Doing the 360

Just started a 360-degree-feedback-survey with a Credit Union in Alaska, it's the second one we've done. It's an effective demonstration of the power of database-backed websites: you almost couldn't do this with a non-DB site, but with the DB it's almost easier than a static data collection and processing system.

This is one of the cool things about the web: sometimes place doesn't matter. Without the web there's no way a (relatively small) Pittsburgh outfit would be providing boutique services to a (relatively small) outfit in Alaska.

Of course, the place-doesn't-matter perspective cuts both way; witness all the geeks displaced when the internet makes moving IT jobs and projects to India very cost effective, hoisting the geeks on their own petard.

In both situations, though, I think that what limits placelessness (new word alert) is that small-to-midsize business is done between people who have decided to trust each other. I don't think we'd have gotten the Alaska gig if it wasn't for a string of references that started with a contact in Coraopolis.