Season’s Greetings from Coast Nerds

It's that time of year again when we should stop and reflect on the year that was. This year saw the launch of "Nerds of a feather" or "Coast Nerds" as it has become more affectionately known. Back in August we had our first meeting to discuss our goals for the community. Since then we have had three monthly meetings with excellent presentations from local IT professionals.

• September - Scrum in Wonderland
• October - The GIPA Project
• November - Test Driven Development - A Testing Journey

We would like to thank all the presenters for their very insightful presentations. Also we would like to thank all those who attended for providing useful feedback and informative discussion. Our primary goal has been to learn from one another and I think we have certainly achieved that.

No Meeting in December
As discussed at the last meeting we will not be holding a meet-up event in December due to its close proximity to Christmas and people's vacation time.

What's Next?
We are aiming to be bigger and better next year. To do that we need to reflect on our journey so far and work out what we can do better. Hmm... sounds like it's time for a retrospective.
So we ask...

• What are we doing well?
• What can we do better?
• What actions should we take?

Think about these questions. Write down your answers. Respond to the google group. We will meet up on Tuesday 18th January to discuss these. On that noe we would like to get an idea who will be attending in January considering that it may still be vacation time for some.

Until then, Merry Christmas!

(photo source: pixelperfectdigital)

What's the business model of the Coast Nerds Group

As coders it's easy to focus on technology.  There are so many awesome new products coming out every month it's hard not to be overwhelmed at all the opportunities.

But what's most important - for this community group as well as for clients of our IT developments - is providing business value*.

So let me put this on the agenda for the early 2011 meet-ups.  What's the value we're trying to create?

Lucky for you I don't usually just fire off random rhetorical questions with no answers.  I want to offer you a framework, which if you apply to Coast Nerds will also provide you with a great tool for understanding customer and client motivations.

Check out the Wikipedia article on Business Model Canvas, the related Slideshare files and for those of you willing to fork out a few buck the book.  I've tested this model as well as several alternatives and I have to say I think it's easy to use, comprehensive and leads to great innovative ideas.

* Or community value in the case of government and not for profits.