From Bob's Cluttered Desk

Timely information makes for great education, and along that line of thought, the upcoming WCRI Annual Conference appears set to truly deliver. Scheduled for March 21 & 22, 2023 in Phoenix, the annual “research summit” (my words, not theirs) has crafted a truly relevant agenda for the times. The theme of the conference this year…

Maybe it’s just me, but I have a growing distaste for some of the posts I am seeing these days on LinkedIn. And it’s probably not the personal opinion “Facebook-style” posts you are thinking about. LinkedIn is a social media platform that has undeniably become a leading business networking platform. In recent years there has…

A maintenance worker in London was killed a few weeks ago, and the manner of his death probably says as much about society as it does standard workplace safety practices. You see, he was crushed by a “telescopic urinal” on which he was performing maintenance. I had never even heard of a telescoping urinal, but instinctively knew…

Once again we delve into the rarified world of artificial intelligence, with another extended discussion with my friend Skippy, the OpenAI ChatGPT thingy that is challenging our conventional wisdom and scaring the crap out if us at the same time. In an earlier post, I mentioned that Skippy’s dataset is all based on information from…

Earlier this week we discussed my new friendship with Skippy, the Open AI ChatGPT system that has been all the rage the last few weeks. While most refer to him as simply ChatGPT, his closest friends call him Skippy.  Or at least I hope they start doing so. He seems quite receptive to it. I…

Comedian Robin Williams once delivered what he called, “A Poem Written While on LSD.” It went roughly something like this: A Broo Arr Arr,A Broo Arr,Eve Arden,A Broo Broo Arr. Recently I have been playing with (chatting with, actually) OpenAI’s ChatGPT, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) machine that will likely, at best, eventually upend traditional search engine…

The Federal Trade Commission is considering a new rule that would ban non-compete language from employment contracts in the United States. While the argument is this would free employees for more job opportunities and bolster wages, this raises serious concerns for employers; especially those employers whose business is based on confidential and proprietary systems. FTC…

This holiday message was originally posted on 12/23/2011 on “another” website (but it is here as well). It has been republished several times over the years; primarily because the message holds true, but also because Bob is too lazy to pen another message. It has been updated to reflect the current calendar and Bob’s employer…

Our post earlier this week about Rudolph and the workplace bullies certainly seemed to gain some attention. It seems that many people had not considered the bullying nature of a group of reindeer whose reputation has been largely protected by a biased and complicit media. Some people have revealed that they will never be able to listen…

I recently saw a meme on Facebook that said something like this: “Everyone hated Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer until they discovered they needed him. Then suddenly everyone was his best friend.” It was a tad dark, a bit humorous, and surprisingly thought-provoking, mostly because it was correct. Unsung in the ballad that tells the tale,…