All posts by RWJ

Hi All, Been a while… Time to give an update as there is news…

I have a “new” job now, as I’ve made an official agreement with the company Relewise to be their “Process and Automation Manager“… The reason “new” is in quotations is that I’ve actually been doing that for a while already; let me explain…

My dealings with Relewise so far:

All the way back in January 2023, when I announced that I wanted to become a Technical Business Coach, Relewise was actually my first real client… I knew their CEO; Brian Holmgård Kristensen, and back then we agreed that it could be mutually beneficial if I did a two-week observation session of the Relewise development team and gave a recommendation on what could be optimized…

Well, Two weeks became a month, 3 months, 6 months, a year; and pure observation became actual process optimization, automation, and a facilitator/mentoring/coaching role in more and more areas… Relewise was on a journey I knew from my previous job, and It was so much fun to help and see the company evolve from, back then, 8 people in Denmark to now 21 employees in 4 countries.

So now we just making something long-established more official 😀

Who is Relewise?

Relewise is a Danish SaaS Startup in the Search and Recommendations space (aka when you are on a website and search for an item they are in charge of giving you a personalized list of search results; And when you add something to the basket they are the ones that recommend similar and additional items that fit with your purchase)… It is kind of an amazing feat of engineering that sometimes feels like magic when you see it in action and know what happens behind the scenes 😃

Relewise is so far mostly known in Denmark but is rolling out now to more and more countries around the world, so if any interest, check them out at https://www.relewise.com

FAQ:

Q: Is this a full-time job?
A: No, officially I only work for Relewise 3 days a week (aka sort of part-time and 100% my choice), rest of my time is dedicated to my own, still to be announced, project + fitness and work-life-balance (though the Relewise work at times are just so much fun that I “forget” to do the other things) 😉

Q: What do you do more specifically at the company?
A: It is a mixed bag of Development, Research, Product Integrations, Coaching and Facilitating.

Q: Are you contributing to the Relewise product itself (aka building new features)?
A: No all my work with Relewise is “internal” in nature, like internal tools, automations, and sparring with the leadership team

Q: Are you getting paid (your Sensum365 manifest said you worked for free)?
A: With the new agreement there is a financial element that both parties are happy with 🙂

Q: Does that mean you stopped offering help to others?
A: No, I still help others from time to time, but practically there is just less time to do it, so it less…

Q: I’m interested in the Relewise Product. How do I learn more?
A: Visit the website: https://www.relewise.com, LinkedIn Page: https://www.linkedin.com/company/relewise/, get a free Trial:  https://www.relewise.com/free-trial or, if you are a Techy, see the Docs Portal: https://docs.relewise.com

Today, one year ago, I left Boyum, the workforce (for now) & the SAP Business One community to rediscover myself and find passion… I started this blog back then called “Rasmus 2.0 – The journey to the next passion in life” (if you are interested in why I left it is summarized here)

Let me give you an update on everything,
since it’s been a while since I posted…

In order to give you the best update I went back and re-read this blog myself for the first time; It was Interesting to read again, and reflecting today I think I was in a bigger mess than I remembered in the beginning, but it is interesting to observe that things evolved much faster than I remembered with most of the changes happening in the first 3 months (it felt longer to find myself, but apparently not)… Well; on to the update

Fitness and Health

One year ago I was already running 3 times a week, but the last year really upped running for me; I started running every single day and only stopped that practice recently (more on that later) with a total run streak of 333 days in a row of running. In the beginning, it was short runs and very slow, but that changed in 2023 when I upped the game by running longer (This year I have 2 Half-Marathons and over 1000 Km of running so far, and the classic 5K time that in the past was just under “mystical” 30 min, is now down to 24 min (something I thought would never happen))

It is not all good though, with me having a medical scare back in May, and another one in early September resulting in an acute doctor’s appointment with chest pains and a trip to the hospital to get my heart examined by ultrasound (yes it sucks getting older)… The examination results were luckily positive (my heart is fine) and instead, it is most likely something called Costochondritis from running too much and too often (hence the end of the running streak)

I’m back out running again; just not every single day which is btw. the smart thing to do anyway, and the plan is to slowly ramp up distance, for the rest of the year, to be able to run a real marathon next year 🤞

Mindfulness

This was a big topic of mine one year ago. It was insightful, but after a while, I did not feel I needed it anymore (not as an active activity). I think however recently that because of “work” (more later), “Work-Thoughts” slowly began dominating my mind again so might be time for a re-visit of Mindfulness by re-reading some of the books I did a year ago.

