Welcome to my world....

Hi ya'll! Welcome to my blog. I think I will start by telling you a little bit about myself. I am originally from a VERY tiny farming community in southern Illinois. My husband (then my boyfriend) joined the Marine Corps for the education benefits, but then ended up serving 20 years. We got married right out of high school. I do not recommend it and would kill my own kids for doing the same, but I digress... We moved to California where he was stationed at that time. We enjoyed life as a young couple in SoCal, but decided to to try to move closer to home when he was up for orders. We got lucky and moved to St. Louis, Missouri which is less than two hours from our hometown. Being so close to family made us want to start one of our own, and so we did. Our son Wyatt was born. At the end of that three year duty, we then moved to Beaufort, South Carolina. This was one of my favorite places to live. I learned to shrimp, got to do a ton of woodworking, and generally enjoyed being a stay at home mom. Then came baby No. 2. Morgan was born a southern boy and remains one today. By the time he had turned two years old it was time to pack up and move again, this time on a huge family adventure....Iwakuni, Japan here we come. This was an awesome place to live and a great family environment. We really enjoyed the people, culture, the base, and the landscape itself. None of us would have traded that experience for anything. Fast forward to today, living in good 'ol Jacksonville, NC, the husband is now a retired Marine, the oldest son is a high school graduate, and the youngest beginning his high school journey.

Life is a highway.....

Article Summary - Corporate Wikis Go Viral

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2007/tc20070312_476504.htm

This article on Bloomberg Businessweek tells of how two companies began and used wikis within their organizations. One company is Nokia and the other and investment bank, Dresdner Kleinwort. Nokia began the use of the wiki in 2004 as an alternative to using email and collaborative software. Not the company reports that “at least 20% of its 68,000 employees use wiki pages to update schedules and project status, edit files, and so on.”  (Carlin, 2007) Nokia has found that their employees have come up with viable alternatives to software that the company used to have to purchase from an outside source. Dresdner Kleinwort had a similar experience in the creation of its wiki. Once the employees began using the wikis, it took off like wildfire.

Both of these companies herald the use of wikis for giving their employees a place to voice ideas to better the company. In addition to the potential to give employees more of a voice, the tools turned out to have huge time saving benefits. Instead of sending around emails with various documents, the employees use their wikis to post the important information so that they do not have to wade through multitudes of emails with attachments. This author sees more companies using wikis as a platform for productivity in the future.

References:

Carlin, D. (2007, March 12). Corporate wikis go viral. Retrieved September 11, 2011, from Bloomberg Businessweek: http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2007/tc20070312_476504.htm

Remembering 9/11

Today is the tenth anniversary of that tragic day in history. As I sit and listen to the reading of the names of those we lost I think of how much pain their families have gone through and the emotional scars carried by those left behind.

Nearly everyone can recall where they were and what they were doing at the time it happened. I was half a world away in Iwakuni, Japan because my husband was an active duty Marine at the time. I was winding down at the end of a long day by watching the Today show as I did each evening. This was one of the few live programs we received in Japan and so I would watch trying to stay in touch with the latest news back in the states so home didn't feel quite so far away. Little did I know that that night I would witness the carnage as it unfolded. I sat and watched dumbfounded and eventually realized how this would affect my husband and all of the other military families.

Fast forward ten years later, our servicemembers are still fighting these terrorists to keep our country safe.