High Fidelity - The Top 5 of Everything

I always get really annoyed when I see all the “Top 10 CIO tips”, “7 best investments in Ballamory”, “3 tips for cleaning your toenails” etc., type posts on LinkedIn. It’s given rise to a fairly irrational need to ignore such posts. So in that vein, here’s my stab at the “Top 5 of Everything”.

And I hope you’ve chosen to read on rather than ignore it. You’ve come this far, so best keep going..

Now when I say “everything” I clearly don’t actually mean “everything”; I mean “something”, and in this case it’s music, or rather pop/rock/etc albums, so not really “everything” in any way, shape or form. And if you can stand the disappointment of that, then you might understand where I’m coming from with this post.

So having written about the Seduction of Claude Debussy (see my earlier post) it set me thinking about that old chestnut, my Favourite Album In The World Ever.

Now clearly this is a very subjective, personal thing. So here’s my stab at my Top 5 Albums in some vague order:

• Statues by Moloko
• The Seduction of Clause Debussy by the Art of Noise
• Sounds of Silver by LCD Soundsystem
• A Secret Wish by Propaganda
• The Future Will Come by The Juan Maclean
• OK Computer by Radiohead
• Full-on Mask Hysteria by Altern8
• Night Flight to Venus by Boney M
• Skanky Skanky by Toddla T
• Parklife by Blur
• Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of the War of the Worlds
• Whatever and ever, Amen by the Ben Folds 5
• Prelude by Eumir Deodato
• 12 Stops and Home by the Feeling
• K by Kula Shaker
• Definitely Maybe by Oasis
• Parallel Lines by Blondie
• The ArchAndroid by Janelle Monae
• Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd
• Bongo Rock by the Incredible Bongo Band
• Darkdancer by Les Rythmes Digitales
• Discovery by Daft Punk

So my Top 5 is, so far, 22 and running (if I’ve miscounted it’s because I am constantly adding to this as I write and edit this piece).

And that’s before Arcade Fire, Jamiroquoi, Kaiser Chiefs, Soulwax, Roisin Murphy, Orbital, Paul McCartney, Stone Roses, Bass-o-matic and other artists where I generally like most of their output.

Or groups like INXS, 2 Bears, the Who, Beck, Air, Freakpower, Led Zepplin, Beats international, the Cardigans, Hot Chip, vampire Weekend, The Kinks, Dave Brubeck, Supergrass, Groove Armada, Mike Oldfield, Basement Jaxx, Robbie Williams, Lalo Schiffrin, the Sugarhill Band, Electronic, Doves, Kasabian, the Chemical Brothers and the Beatles, Weather Report, Daft Punk, and Calvin Harris where it’s a body of work rather than a specific album that I enjoy.

Or New Order, Kylie, Minnie Ripperton, the Levellers, Moby, De La Soul, Madonna, 2 Unlimited, KLF, Nouvelle Vague, Venga Boys* (*just checking to see if you are still awake), Beastie Boys, Shirley Bassey (early work), Ian Drury and the Blockheads, U2, Propellerheads, Elbow, and Bis where the albums don’t do it for me but the singles do (aka the “Best of” bands). And you’ll notice there are no Greatest Hits albums, otherwise the Carpenters would be in there with a few more.

Or original sound tracks, such as the sound tracks to Kelly’s Heroes, Bullitt, The Rocky Horror Picture Show or Jesus Christ Superstar which have all been very important in my life.

Or singles where my “Top 10 Ever” song list on my iTunes is currently, er, 212 songs. And growing...

There are common themes running through some, but not all, of the above, such as James Murphy / the DFA record label, Roisin Murphy & Mark Brydon, William Orbit , Lalo Schiffrin, Lennon & McCartney, and the most important and formative to me, Sir Trevor Horn & Anne Dudley / the ZTT record label and the Art of Noise.

Ok, so I’m passionate about music. And probably a bit of a spotter. An anorak, even…

And so this leads me to an area that I get very excitable about and often see executed badly: Requirements. Or more specifically the process of eliciting business requirements.

Ask me what my 5 favourite album is and you get an answer, as you can see above. A long, misleading one where I probably won’t manage to answer the question clearly, if at all.

Ask me to rank and rate them and give me a few months and I’ll still come back with an answer that is ever changing

But ask me my top 5 driving albums or 5 best to work to and you’ll get some sort of sensible answer.

Do you see where I’m going with this?

The key here is framing the context and managing the process properly.

Don’t take the small child in to the sweet shop; tell them the frame and constraints for what is available and then you have a better chance of getting a sensible answer. If they don’t like the constraints, they can challenge, but you still have some sort of established boundaries. So many projects go wrong because the Business or end user isn’t adequately engaged in the process of working out what is required. And that’s from being merely involved to properly engaged and giving sensible, useful input to the process and the outcome. It is hard to herd cats, but if you don’t it’s just going to make the rest of the delivery harder. And I know there is a difference between what is required and what is actually needed (and the really tough one, of all that what you are actually going to get!).

All too often there’s a perverse rush to start cutting code as quickly as possible as if that is somehow a legitimate, tangible form of progress; I’m not talk prototyping / wire frames here as these techniques actually help nail down the end solution by creating tangibility. What I’m talking about is rushing off to build something before you know what that something needs to be – what business outcome it is supporting, and what the shape of the solution needs to be for the business within that outcome.

There’s a truth in the idea that if you can get the requirements right, then generally the rest will follow. I know, I know, *if only*, but we can cover that another day.

Next week: why my wife doesn’t take me to the Supermarket anymore