“Work” (“Games”, “Open Source” and “Business Coaching”)

A year ago I was not only burned out on work, but Code/Development in general… I felt it was “too hard” and had no future… For that reason, I tried alternative development in Unity Game Development, and while it re-kindled my love for Code, it became more of a hobby (and lately not touched anymore really)… My real passion is back for “real” code in the form of Open Source Development, Automation, and Reporting Software, as part of my day-to-day “work”… It is wonderful to feel this way again.

And the “work” nowadays in “Technical Business Coach” as I call it through my company Sensum365.com, where I, for free, help smaller companies reach their full potential. I primarily help 2 companies at the moment, and it is a joy to see improvements with low commitment ties… Yes; many still don’t understand why I do it for free, which has been the hardest thing to explain.

Practically the work is between part-time to full-time now, being my own boss, and it is nice but not 100% perfect, so I’m not totally ruling out building either my own products (have a few ideas) or getting back to something a bit more structured with a real employment again of some sort… but not in a rush…

Regrets?

So do I have any regrets, a year down the line?… Not really… Could the process have been slightly better looking back; yes, but the process was the healing, and I think everything along the way was needed. But one thing is for sure; It was the right decision for me, and one can only speculate what a continued out-of-balance life + medical scares could have led to; scary stuff….

Future

So what will happen going forward? I’m in a good mix right now, but am still tweaking and searching for even better happiness… There is still a longing for something I can’t set my finger quite on, so will keep searching… Like the rest of you out there…

Ever since I learned about Scrum and Agile back in 2000, I have been using them, but as an Agile Coach/Practitioner, I still have 2 glaring blindsides:

1. I’ve never experienced Agile Failure
and
2. I’ve yet to try Agile at Scale…

If I look online and in Agile Meetup Groups it is easy to get 2nd hand experience with failure and horrible “war” stories, but (at least in my own opinion) I never tried such failure myself.

My “problem” is that I was only in a single company over 19 years, and while I have been part of countless projects, my biggest team ever over the years was 11 people… But I’m yet to try to directly lead people into failure on the product or the people side (Yes, there have been minor bumps along the way, but never true failure)

Question: Why have I never seen failure?
I don’t see myself as someone good at following a specific method, and I typically just apply passion and what I see as common sense to a situation, so why have I not seen failure?

• Have I just been Lucky with the people I’ve worked with?
• Have I just not tried working with a big enough team/company?
• Have I just not tried having a bad enough upper management?

I honestly don’t know; hence this odd request…

I’m seeking someone out there that owns or is in charge of a bigger company/team/product that is struggling to implement/use Agile right now, that will allow me (for free) to try and observe/assist/help…

I can’t promise that I magically can turn the fail or struggle around, so the worst case for you is that I get to experience failure along with you which is what I’m after to help me grow… The best case can of course be hoped for, but no promises…

Is anyone brave enough out there to try
and help me with this “mad” experiment?

(If you are then reach out on Email or LinkedIn)

So, roughly 3 weeks ago, during a lecture at a café in town, I fainted…

During the talk I got more and more dizzy while listening, I tried to get up and out to get some air, walked a few steps, and then (I’m told) I walked straight into a wall and fell to the ground… ~10 seconds later I woke up with people standing over me asking if I was OK, sweating and not knowing what just happened 😕…

Why?

I’ve never had such an experience in my life, and while I was not seriously hurt (sore ribs from the impact of the wall was the only physical injury),  talking to a medical professional over the phone afterward, I was told that it is commonly known as Syncope in medical terms, and while no urgency, I should book a consultation with my doctor… So I did for the next day, and after a sleepless night, the “medical rigamarole” started…

Me, and the Medical System

While I’m grateful for living in a country with free (paid via tax) and professional medical care, I’m not a heavy user of the system (this was my first visit to a medical facility in 12 years… (not counting Covid Shots)).

