Category: Everything else

I was in the midst of an engaging and perspective shifting conversation with someone who’d given thoughtful consideration to big ideas like the effects of climate change on our species, the effect of the evolution of modern medicine on the notion of  “death” (will it be a choice soon?), among others.

It was a fascinating conversation – one of those that gets you thinking about ideas well beyond your current host of minor problems.

As we approached the end of it, I asked this person how he balanced the perspective from thinking about problems like climate change with having to, for example, close a deal next week. He responded half jokingly – “Because this is the life I’ve been given and I want to make sure it doesn’t suck.”

I’ve reflected on that note a bunch since our conversation. It struck me as the definition of pragmatic. Through his career (a very successful one), he’s done a great job “making sure it doesn’t suck.” And, in doing so, he’s acquired the resources required over time to effect meaningful change to the causes he cares about.

There’s a lot of attention given to romantic pursuits of problems that disregard practical considerations. But, at least in my experience, the pragmatic approach – especially when combined with thoughtfulness and long term planning – is often very effective.

We went to a Target outlet recently to purchase a piece of winter clothing. We’d looked it up online and it was supposed to be in stock at this particular outlet. After combing through the relevant aisles, we finally learnt from the customer service desk that the “in stock” status on their app isn’t the most reliable.

The natural response here might be to say this was a bad outcome. We drove a bit longer to get to this particular outlet and failed to get what we wanted.

But, that would completely negate the process. We did our research, found the one spot where we’d find what we were looking for, and then learnt that their stock status isn’t the most reliable. There’s not much we’d do differently.

It is one thing to know that it is important to separate outcomes and processes. But, it is quite another thing to actually do it when we encounter small outcome setbacks everyday. I’ve learnt to view incidents like this one as practice sessions. As we build our muscle memory to evaluate processes instead of evaluating outcomes, we invest in more learning focused, thoughtful, and happier versions of ourselves.

PS: We ended up finding another version of what we wanted online. It easy to take it for granted – but, online shopping is such a game changer.

NPR had a lovely article celebrating the life of Stan Lee – the person who created characters like the amazing Spiderman and the X-Men.

Stan was known for creating superheroes who struggled with being human. He explored insecurities, unhappiness, and themes like racism through his stories. He put being human before superhuman and did it all while ensuring he made us smile.

In his words – “Before Marvel started, any superhero might be walking down the street and see a 12-foot-tall monster coming toward him with purple skin and eight arms breathing fire, and the character would have said something like, ‘Oh! There’s a monster from another world; I better catch him before he destroys the city.’ Now, if one of our Marvel characters saw the same monster, I’d like to think Spider-Man would say, ‘Who’s the nut in the Halloween get-up? I wonder what he’s advertising?‘ ”

When reflecting on his career, he once said – “I used to be embarrassed because I was just a comic book writer while other people were building bridges or going on to medical careers. And then I began to realize: Entertainment is one of the most important things in people’s lives. Without it, they might go off the deep end.”

Thank you, Stan. You will be missed.

“According to its teachings, as social beings, the path to happiness for humans is found in accepting the moment as it presents itself, by not allowing oneself to be controlled by the desire for pleasure or fear of pain, by using one’s mind to understand the world and to do one’s part in nature’s plan, and by working together and treating others fairly and justly.” | Wikipedia on Stoicism

Someone recently asked me about the kinds of changes writing here for a decade had inspired. I always share a few example themes when asked this question – learning to focus on process vs. outcomes, to reflect and synthesize, to be intentional, etc. It is hard to tell the full story as the change daily public writing has inspired is both vast and deep.

But, in the spirit of synthesis, it occurred to me recently that a lot of these coalesce to form some of the tenets of stoicism. To accept things as they are, to prioritize discipline and commitment over desires and fears, to be thoughtful, to seek to be aware of the environment, and to view the world from a lens of abundance and collaboration.

Interestingly, and perhaps most significantly, the stoics believed that the truest measure of what people believed lay in their behavior. The idea that we shouldn’t listen to what people say and, instead, watch what they do has been among the more hard earned lessons I’ve taken away in the past decade.

So, a better description of the impact writing here has had on me is that it has helped me understand some of the fundamental principles of stoicism without seeking to understand it.

If I had to boil it down to four words whose meaning I’m slowly beginning to understand, I would choose “awareness,” “thoughtfulness,” “commitment,” and “perspective.” I think the act of writing about what we learn everyday inspires this journey toward understanding.

I am grateful for that and for your role in that journey.

If you are manufacturing cars, there is no point doubling down on manufacturing doors or steering wheels if the rest of the car isn’t being produced at the same pace. “Understand the goal” and “don’t optimize sub-systems” are thus key principles in operational effectiveness.

