debates in linguistics featuring insights from Noam Chomsky and Steven Pinker  📖 The power of storytelling in building team cohesion and culture  🔄 The critical concept of common ground in effective communication  ✈️ Practical applications from aviation, space exploration, and more Andrew's expertise at the intersection of sociology & linguistics and his focus on team communication is captured in this episode. His tour through academic literature and research bridges the gap between theory and real-world application, making this episode a must-listen for anyone interested in optimising team performance. So thanks Andrew, for sharing your knowledge (and giving me an easy ride this episode!) 👉 Listen to the full episode on your favourite platform: 🌐 All platforms & episode info: https://bit.ly/3z0fVbC 📺 YouTube: https://bit.ly/45tKByx (video and podcast) 🔊 Spotify: https://bit.ly/3RgYF8m 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/4aOzwZS 🔊 Amazon Music: https://amzn.to/4aS7CMD #Teamcraft #Podcast #Teamwork #Communication #Linguistics #Storytelling #Leadership #CommonGround

"Most of what we need is to be able to work well with people. It's not about skill set as much [as] softer skills." In this episode of Teamcraft, Dr Andrew MacLaren and I have the pleasure of speaking with Hannah Blom-Cooper, an accomplished civil fraud lawyer and partner at Greenberg Traurig. One of the most important things that Andrew and I want to achieve with the Teamcraft podcast is to explore how teams in different settings approach collaboration, leadership, and team building. In this episode, we turn our focus to the legal profession, where Hannah offers a unique perspective on how legal teams operate under pressure, manage complex cases, and build trust within their ranks. Our conversation sheds light on the intricacies of legal teamwork and shows that regardless of the industry, the principles of effective teamwork remain universally relevant. Hannah provides an insightful look into: ♦ the distinct roles of solicitors and barristers (in the British legal system) ♦ the complexities of insolvency law ♦ the art of assembling effective legal teams under pressure ♦ managing uncertainty and vulnerability in high-stakes litigation ♦ and the importance of trust and communication within teams Hannah also shares her unique 'Conga' metaphor for leadership and recounts her experiences in building a cohesive team, even in challenging circumstances. For anyone with an interest in team dynamics and leadership, this episode is packed with valuable insights. You can now watch on Youtube, or listen to the episode wherever you get your podcasts: 📺 Watch on YouTube: https://bit.ly/4an0CHh 🎙 Listen on Apple: https://bit.ly/4dChZqh 🎙 Listen on Amazon: https://bit.ly/4bEkney 🎙 Listen on Spotify: https://bit.ly/4bjR1Cg 🎙 All other platforms: https://bit.ly/3UYLWcF A huge thanks to Hannah for sharing her time and expertise with us.

As we foreshadowed in our last Seeto newsletter, we've got a lot of Google news in this month. At the Google Cloud Next event, Google announced a raft of AI features, with many just in their Google Workspace suite. Meeting notes, summaries, translations, a new video product and improvements to Gemini were announced, many carrying additional fees. Not to be left behind with AI announcements that they'll happily charge you for, Slack announced more AI goodness for paying customers. There's more on genAI, workplace security in this month's edition, as well as a hat tip to Okta, one of Seeto's favourite and longest standing partners, winning Google's Cloud Technology Partner of the year gong. Read our condensed summary of all you need to know in business tech, here...

There is a magic in the English word ‘team’ that suggests something more cohesive and productive than words like ‘group’ or ‘committee’. But where did the word ‘team’ get this magical power? In the latest Teamcraft episode, Dr Andrew MacLaren and I talk about our journey to discover how ‘team’ became the term to indicate especially high performance in a group of people. After starting to pull the internet thread that offered many misattributions and dead ends, we unearthed the groundbreaking research of the Tavistock Institute into the performance of working groups in British mines. This episode talks through the amazing research that Eric Trist, Ken Bamforth and their colleagues at the Tavistock Institute did in the 1950s and 1960s, which led to the creation of terms like "composite teams" and "Socio-technical Design", and laid the foundations for decades of research into high performance teams. Sure, this is an episode about British coal mines in the 1950s, but it's not just about that. It tells the story of how a group of motivated workers designed a superior system than a group of industrial designers, because they had expertise in the work that needed doing, and autonomy to decide how they were going to work. To me, this work is just as important as the work of Taiicho Ohno on the Toyota Production System. 📻 Links to the episode: Episode link: https://bit.ly/44dZgNE Youtube: https://bit.ly/3Jvpvp9 Apple: https://apple.co/3QekIMz Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3UsmxI5 Amazon: https://amzn.to/49PDb9g Barry Smart David Leach Matt Chocqueel-Mangan Dave Winsborough #teamcraft #sociotechnicaldesign #orgpsych #agile #lean #teams

Do you use one of the big three hyperscale clouds, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure or Google Cloud? Have you thought about the sustainability impact of your provider since you chose them? I love the annual research that Penny Horwood at Computing and The Channel Company put into comparing the three leading vendors for their impact. Although Microsoft has carried the title for the two previous years, this year there's a new title holder. Notably, AWS performed poorly in the analysis in the 'Standards and Policies' category, while Google swept the scores for 'Circular Economy and Recycling'. I'm not going to spoil the surprise of the winner this year, as Penny's work deserves reading. If you're choosing a cloud vendor, you should know this information, and if you're in a position to give feedback to your incumbent provider, let them know they should start preparing for next year's awards... https://lnkd.in/eawsK9P8

This month, a number of Google Workspace enhancements, including new enhancements to Sheets, AI enhancements to Meet and a long awaited (apparently) dark mode for Drive make it into the April edition of Seeto's monthly newsletter. We expect these Google announcements to be massively overshadowed in our May edition, with the Google Cloud Next event teasing a huge number of GenAI features in Cloud Platform and Workspace, but until then this month's edition also covers: 🔒 Several new worries about security , including vulnerabilities in Apple’s iOS software and in Macs with Apple Silicon 👨💻 GitHub's new security features to prevent the accidental commitment of sensitive information like passwords and API keys into public repositories ☁ The update to the Cloud Security Maturity Model (v2) by the Cloud Security Alliance As always, if anything in the newsletter catches your attention, or you'd like a little more friendly explanation, get in touch with anyone in the Seeto team!