Am I scared of doctors?; not as such; they are nice people too 😉, but as a worst-case scenario thinker and a control freak, I feel so out of control in a world I know very little about (and researching it on the internet certainly only make you feel worse)… so while what I’ve been through is not unique or extreme it was a fear of the unknown experience.

“Blissful” ignorance

Just before going into the talk with the Doctor, I felt fine (less stress being my own boss now, recently lost 20kg, and in the best shape of my life, running every day). 15 min later however I was told my blood pressure was way way way too high and was urged to come back for a blood sample the next day… Again, thousands of others hear the same every day and to sometimes harder degrees, but remember as a worst-case-scenario thinker, and with a fear of needles on top, it ended up with another sleepless night of worrying.

“Measure and you shall become sick”…

This subtitle is unfair to the medical profession (sorry). Still, the blood work “of cause” showed various “common” things wrong with me (too much cholesterol, and so on), so after the first follow-up in which I was told I needed to lose weight and exercise even more to avoid blood pressure medicine, I needed another more fancy blood test (yay, more needles… 😓). Again everyone has been nice and helpful, but it of cause is forgotten when you are “forced” into something you really don’t want to and are scared of…

Silver lining

So now after 3 weeks of worry, reacting, and fearing every little sign my body gives me (the ones that are normal and you don’t notice in normal life, but become, “a thing” when you are hyper-aware), I’ve finally, and luckily been told by my doctor that while I should take care of myself more (already on it; and a good wakeup call to continue weight loss that had plateaued recently), I “only” need a follow-up in 6 months.

Moral?

Is there any? Properly not, but writing these words (as is the core reason for this blog) helped me, so “Rasmus, the fearful” can get on with his life and live it to the fullest… Will I be OK? Most likely, like the rest of you out there…

Hi all. My Technical Coach business now has its own name;

I’ve done this as the old company name (RWJ Invest) caused confusion in the new role it has.

Why Sensum 365?

“Sensum” is Latin for “Sense” as in “Common Sense“, but it also translates into “feeling” which I also found fitting 😉…

End of the day, it is still the same passion for helping you and your customers through common sense, so in that regard; who cares for a name…

People that know me from my previous job, know I did a lot of YouTube videos (600+ in fact 😉)… I found making videos a fun part of my work, so I kind of missed that aspect a bit…

Well I’m back at it!, but not with SAP Business One or B1 Usability Package videos, but instead two passion topics of mine: Productivity and Code.

Productivity Videos

I’ve always been a fan of productivity and whenever I had a tool I was one of those that tinkered and tweaked it to the absolute fullest… One of those tools was Microsoft Outlook and mail/todo-productivity, and for that reason, I’ve made a video series on Outlook Productivity, Tasks, and Zero Inbox. The content of the series took over 10 years of tweaking to get to, and since everyone, I’ve shared my way of working with has adopted the same process I thought it was a good topic for your YouTube video series. The 10 video series are online now and can be seen here:

Code Videos

Nerd at heart my other passion is Programming, and when I recently created a Trello Open-source NuGet package, it was natural to of cause also make E-learning of the API. That video series can be seen here:

As part of some work for a client that worked with Trello, I wanted to do some automation against the Trello API… Only to find out that all NuGet Packages out there were rather poor or not working at all… 😒

Well, that is not an issue for a nerd, so since I had on my list of experiments to try and contribute to open-source, I’m now a creator of a NuGet Package 🤓

So if you are a Trello User and need a C# API, you can check it out here: https://www.nuget.org/packages/TrelloDotNet/

Quick update on 3 Fitness Milestones in Fitness happening in January 😀 … All related to the number 100…

100 Days of Runs in a row… 🏃🏼‍♂️🏃🏼‍♂️🏃🏼‍♂️

I’ve now been running every morning since the start of October 2022, so in mid-January, I crossed the 100 days of running in and row and going strong with a recent 15K run…

