Category: Everything else

We have data and statistics thrown at us everywhere we go. And, if it is anything you do on a computer, it is likely that data has been analyzed in many ways.

It is tempting to just do things that make the numbers work. Write posts that generate more hits, make management decisions that improve your approval rating, and so on.

But, numbers lie. They might seem fool-proof and indisputable. But, the fact remains that they only show you the state of things at any given time. And, we all know that projections need to be taken with a healthy dollop of salt.

The solution is to learn to use numbers to inform your decisions, but not to let them decide everything for you.

Painting by numbers does make painting easy. But, it is also for amateurs.

I didn’t do my product review post this week. That’s because I’m struggling with 2 questions.

But, before I get to the questions, I had an interesting experience after downloading the excellent Economist Espresso app. This was thanks to a reader who insisted I try out the Economist Digital subscription (thanks friend!). It has been a fantastic experience using the app. I’m sure I’ll review it shortly. But, the big break through was when I scrolled down to the bottom of the article by swiping up. I instinctively tried to swipe up to move to the next article. But, it turns out you have to swipe right. That works for photographs and makes sense. But, does it make sense when you are reading text? I am not sure. But, it feels great to find myself asking such questions and not taking design for granted.

Onto my questions –

1. Do I just review products as soon as I try it? For instance, I might love the Economist Espresso. But, what’s the guarantee I’ll continue to use the app? Isn’t longevity the sign of a good product? The only issue with the longevity approach is that there will be very few products I will ever review as there’s only a few things that stick.
   Perhaps the way to overcome this is to just try as many products as possible and caveat that reviews are based on a short, quick usage experience.
2. What is the right framework? I’m not satisfied with my product framework – I need something simpler that sticks. While borrowing a framework helped me get started, I’m beginning to gravitate towards the next version. So, I’ll plan to give this more thought and put together a simple framework I’ll use for the future

In short, more to follow. Fascinating process so far. And, looking forward to lots more learning and thinking about how technology products are built in the weeks and months ahead.

As a consultant, I worked on a fascinating project back in 2012 to prepare a client for a potential Greek exit from the Eurozone. This was July 2012 and things looked bleak.

Fast forward 3 years later and we’re still in the same situation. There have been a couple of false dawns along the way but, largely, the problem hasn’t gone away. Every time I see a headline in the news about the situation (i.e. every day), I am reminded of sunk costs and bitter pills.

The sunk cost fallacy is when we weigh up all our past investment to make an investment in the future. The phrase “throwing good money after bad” sums it up. Billions of Euros have been sunk into this “relationship.” And, it feels like both sides are consistently looking back at all past investment instead of making decisions based on what lies ahead.

When you fall sick, the recovery path is rarely sweet. Yet, leaders on both sides are refusing to swallow bitter pills. Greek President Tsipras won the previous election by declaring he would be anti-austerity. There was no shred of sense in that campaign. He resigned yesterday. Glad that worked out. There’s a nice saying that says something like – “When 50,000 people believe in something wrong, they are still wrong.” The trouble with politics is that it often involves hundreds of thousands of people screaming populist bullsh*t. Someone is going to have to take the bitter pill in this situation.

Time doesn’t make difficult problems go away. The last 3 years in the Eurozone saga have demonstrated that.

I’ve been following football (/soccer) for 13 years now. Many of the young stars I started out admiring have now retired. Football has taught me a lot about life and careers. I’ve seen careers torn apart due to bad life decisions, personal lives messed up due to hubris and seen innumerable cases of “the next big thing” never turning out to be the next big thing.

There are, however, a handful of legends who did manage to stay true to their status as the “next big thing,”  And, every single time, they did so not just because of their incredible technical abilities but because they were willing to adapt and reinvent themselves. They understood their physical make up and changed their game to suit them as they grew older. Many changed positions and styles. And, what is telling is that they found new strengths as they grew older. If they were pacy in their youth, they impressed with their reading of the game a decade later.

Careers in sport at the highest level are rarely longer than 15 years and, yet, top players probably reinvent themselves 2-3 times in that period.

Careers in the professional world are 30-40 years long generally. How many people reinvent themselves by adding new skills and abilities 6-8 times in that period?

Have you ever had a good work out without feeling a bit of pain, soreness or discomfort? Have you ever achieved anything that you felt was meaningful without challenges? (And, if you did, would you feel it was meaningful?)

Life is a series of ups and downs. And, the way I see it, you can either experience a down or invite a down yourself. This sounds somewhat masochistic – so, let me explain myself.

