Finding Clarity in an Ambiguous World
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Dealing With Insecurity
I have two friends who are extremely talented software designers: one wrote an algorithm by himself that typically takes teams of engineers to implement, and not being told otherwise, solved a problem that all the teams at large companies said was impossible. The other wrote a piece of software which provides the foundation for many…
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Transitioning Work States
A couple weeks ago, I went for a longer run and decided to try a new technique: run and walk. The idea is to run for a while, but periodically walk to save energy for further in the run. Normally, I like to run the whole time because other wise it doesn’t feel like running*,…
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Saying “No” To Authority
Several years ago, I managed a group of engineers that tested the system developed by our organization. Most people we worked with didn’t exactly understand what happens when we test something; we didn’t build anything but added something less substantive: quality As such, if someone wanted us to test something extra, saying no wasn’t an…
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Hidden Influencers
Think of a famous person. Could be the president or a CEO or a well-known actor. Now think of the people who positively influenced and helped them. A bit harder. Fame comes from a combination of skills and luck. Not all who have equal ability will become famous. As such, even those that do become…
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More or Better
A long time ago, I evaluated a software tool for simulating systems that I quickly realized was built by a small company when I asked a few questions. The guy had developed the tool for over ten years and seemed to have all the functionality I was looking for, but it was hard to use.…
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When To Say, That’s Not My Problem
I was recently visiting with a friend who retired after working as an executive for many years. He was sharing that he recently went to a doctor’s office and noticed some inefficiencies in the way they were handling their business and found himself making suggestions to the receptionist about how they could make it better.…
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Milestones and Summits
At an earlier startup, we sold software to large corporations which entailed wrangling many people together in order to make a sale. Usually, it entailed convincing engineers it was the right decision, them convincing their management to do something, followed by a negotiation over business terms, and then approval of the budget. The whole process could easily…
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Triathlons: A story in gradual change
Last weekend, I found myself shirtless with swim trunks along with 126 other people in a variety of swim attire on the side of a pool. A number written with a black sharpie on my right arm. It was 6:45 in the morning and I was about to swim 450 meters, then quickly throw on…
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Overfitting
In a probably apocryphal story, an AI research team tried to train a computer to detect a tank among a forest. They showed it 50 tanks in a forest so it could learn what a tank looked like and showed it 50 forests with no tank so it could learn about its absence. Then they…
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The Greatest Good for the Greatest Number
Several years ago, we got together with some friends to teach them to play “The Settlers Of Catan”. We’d never tried using the recommended setup from the rule book so we gave that a go expecting that it would put us all in an equally good spot. The starting positions were fair, but instead of…
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