I've had some friends ask me why I don't blog much anymore. The short answer to that is easy: time.
The longer, and more accurate, answer has actually caused me to not write when I normally would have: my career path and responsibilities have changed dramatically over the past few years. Where I once was a developer and hardware hacker by day and night, I now rarely have the opportunity to perform that kind of work.
As the Director of IT for a mid-size logistics company, I find more of my time spent performing higher-level functions: determining which technology best suits a particular business need, discussing strategy with my peers, and, most interestingly, developing talent rather than code.
It's this human factor that has really taken up most of my free time. How do I encourage the folks on my team to work together despite personal differences? How do I empower team members to bring new ideas to the table? How do I remove obstacles so the team can achieve their goals?
It's not that this aspect of the job is time-consuming, per se. In fact, it's really not. But my desire to be a better manager and leader is what draws me into hours of reading, team exercises, coaching sessions, and comparing notes with a couple people at this level that I've come to really respect.
So what do I do with a tech-driven blog when I don't really have the time to contribute? The passion for technology is just as strong now as it ever was, and I don't want to just abandon it.
The answer to this is probably to merge the two: how I use technology to attack problems or drive change as it relates to a given position or industry.
Let me mull that over, and I'll get back to you.