Take a simple example – you can choose to enjoy a period of eating lots of delicious food combined with no exercise and feel certain that there’s a “down” coming. The down will either be gaining a few extra pounds or just feeling lethargic and unhealthy. Similarly, you can choose to skip studying before an examination or slack off before an important deadline and be certain that there’s pain coming on the other side.

The impulsive and emotional part of our brain is wired to make short term choices. It comes from a few thousand years foraging in forests. Who knows if you’re going to be alive to enjoy the next meal? Might as well make the most of it while it lasts.

The wiring clearly doesn’t apply anymore. So, we’re better off adapting to the times and re-wiring ourselves to be suspicious if there’s too much ease. Instead of coasting towards our critical deadline next week, expect challenges and push to finish earlier and faster by waking up earlier and working longer for a couple of days. A little bit of pain now can ease the path later.

Re-wire yourself to invite pain. That way, you’ll expect problems and eat them for breakfast.

Muhammad Ali once said – I hated every minute of training, but I said, ‘Don’t quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.’

He buried the lead and made it sound like training is a short-term thing. It isn’t. We never really stop training.

So, we might as well get on with it and embrace it.

For every post that shows up here, there’s at least 3 that are thrown away. Many of the ones that don’t make it are discarded in the mind. Some make it all the way to my “safety stock.” This is a page on my OneNote where I document post ideas. Most of those will never make it here. I still go through that list on days I don’t feel inspired to write about anything in particular. But, I don’t throw the ideas on my OneNote page away.

I’ve realized that the most important role of safety is precisely that – safety. Once you have safety locked in, it is possible to explore different avenues and dream. Without it, you’re just fighting for survival.

The best illustration of this idea is money. The first step in Dave Ramsey’s financial management program is to build an emergency fund and this is followed by building up savings to last you 6 months without pay.

It works great with time as well. If you’re always over capacity, you’ll never have time to be creative.

We all need safety stock. It enables us to do more than we realize.

What good is life if we always need that big milestone to feel good?

What if all it took were the small things?

A fun song

The wind in our ears

A drive in a nice neighborhood

Hanging out with a loved one doing nothing of note

Working really hard on something you care about

A Friday

Day dreaming about something cool coming up

A delicious meal

A functioning heart :-)

There’s more things going right at any moment in our lives than we know or realize.

Every once a while, when we find ourselves weighed down by this or that, it is worth reminding ourselves about a few of the small things that are going great.

If we’re unable to enjoy the small things, it is unlikely we’ll enjoy the big things.

And, besides, in the final analysis, the small things are the big things…

There are a few learnings that get repeated here. One of my all-time favorites/most repeated is the one where I remind myself to end low energy days early. This works very well – so much so that I do this nowadays on auto pilot.

I was wondering about the “why” behind this learning (beyond knowing it works great). And, I think the reason is that the amount of energy we feel is proportional to the amount of willpower we have. So, if we’re feeling very low on energy, it is likely our willpower is depleted. The way to recharge our willpower is to either do something that helps in the short term (eat or drink stuff that gives us energy) or go to the best long term solution – sleep.

The temptation, in a low energy period, is to either indulge in eating, watching TV or, in the worst case, attempting to be productive. Willpower depletion begins a negative cycle that leads to tiredness, bad decisions, irritation and more bad decisions.

Learning to manage energy is critical. And, being able to muster enough willpower to switch off all internet access, get an early dinner and sleep during low energy days is still among the most important things I’ve learnt.

Every time I ask myself to do something, I find myself making an important decision – do I treat myself as a goofball or friend?

If I choose goofball, it means –
– Create really rigid rules because there is no trust when dealing with goofballs
– Expect screw ups (that’s what goofballs do)
– Kick myself when the expected screw ups happen

If I choose friend, it means –
– Create simple guidelines and check ins to make sure all is well
– Expect to get it right in the long term with a few mis-steps along the way
– Be kind when the mis-steps happen

The funny thing is – when I choose the friend approach, there’s a good chance I’ll actually become worthy of the trust.

But, in nearly every case, once a goofball, always a goofball.

If you’re aiming for the proverbial yacht or private jet, it is worth remembering that there will likely always be a bigger yacht or private jet. And, if you are indeed the owner of the biggest, it is likely that record will be broken too, in time.

It is very easy to be caught up in our single minded pursuit of that big yacht and forget that our current boat works just fine.

Yes, there will always be the next thing. But, if you’re wasting the privilege of being where you are now, it is unlikely you’ll use the privilege of being at that next place.

So, when you find yourself stressing about that next outcome, it is worth asking – to what end?

After all, there’s always a next thing. And, there’s always a bigger yacht.