Chemicals in the right place
I want my food to last less and my devices to last longer.
So I know the chemicals are being applied to the right things.
Obviously inspired by Joanna Maciejewska
Tag
Personal
17 posts
A bit better
There’s nothing that is perfect or works for every use case.
But there’s something that’s a little better than the existing solution and can lead to the next opportunity to improve.
(This came up from a discussion with my dad about a poorly implemented bike lane close to home.)
Good video from Vox about the subject:
Why protected bike lanes are more valuable than parking spaces
Questions help clarifying
Don’t assume the requester know what they’re asking for.
Ask questions to clarify.
You are their partner, not an order-taker.
Turn poison into medicine
If I exposed myself and looked dumb for a while but learned something new at the end, then it was worth using that vulnerability to have some learning.
Here, Herbie Hancock talks about how a time when he, in his words, made a mistake, but Miles Davis found that event as an opportunity to change the next notes to make Hancock sound right.
Read MoreA style of leadership for me
When you share an unfinished product, you give people a chance to engage with you, that is shared enrollment.
On this day I learned a lesson on altMBA about a style of leadership that worked really well for me.
We were discussing about which idea to pick between two options and while the subject was common, everyone had different definitions and details in their minds.
When I shared the unfinished/half baked work I was doing, everyone could look at one thing and develop from there.
Read MoreSoft skills are real
The real (or soft) skills feel as concrete as the hard skills.
You can sense how you are changing because of them, the same way you can see clearly how you have made progress on that design, exercising, or driving skill.
Adding value by asking questions
There are no consequences here for speaking up, the consequence would be staying quiet and NOT speaking up, not stepping up even if you believe you are not qualified.
I have been telling myself that I would be doing my team a disservice if I did not share my opinions or ask ‘stupid questions’.
I know I am adding value to my team when they explain their thinking.
Teaching is a great way to learn.
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Missing action
In the midst of some anxiety and many thoughts, there is a lack of action to put the planned ideas and ramblings into motion.
Which action is missing?
Michael Jordan - Winning has a price
Winning has a price, and leadership has a price. So I pulled people along when they didn’t want to be pulled. I challenged people when they didn’t want to be challenged.
And I earned that right because teammates came after me. They didn’t endure all the things that I endured.
Once you joined the team, you lived at a certain standard that I played the game, and I wasn’t going to take anything less. Now if that means I had to go in there and get in your ass a little bit, then I did that. …you ask all my teammates, “The one thing about Michael Jordan, he never asked me to do something that he didn’t fucking do.”
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Seth Godin - Bored
Bored means that you’re paying attention (no one is bored when they’re asleep.)
Being challenged at work is a privilege. It means that you have a chance, on someone else’s nickel, to grow. It means you can choose to matter.
I’m glad you’re feeling bored, and now we’re excited to see what you’re going to go do about it.
— Seth Godin
Dan Martell - Time constrain your work sessions
That’s it. Most of the time, we don’t fail to achieve our goals because of lack of knowledge and how-to, it’s because we haven’t associated the right level of motivation to the outcome.
It’s a powerful story to help remind you that anything is possible when our backs are against the wall.
Crating time constraint work sessions either personally enforced, or by not bringing your power cable on a work session will have a huge impact on your output. It also gets you into flow a lot faster.
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Liam Veitch - How to describe your services
You should get deliberate about the way you describe your services, remembering that you are not being hired because you can write, design or code. You’re being hired because your client has a pain in their business life, which they believe your service can remedy.
— Liam Veitch
Shane Snow - Turn up the speed
That’s just the way people did it. Instead, DHH compressed what normally takes five to seven years of hard work into 18 months of smart work. “Once you stop thinking you have to follow the path that’s laid out,” he says, “you can really turn up the speed.”
— Shane Snow
http://fourhourworkweek.com/2014/08/25/the-art-of-strategic-laziness/
Ramit Sethi - Successful people
Successful people do what what others will not. If it means you lose a few hours of sleep for a night, so be it. It’s not easy. Sometimes, it’s not fun.
But as Muhammad Ali 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.’”
— Ramit Sethi
http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/i-will-teach-you-to-be-rich-turns-10-years-old/
Michael Lopp - Stables and volatiles
Stables - appreciate direction, happy to work with a plan - they appreciate it. Order is good. dot the i’s and cross the t’s. Play nice with others and are carefully work to mitigate failure make good & predictable decisions.
Volatiles - define strategy rather than follow it; failure is not interesting to them. Risk gives a thrill. Code volume over quality. Reliable when it’s in their best interest. Tell them what to do and they’ll say ‘fuck you’. Allow them to choose by proposing you have a hard problem and ask if they can help or give you their advice and they’ll jump right in (a bit like a 5 year old!)
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Seth Godin - Pick yourself
Are you satisfied creatively? Not even close. That’s a very dangerous place to be and it would truly depress me if that happened and I would get very scared as well. I think if your goal is for everything to be okay, that’s a mistake. To achieve that goal, the only obstacle you’d have to face tomorrow is to eliminate all risk so that everything would be okay. I’ve made the decision that I’m never trying to make everything okay. I’m trying for there to be more loose ends, not fewer loose ends.
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