…a level above which people tend not to be any happier, according to a long but fascinating post at You Are Not So Smart entitled “The Overjustification Effect“.

“The Misconception: There is nothing better in the world than getting paid to do what you love.

The Truth: Getting paid for doing what you already enjoy will sometimes cause your love for the task to wane because you attribute your motivation as coming from the reward, not your internal feelings.”

This applies equally to being paid poorly as is does to being paid well. I remember the frustration I felt spending three years at the bottom end of the music business with little to show for it. This frustration prevented me from feeling fulfilled by work I enjoyed.

One of the comments references Steve Jobs’ exhortation:

“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”

Note that he didn’t say “do what you love”.

I thought I was going to have to ditch my HTC Wildfire and upgrade expensively to something more powerful, but I found a way to squeeze better performance out of a phone locked by the manufacturer to encourage people to spend more money.

Gadgetphobia

I’m not big on gadgets. I spend most of my time fixing problems caused by technology and my disdain for the arms race the mobile phone marketplace has become means I have only ever owned two mobile phones: one in the ’90s and one in the ’00s (a Panasonic and a Samsung. I couldn’t tell you which models).

So perhaps it was the dawn of a new decade which led me to decide I could no longer live without instant all-day access to e-mail and social computing tools on the move. Having seen the Samsung go through the washing machine, survive and limp on for another 18 months, I’d kept an eye on smartphone developments. The convergence of photography, video and GPS navigation were the main attractions. Vodafone’s Text And Web Freebee meant I could get web access for less than £10 a month – a significant increase on my current use as I’m not a big talker, viewing a phone as a convenience rather than a necessity - and when I saw Phones4U offering the HTC Wildfire for around £120, I picked one up at their Strand shop.

I spent the following weeks getting to know it. With a 600MHz processor, it was slower than the HTC Desires and iPhones sported by friends. The only application, I bought was music player PowerAmp which plays lossless FLAC format music files. Coupled with Last.fm‘s scrobbler, this automatically updates my listening history.

Problems

In the beginning, performance was good. Early problems saw PowerAmp locking up when syncing my Yahoo Mail or if Seesmic attempted to update my Twitter stream, necessitating a reboot. Things worsened over the summer after I installed the huge Google+ client application.

Removing as many applications as I could resulted in some improvements and I found myself wondering why I couldn’t get rid of the unused apps in HTC Sense which I found useless: stock price updates, Quick Office… none of which I used.

The release of version 2.3 of the Android operating system, Gingerbread, in the summer also passed me by. It wasn’t until I was marvelling at the interface sported by a friend’s HTC Sensation that it occurred to me I was missing out. Checking the latest HTC phones, I found Gingerbread wasn’t an option for the Wildfire, now replaced by the Wildfire S, which did have Gingerbread. Likewise the original HTC Desire.

Would I be compelled to upgrade a mere six months on? While I didn’t fancy shelling out £400 for the Sensation, even a Wildfire S would leave me around £100 out of pocket, going by the Wildfire’s current resale value.

CyanogenMod 7

I soldiered on for a couple of months, but some questions kept bothering me. If Android is an open platform, why can’t I upgrade it? And why can’t I remove applications I don’t need?

Several years ago, I improved the user interface of my Archos FM Recorder by replacing the operating system with RockBox. Perhaps something similar is available for Android phones?

Upon investigation I found all these things were possible. There is a thriving community of dedicated modifiers dedicated to improving user experience. One of the most popular is CyanogenMod, the new stable release 7.1 based on Android 2.3.7 had been made available a few days earlier.

The upgrade process was involved, but the steps are well documented. You cannot omit any of them.

The improvement was instantaneous and way beyond my expectations. Navigation responds more quickly, PowerAmp no longer freezes, applications work better. And I’m not the only one surprised by CyanogenMod7‘s effectiveness.

Further improvements are possible. Repartition your SD cards so you can install applications onto them, which stops your phone filling up and slowing down.

There have been some hiccups – it took me over two weeks to get GPS working again by reflashing the radio component - but there is a vast amount of information on-line and a supportive community who answer questions (as long as they haven’t been asked too many times before).

I’m looking forward to future improvements. After all, the Wildfire has a lot to live up to if it’s going to make it to 2020′s.

…after a third attack, so I’m joining Neville Hobson in running a default theme for a bit.

I spent much of May and June either pointing video cameras at senior executives or huddling over an editing suite to enhance their ruminations on career management. We’ve collected stories we’ll share through an internal on-line elearning tool whose goal is to encourage people to take responsibility for managing their own career.

Coming from the knowledge management angle, I couldn’t help slipping in the odd KM-related question, such as “what mistakes have you made and what did you learn?” Only one person dared to answer directly, admitting that you never stop making mistakes and you have to learn how to deal with them. Most instead preferred to brush the question off with an answer along the lines of “well I wouldn’t want to talk about specific instances…”

One director was brave enough to admit that luck had played a part in his own career choices – being in the right place at the right time – so we hope that including these stories will help to open people’s minds about the potential opportunities available rather than being seen as a “recipe for managing your career”.

I have been tagged by Robyn McMaster to say something about myself and – more worryingly – to select eight more people to do the same. Do I know eight people? How will they react? What if they don’t reply? What if I don’t invite someone and they take it the wrong way? What if I write too much?

1. I’m passionate about music
I worked as a record plugger during the early ’90s. It was slightly disillusioning to find out how business really works, but a much-needed reality check. My heroes are people who are doing it for themselves, like Truck Records, Piney Gir, Oof Records, Victory Garden Records – admittedly they are mostly friends of mine.

