Saturday, July 12, 2014

The Goal - Reducing Stuff Quotient

I recently moved from a large home in Long Island to large home in Guelph - but a home that is half the size.    So now, everything is a mess with too much stuff.  So I am committed to a negative Stuff Quotient.  I commit to get rid of more stuff than I bring into the house every day.  And to add to it, I would like to get rid of one more thing per day - this will add up to 1000 less things in 3 years which might put the house into an equilibrium.

Stuff has a great cost - the worst of which is stress - usually caused by time.  Stuff takes time.  Time spent on stuff can far outweigh the value of the stuff.

Storage costs.  Many people spend thousands of dollars storing hundreds of dollars of stuff.

Stuff has no value if it cannot be found easily.   And storing it a retrieving it takes time.  Good organization systems help of course but there is a time factor to set those up.

And most Stuff degrades or has obsolescence as it is stored.  EG - I just threw out an awesome maglight because the batteries had corroded.  And then in looking at flashlights, I realize it was obsolete anyways.  New ones are LED - better light and longer life.

Part of what makes it difficult to get rid of stuff is frugality.  I hate waste.  To help this feeling, I give things to friends (is this mean?), or goodwill/Salvation Army.  But some things just need to be tossed.

Stuff can be security but it can also be stress.

Consider making the Negative Stuff Quotient Pledge.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I thought this was a very interesting KPMG report on the tax efficiency of various jurisdictions.  Canada and Ontario rank very well.  Especially for tech companies using SRED credits.  See report.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

A friend emailed me an online miniseries his brother is directing.  The phenomenon of anyone being able to be a producer/director is interesting.  This is just like blogging allows anyone to own a publisher.  Media empires have been broken.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

And a plug for one of my investee companies:

LaunchSpot is a solution that:
1. Enables people in your organization to save time by making it really easy to find expertise wherever it is across your company’s network - in both critical situations and in normal daily work.
2. Enables your people to setup a profile in seconds because we use existing information to pre-populate profiles.  The on-boarding process is very simple and fast.
3. Helps you gain insight into your organization (skills breakdown across the organization, etc.)
4. Enables you to integrate with other systems via our API.

Why:
Information is available now more than ever but information is only useful when applied with the needs of your current context.  A google search alone can not provide that context but the people in your organization with expertise can.  We believe that information alone does not contain the answers, people do and to that end we make it easier for your people to find the expertise in your organization.

ROI:
The average knowledge worker spends 20% of their time looking for answers to do their jobs. Help each of your people turn those hours into minutes.

http://LaunchSpot.io