These principles have powerful life lesson equivalents. First, they ask the question – what is the car equivalent we’re building in our lives / what are we optimizing for? And, what is the right amount of production for each of the aspects (work, home, social or however we define them) in our lives to build it well?

Second, they speak to the futility of comparing certain aspects of our lives with that of others. Unless we’re optimizing for the exact objectives someone else is optimizing for, there is no point comparing the sub-systems.

In case you missed it, there’s been a lot of recent press about the “Financially Independent, Retire Early” or FIRE movement. The news is a mixed bag with many strong criticisms about the idea. Amidst all this varying sentiment is a lesson for all of us on taking the time to separate tactics from principles as we communicate ideas.

While the “retire early” part of the name is provocative (and seems to be drawing most ire), the central principle behind the FIRE movement is to become financially independent by being conscious about our financial well being.

Financial independence doesn’t mean not working – it just means being able to build a career and life without worrying about money. This is done with a strategy based on 3 simple tenets – i) Save more by living simply and cutting costs, ii) Invest aggressively in low cost index funds, and iii) Increase your income.

Would anybody argue against these principles? I’d posit that we should all be part of this movement.

The deeper learning here is that it is human nature to lose sight of the principles as we get caught up in the details. So, as we work to communicate our ideas every day, it is on us to obsess about sharing principles versus tactics.

Shane Parrish, author of the generally excellent Farnam Street blog, had a great post this morning about defensive decision making – the type of decision making that focuses on what “looks right” vs. what “is right.”

Defensive decision making is the “IBM” option. Since “no one got fired for buying an IBM,” it is intended to protect the decision maker. Organizations can often create a massive decision-consequence asymmetry in that they become so risk averse that most decisions come with small upside if they go well and large downside if something goes wrong (e.g. get fired).

So, the natural incentive is to just make the “default” decision. There is no risk to one’s reputation and it is always defensible.

This points to why so many cultures talk about “thinking out of the box” but never actually do so. It also speaks to why cultural change is very hard.

And, finally, it is a great reminder that approaching building products and services for customers with first principles thinking and hypothesis isn’t just about hiring the right people.

It involves building a culture that incentivizes attempting decisions that are right instead of rewarding those that look right.

Does cleaning ever get done?

It doesn’t matter how beautifully we vacuum our home this week. We will still need to vacuum next week.

Of course, it helps that we don’t expect to ever be “done” with cleaning or washing vessels or exercising. We understand that our commitment to being clean will be tested every day of every week. It is on us to recommit, take action, reflect, and keep improving how we take action.

It turns out that dealing with our insecurities works the same way. Our trysts with imposter syndrome, our deepest insecurities, and most powerful demons never go away. They are ever present and part of who we are.

And, we must deal with them like we deal with dirt or unwashed vessels every day. Re-commit to acting from wholeness instead of our wounds, take action, reflect, and iterate.

I’ve shared a lot of nuggets from Jeff Bezos over the years on this blog. His notes on the importance of being open to changing your mind, on strategic patience and tactical impatience, on using long form memos for business decisions, to name just a few, have all had a big impact on how I think and operate.

As someone who admires much of his thought process and approach to things, I found Amazon’s and Bezos’ approach to their second (and now apparently third) HQ deeply disappointing.

NYU Professor Scott Galloway outlined the many issues with this fiasco in his weekly note today. 2 excerpts –

“Amazon’s HQ2 search was not a contest but a con. Amazon will soon have 3 HQs. And guess what? The Bezos family owns homes in all 3 cities. And, you’ll never believe it, the new HQs (if you can call them that) will be within a bike ride, or quick Uber, from Bezos’s homes in DC and NYC. The middle finger on Amazon’s other hand came into full view when they announced they were awarding their HQ to not one, but two cities. So, really, the search, and hyped media topic, should have been called “Two More Offices.” Only that’s not compelling and doesn’t sell. Would that story have become a news obsession for the last 14 months, garnering Amazon hundreds of millions in unearned media?“

“We are not only witnessing the 1% pull further away from the 99% in our hunger games economy, but certain metros begin to pull away from the rest. Of more than 400 metros in the US, five account for over 20% of the growth. And, you guessed it, two of those five are DC and NYC. This is not Amazon’s problem, but this was an opportunity to do something extraordinary. Locating HQ2 in Detroit would have been transformative.“

Scott Galloway’s conclusion is withering in its assessment of this move that displayed canny PR and negotiation and a disappointing display of capitalism taken to its extreme all at once.

I keep going back to a note from Seth Godin on capitalism – capitalism exists to maximize civilization and not the other way around.

This was a classic case of the other way around.