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Howto. Social 1. Education. Women. Story, MBA. Social 2. Maker's Schedule, Manager's Schedule. July 2009 One reason programmers dislike meetings so much is that they're on a different type of schedule from other people. Meetings cost them more. There are two types of schedule, which I'll call the manager's schedule and the maker's schedule. The manager's schedule is for bosses. It's embodied in the traditional appointment book, with each day cut into one hour intervals.

When you use time that way, it's merely a practical problem to meet with someone. Most powerful people are on the manager's schedule. When you're operating on the maker's schedule, meetings are a disaster. For someone on the maker's schedule, having a meeting is like throwing an exception.

I find one meeting can sometimes affect a whole day. Each type of schedule works fine by itself. Our case is an unusual one. I wouldn't be surprised if there start to be more companies like us. How do we manage to advise so many startups on the maker's schedule? Those of us on the maker's schedule are willing to compromise. Arts & Business. How to Work ON Your Business, Not IN it. We get so caught up in the daily life of running a business, it’s easy to miss the forest for the trees.

Not that you have a choice! You’re fighting fires, handling a pissed-off customer, rending your face over an emergency bug-fix, the website just went down, and the accountant is coming tomorrow and the books are in shambles. All normal. But still every month or so it’s nice to take a step back and see whether you’re missing a chance to make a more meaningful change to your business. Here’s some things you can do: View your website/product/service through the eyes of a new potential customer. *Do informal usability testing with a stranger. I hope some of these ideas inspire you to reconsider your priorities and shift your behavior.

What other tips do you have? About the Author: Jason Cohen is the founder of Smart Bear Software and mentor at Austin-based startup launcher Capital Factory. Google's anniversary gift: A 420% gain -- (CNNMoney) NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Can you believe that it's already been five years since Google went public? The search engine giant debuted on Aug. 19, 2004 at $85 a share. Today, the stock trades at about $445. That's a nearly 420% return during a time when the Nasdaq is up only 8%. And shares of top rival Yahoo! Yet, it doesn't look like all those Googleaires are too interested in celebrating their 5-year anniversary as a public company. I was hoping it would look like a tree carving or maybe a set of spoons, forks and knives since wood and silverware are the traditional five-year wedding anniversary gifts. Nonetheless, it's been an interesting five years for the search giant to say the least. The company has used its strong stock price and mountain of cash reserves as currency to scoop up the likes of YouTube, DoubleClick and Postini to name a few.

It has watched Yahoo! News Corp. Of course, remaining on top in a business as dynamic as technology is not easy. Business Online.