my blog. for you.

Let’s talk digital.

I’m an independent IT consultant and entrepreneur in the Internet and software business. I’m interested in design, enterprise applications, web apps and SaaS products. I design and develop business solutions and applications. I help companies in terms of software quality and knowledge transfer, e.g. with Angular and Spring Boot.

Ron Finley: A guerilla gardener in South Central LA

Ron Finley is a self-proclaimed guerilla gardener from Los Angeles who took the initiative and went about making his neighborhood a better, healthier place to live by converting vacant lots in the "food desert" of South Los Angeles (formerly known as South Central Los Angeles) into vegetable gardens. Ron truly is an epitome of "Be the change that you wish to see in the world." taking steps as tiny as planting a tomato plant in order to gradually and steadily ...

Supporting the Idea of an Unconditional Basic Income

About a year ago Scott Santens - self-declared writer and advocate of basic income for all - wrote a highly recommendable piece on why should support the idea of an unconditional basic income. In this article he debunks common myths about less desirable repercussions a basic income might have (such as suddenly nobody wanting to do any work anymore ...). He makes a few salient points as to why a basic income is the right thing to implement both from a capitalist's ...

Sunday June 21st, 2015 by Bjoern in Entrepreneurship, Ideas

Everything you ever want to know about enterprise sales

This title sounds a bit like dirty secrets, doesn't it? When thinking of enterprise software sales most people think about arcane, lengthy, sometimes sleazy bureaucratic processes entailing: Vendors who are very secretive about pricing: If you have to ask for a price our product isn't for you! Lots of pointless meetings Obnoxious PowerPoint presentations A plethora of stakeholders A decision maker who won't be using the software product being bought and - of course - a user who doesn't have a say but has to use this ...

Sunday June 14th, 2015 by Bjoern in Enterprise Software, Entrepreneurship

Money is not a scorecard

Two weeks ago I came across an interesting article on the Mr. Money Mustache blog: "What I’m Teaching my Son about Money" As is usual for Mr. Money Mustache it's a very insightful post about money, financial independence, how to achieve it and what to do with it. I love his blog because he not just tries to educate people about personal finance or money as an end to itself but about money with a purpose. The single most important lesson that can ...

Sunday June 7th, 2015 by Bjoern in Entrepreneurship, Ideas

Freelance Developers: Get Your Act Together!

Time and time again I get emails starting like this: Good morning Harvey Nash Business Partner, I would like to make you aware of a new contract that we have open at the moment [ ... ] I didn't bother to anonymize this particular example because somebody who can't bother to look up a person's name on the Internet certainly doesn't care about some negative publicity either. So, go look up their website, I'm sure Harvey Nash are nice people after all. Anyway, I can only ...

Sunday May 31st, 2015 by Bjoern in Entrepreneurship

beyond tellerrand 2015

Last week I attended beyond tellerrand 2015 in Düsseldorf. This year marked the fifth iteration of the event. It was once again a fantastic two days filled to the brim with a wide range of inspiring, insightful and technical talks about design. In the next few weeks I'll be posting more about some of the talks including live recordings as those become available. Until then I'll leave you with the marvellous opening titles for this year's conference, created by the Barcelona-based audiovisual ...

Sunday May 24th, 2015 by Bjoern in Design, Entrepreneurship, Web

Antiwork – Rethinking Work Ethic Or: Hard Work is Not Working

In a highly interesting recent article Brian Dean calls for a a radical shift in how we view “jobs”. He poses a seemingly radical question: "Over a decade into the 21st century, we seem as work-obsessed as ever. Is it time for a progressive reframing of work and leisure?" Drawing upon other recent articles such as the already famous one by anthropologist David Graeber on the phenomenon of bullshit jobs Dean argues that in the 21s century our work culture and work ethic is ...

Sunday March 29th, 2015 by Bjoern in Entrepreneurship

Caring

Recently, I've read two interesting stories about people who genuinely care about helping others and how as a consequence everyone involved benefits. One of those articles is titled "How my life was changed when I began caring about the people I did not hire" and describes the outcome of a hiring process. Brooke Allen, the hiring manager, describes how he not just gave feedback to the candidates that ultimately weren't hired as to how they might improve their skills but actively and ...

Sunday March 8th, 2015 by Bjoern in Entrepreneurship

Timothy Dexter – The man who carried coals to Newcastle … and turned a profit

Timothy Dexter was a colourful 18th century American businessman noted for his eccentricity and his eerily acute business sense that in most cases flouted common sense. Among others his business feats include: delivering warming pans to the West Indies, where they were sold for a profit for use as ladles in the local molasses industry shipping gloves to Polynesia, where they were bought by Portuguese merchants on their way to China, who coincidentally anchored there at the time his shipment arrived amassing early Continental Dollars ...

Sunday February 15th, 2015 by Bjoern in Business, Entrepreneurship

The How: Learn From Entrepreneurs

If you're an entrepreneur building upon the insights of others, learning from fellow entrepreneurs is essential. Learning from past experiences, mistakes and failures probably is the best way to succeed. Seeing what worked for other startups and what didn't will help you building a better, more sustainable business yourself. The How is a website by Lean Startup Productions that helps entrepreneurs by sharing useful tips and advice about running a startup.

Sunday February 1st, 2015 by Bjoern in Business, Entrepreneurship

Björn Wilmsmann

my blog. for you.

Let’s talk digital.