Category: Leadership
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Creating Art at Work
We are all artists. Or rather, we should be. What we pour into our work determines whether we are simply looking to get paid or are making art. I’ve long thought that the best way to grow is to look for tasks not being done and do them – to pour myself into the enterprise…
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The Art of Trimming
Walking home from my spinning class this morning, I noticed a man trimming a tree. Not an extraordinary event, but it struck me: Here was a pile of vibrant green leaves on the ground and when you looked at the tree, it was still full of the same verdant leaves. After the gardener cut the…
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You Can’t Think Your Way Out
You’ve come down with a serious cold. You feel miserable. You start trying to figure out who or what gave you this cold: Was it not washing your hands after that bus ride? Was it that guy that coughed on you while you were standing in line to get groceries? We all want answers to…
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Life By Autopilot
We live in a highly complex world but with a very limited amount of focus. This limits the amount of conscious decisions we make. The rest of our life runs in autopilot: we decide not to decide. This, as it turns out, is our default choice. It’s why states that require you to opt-in for…
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The Unstated Rules
Earlier today, my wife, Ann, and I were eating at a restaurant and we watched a two-year old solve a maze like the one above, connecting point A with point B. She solved the maze in a couple of seconds, then moved on to the next activity on her placement. How did she do it…
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In Search of Simplicity
I just finished reading When Genius Failed by Roger Lowenstein. This book documents yet another example of humans desire to seek simplification even when that simplification doesn’t truly model reality. In short, LTC believed they had figured out a way to make money that was very low risk. Each transaction could only make a little…
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Being Great Even Though You’re Not Perfect
About nine years ago, I went on a trip to Latvia with a group of more than 50 people from eight different countries including Russia, Sweden, US, Holland, and Latvia. The age ranges in the group were from 16-60 and contained people from all walks of life. The purpose of the trip was to provide…
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Amplifying Noise
Yesterday, Ann and I were watching a Mexican dancing television show at a restaurant. Something about it struck me very funny and I laughed out loud. At the same time, I looked over to see a waiter and a waitress pretending to dance like they were on the show. After my laugh, they looked over…
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The Fine Line Between The Great and the Amateur
What makes a dancer, singer, or speaker great? I mean really great, like genius-level great? There are three things that make the great different: First, they stand out. They break conventions. No one gets excited if they play it safe. In fact, they know “playing it safe” is one of the most dangerous options around…
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The RapidChip Fallacy
“The market is going to face this big, nasty problem and they will have no other choice but to use our product to solve it.” – Excited Entrepreneur Most of the time, this entrepreneur is committing the same fallacy that we faced when working on a failed project called RapidChip. This fallacy is related to, but different from…