2. I’m passionate about football
Or soccer as it’s occasionally known. I have a Leyton Orient season ticket which is due for renewal. Like all Englishmen, I know the measure of a person is the team they support. Is it the nearest team to the place they grew up? The first team they were taken to see when they were young? The most successful team when they were a child? (Or worse, now?) And if you’ve ever changed teams, forget it.

3. I love films
I’m a member of the BFI and Cambridge Arts Picturehouse. I write, produce and direct films and after three years of trying, I have had a short selected for exhibition in this year’s Straight8 competition (it made the “arty” selection). I have taken Robert McKee’s Story seminar: life-changing. I joined Cambridge experimental theatre group in situ: two years ago because I felt learning to act would help me understand the role of the director better. We complete a week-long run of Oedipus Rex at The Leper Chapel in Cambridge this evening. Surprisingly, learning to act taught me a lot about working with people which I have reapplied in my work designing and facilitating workshops. It has also helped me prepare for speaking at conferences.

4. I’m an introvert who likes meeting people
I don’t enjoy being around other people all the time – I need time to withdraw and think about my experiences – but I enjoy meeting and talking to interesting people. This blog is helping, as is Facebook.

5. I’m a collector
I needed a definite purpose from an early age. Since I was young, I have put a lot of effort into building many collections, most of which have little or no value. I have an impressive collection of vinyl by Irish rock group U2 who I have followed obsessively from 1983 onwards. The top floor of my house is the long tail of collecting.

6. I want to make things better
When I find something that doesn’t work – a tool or a service – I like to think of ways to make it better. (That sounds more like an answer from a personality test. I wonder if I can improve it?) As a consultant, I regard this as useful trait. Employees at client companies – whose existence seems to revolve around being politically positive about everything in an effort to forward their managerial career – sometimes object to this “negativity”.

7. I crusade against jargon and management speak
If you can’t say what you mean using simple words, most people will not understand you. The last thing we need is more people who like using long words. I still meet managers who don’t seem to understand this.

8. I have a three and a half-month old baby daughter
Fatherhood hasn’t changed me much, I’m still trying to rationalise it (perhaps my greatest failing).

And I use the word “interesting” far too often.

Robyn tagged:
G.L. Hoffman
Carma Dutra
Mrs. Druff
Jackie Cameron
Diogenes
Matt Owen
Richard Hare
Chris Cree

I find I’m reading more and more about cognition and cognitive science. Had I become interested in any other topic I might assert that “everyone’s talking about it”. Of course they aren’t – it’s confirmation bias (I think?). I’m pursuing it, at an admittedly leisurely pace.

In quick succession I have just read Scott Adams mentioning cognitive dissonance in yesterday’s Dilbert blog, Dave Snowden’s blog and I keep returning to Jason Bates post listing 71 forms of cognitive failure from wikipedia.

My first thought was “‘The Halo Effect’ is already a book… that leaves 70 books waiting to be written!”

Philip Greenwood’s response: “It seems to me that the people who are cerebral enough to internalize the implications of this list are also unlikely to be the talkative or assertive ones in meetings.”

It’s like you’re reading my mind.

13:18 Google Search:

“dave snowden gorilla”

Three times! Thanks to MyBlogLog.

And if you reached this page, you’re probably looking for this one.

Adidas sports bags, Sta-pressed trousers, Nike trainers… I’ve never been at the leading edge of fashion, one reason I’ve cultivated a more “classic” aesthetic. I just don’t look good in fashionable clothes.

I’m usually the one who signals the end of a trend merely by surrendering to the inevitable. When I get an iPhone I suggest you put yours on eBay, because I guarantee the next big thing will be right around the corner.

This isn’t without it’s upside, thanks mainly to the cyclical nature of fashion. When chinos briefly became popular among young people seeking to differentiate themselves from their fathers – and Jeremy Clarkson – I was already there. I was so late to Converse high tops in 2001 – I just fancied a pair – I was ahead of the curve when The Strokes arrived 12 months later. Maybe there’s a future for those boxes of Belgian hardcore techno in my loft after all?

If I had thought this might be a harbinger of some latent unconscious predictive ability, I was disappointed. I began blogging externally just in time for the great prediction of blogging’s imminent demise.

I may never become an A-list blogger. But I don’t think I’m too old for Facebook – although I waited a month before joining (“another social networking platform??”).

According to “The Long Tail”, there’s a niche out there for me – I’ve just got to find it.

On Saturday, I joined the Stormhoek group on Facebook. Having restocked at Tesco that afternoon and noted that Stormhoek wines were labelled “discontinued”, I pointed this out in the group.

Chris from Stormhoek responded saying they are simply out of stock and that Stormhoek is not being discontinued by Tesco.

I feel so included.

I enjoyed reading Lawrence Lessig’s comments on Andrew Keen’s “The Cult Of The Amateur”. His and Charlene Croft’s comments saved me time and spared me disappointment.

The idea that culture is defined by those who are somehow “qualified” – usually through a relationship with a major media company – is something I’ve never felt comfortable with. Having worked in the music business, I’m familiar with how these companies operate to restrict choice – one reason I prefer to support independent record labels and artists.

It seems naive to imagine web2.0 will end this or the music business has suddenly been democratised overnight. After 100 years of these gatekeepers determining what media we see and hear, the gates are open – well, as long as you have a relationship with a major media company… like Google (YouTube), News International (MySpace)… not something Billy Bragg was especially keen on.

Prof. Lessig’s post made it sound as if Keen was arguing for the return of the gatekeepers – shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. I prefer to look forward.

Perhaps I’ll go and read “The Long Tail” again.