Desire for life efficiency

I like to be efficient.

Take the shortest route when driving between places. When writing code I hate to make an inefficient routine. Why quickly spew out a slow, sloppy routine when a little time spent on planning can create something beautiful, and efficient? If the routine is going to suck, I'd prefer to not write it in the first place.

I also like people.

I love hanging out sharing in life; sharing in struggles; sharing in ideas... I particularly love this when it happens over coffee. When investing in people's lives, I still have a desire for efficiency. This means getting the most out of the time I am spending with the other person. I try not to let my borderline ADD interfere with listening, and am always cross referencing my internal Rolodex to see if I can help build some additional connections. (I also love connecting people.)

But while I enjoy meeting people to talk about life, I despise repeatedly meeting to talk about a project that fails to materialize.

This week...

I sent a frustrated e-mail to some friends about such a project; a web-site that I've helped maintain which has been long overdue for an overhaul. My frustration stems from how the group has become inefficient with meetings and little action; and that this situation happened to me 7 years ago.

Back in the day, I was on the technology committee at my old church. Once a month about 10 of us would meet for 2 hours to discuss technology related issues. At one meeting, a web-site was proposed. By the next meeting I had a mock up. Everyone in the committee had an opinion, from page layout to color-scheme to navigation tree. Additionally there were opinions on the the ISP, domain name, and other aspects of the web-site. For 6 months I continued to solely revise the mock up, based on the group's suggestions, and for 6 months the cycle repeated. Eventually I got fed up with the inefficiency.

The logic in my head was clear, "Talk is cheap, and brings no support. Action takes time, and brings results."

I had decided to stop making mock ups and just built the web-site. Then I paid, for a domain name and ISP. I made the site live, and presented it to the committee. Then I quit attending the monthly meetings. Every month I valued that 2.5 hours of time that was no longer being used inefficiently

So here I am in the same place I was 7 years ago. I don't want to just fix the web-site, I want my friends to understand the inefficiency. I realize most people are not annoyed at this like I am; except for perhaps Scott Adams, who's notorious for slamming meetings.

Perhaps this is a first step in getting my voice back out there. I suppose blogging again can't hurt unless I start telling everyone what I had for breakfast (biscuits), the mood I'm in (tired), and the song I'm listening to (nothing). ;)

End Of Line.