100 Km of Running in January 2023… 🏃🏻🏃🏻🏃🏻

I reach the running goal of 100 Km of running in January… If I can stay injury free the goal is at least 100K each month in 2023

Weight below 100 kg… 🥒🥬🍅

The last time I was under 100 kg was 6 years ago… I’ve lost 23 kg in the last 6 months 😀… The final goal is 90kg which I have not been near in a decade…

The Website and Blog got a fresh coat of paint… Hope you like it 😉

(The 2023 Plan)

3 months; That is now the amount of time that has passed since I changed my life after 19 years in the Software Industry. Luckily it has been 3 really good months and they have flown by which I see as a positive thing… They have been full of me “rediscovering” myself and though I’m still largely the same “me” it is a more relaxed and happy “me” with a bigger perspective on life that the “old me” was way too busy to notice.

So now we stand in a new year with a new “improved me” and the committed original “3 months think period” now over… So what now; what’s in store for 2023?

To find that out I sat down for 60 min to come up with a set of statements that came directly from the heart and mind… Here are the statements that came out of that (in the order they arrived) and I will allow those to define my 2023…

“Remember to enjoy life. Not everything needs plans and checklists”

“Unity Game Development is fun but more in a hobby way than a full-time job”

“Health and Fitness do not feel like a chore anymore so embrace it. It is good now and for the future”

“I still want ties to the IT industry but in a less committed role”

“Work areas of Agile and Usability are a joy to work with”

“#Give’ism feels awesome”

“I want to be my own boss controlling the tempo”

“I don’t want a full-time job anymore”

“Give travel a try”

“Embrace slow living and minimalism even more”

Given above are here the Rasmus 2.0 plan for 2023…

Work 🏢

I will return to the work-life, but not in a traditional sense…

I started my own one-man company around Agile Coaching and Usability Testing. The untraditional part is that I will offer the initial services to companies for free (aka #Give’ism; later people are allowed to pay me if they so desire, but only after they feel I have brought them value). On the flip side, I will be very opinionated on who I choose as clients and have every right to say no or end a working relationship if the passion disappears or the client does not commit to self-improvement (this is a partnership toward betterment after all).

In this way, I can contribute to making the IT Industry better, but on simple terms and with very low binding commitment (as in I will still be ultra professional and work hard, but without the ties of money, employment or partnership can have).

I created this dedicated page for this where you can learn more about my philosophy of this and how to contact me for an initial meeting: https://www.rwj.dk/business

Hobby 🕹️

My passion for creativity and code will be satisfied day to day by keeping Unity Gaming around as a Hobby … Game Development is really fun, but I also need to be honest with myself and acknowledge that the passion comes in bursts and are not there every single day so Game Development fits better as a Hobby than “work”. My goal is still to build and release a Tower Defense game, but, it will take longer to complete in this form, and will not give me guilt feelings if there is a day/week here and there where there is no mood to code. You can get more details on my games here: https://www.rwj.dk/unity-game-development (and in this blog post)

Health and Fitness 👟

Reserving more time for this part of my life will persist as it brings balance from working, so I will keep all the good habits from the last 3 months as is. I will also experiment with focus weeks to allow travel and slow living. You can get more stats on my health and fitness here: https://www.rwj.dk/fitness

Other Tweaks

I will try to focus less on Weekly Goals and checklists and instead feel and reflect on what feels right at the moment to further break my too-structured habits.

What about the blog in 2023?

That is a good question… I started it as a tool to help with the transition, and it has helped immensely so its purpose is essentially over. I could do various things:

1. Close the blog down entirely
2. Keep it but with an ad-hoc posting, schedule know I might run out of things to say soon.
3. Give it a new focus in the area of Agile and Usability

But I will leave it up to you readers so please write in the comments what you would like to see here for 2023

So that is the 2023 plan… Will it work (I hope)? Is it naive (Perhaps)? Will it need change (likely)?
Only time can tell, but right now I feel good about it, so let’s all hope for an awesome 2023 for all of us
Take Care… 🧠❤️