Do your homework. Show up with contributions and connections long before you bring your opinion. Save the snark for later. Pay your dues. Speak up about shared truths, shared principles and shared goals. Don't blame the ref only when the... | Continue reading
Yes, that dog is moving, but not that tree. Plants don't move. Well, yes, they actually do. Trees grow and then they decay. It's just that we can't see it happening now. It happens over a longer span. Which means... | Continue reading
We still teach a lot of myths in the intro to economics course, myths that spill over to conventional wisdom. Human beings make rational decisions in our considered long-term best interest. Actually, behavioral economics shows us that people almost never... | Continue reading
The arc of the moral universe is long, and it bends toward access. Twelve years ago, Acumen made a modest investment in Water Health International, a start-up that builds water purification hubs in small villages in India. Today, and every... | Continue reading
Why do people buy lottery tickets? It's certainly not based on any rational analysis of financial risk or reward. So, why do something that almost never seems to work? Because it actually works every single time. What it does is... | Continue reading
There it is, at every entrance to the terminal at LaGuardia, one of the busiest airports in the world: TERMINAL CLOSED FOR MAINTENANCE between 12:00 a.m. and 4:00 a.m. until further notice. Ticketed Passengers & Employees ONLY will have access... | Continue reading
All the promises, explanations and asides in the world pale in comparison with what you do. Too often, we forget that jargon and narrative exist to help shape our actions, not to replace them. Words keep getting cheaper, which makes... | Continue reading
Imagine if the owner of the local bookstore hid books from various authors or publishers. They're on the shelf, sure, but misfiled, or hidden behind other books. Most of us would find this offensive, and I for one like the... | Continue reading
Here's the obvious way: Watch people waiting to go through the line. Find the spot where the line slows down, where there's a gap between one person and the next. That's the spot that needs attention. Add a few spoons,... | Continue reading
It's not forced on us, it's something we choose. And we rarely benefit from that choice. That emergency surgery, the one that saved your life, when the ruptured appendix was removed—the doctor left a scar. We can choose to be... | Continue reading
More creating Less consuming More leading Less following More contributing Less taking More patience Less intolerance More connecting Less isolating More writing Less watching More optimism Less false realism | Continue reading
If someone needs directions, don't give them a globe. It'll merely waste their time. But if someone needs to understand the way things are, don't give them a map. They don't need directions, they need to see the big picture. | Continue reading
When you appeal to the better nature of a specific group, you're doing something with good taste. Just barely ahead of the status quo, in sync but leaning forward. The key understandings are: It is never universal. Good taste is... | Continue reading
You might have noticed that the gym was a little less crowded this morning. It's only four days into the new year and most well-intentioned resolutions have already faded. Of course they have. You can't change an ingrained habit with... | Continue reading
Luxury goods are only consumed when we've got enough. You shouldn't go shopping for a Birkin bag with your last dollar. It's easy to believe that kindness is like that. We need more reserves, perhaps, before we can expend some... | Continue reading
The bestselling novel of 1961 was Allen Drury's Advise and Consent. Millions of people read this 690-page political novel. In 2016, the big sellers were coloring books. Fifteen years ago, cable channels like TLC (the "L" stood for Learning), Bravo... | Continue reading
The blockchain, game theory, float tanks, turmeric, Justin Trudeau, Joi Ito, dal fry, thermite, the Corbomite Maneuver... these are all notions (people, ideas, technologies, foods) that you may or may not be aware of or have engaged with. There's a... | Continue reading
Wondering about your past, about what might have happened, about bad decisions made and roads not taken... this is a recipe for not much more than regret. But wondering about your future? When we wonder about the future, we get... | Continue reading
Attitude is the most important choice any of us will make. We made it yesterday and we get another choice to make it today. And then again tomorrow. The choice to participate. To be optimistic. To intentionally bring out the... | Continue reading
It's easy to remember our first job, or even our first 7 jobs. Cleaning the grease off the hot dog wheel at the fast food place. Caddying. Mowing lawns. Shlepping. But how common is it to ask people about the... | Continue reading
Your smartphone has two jobs. On one hand, it was hired by you to accomplish certain tasks. In the scheme of things, it's a screaming bargain and a miracle. But most of the time, your phone works for corporations, assorted... | Continue reading
That next thing you're going to say, what's it for? Is it to advance the conversation, to get a client, to make them go away, to find intimacy, to share a truth, to ask for help, to offer help, to... | Continue reading
The best way to persuade someone of your new approach is to begin with three agreements: We agree on the goals. We both want the same outcomes, we're just trying different ways to get there. We agree on reality. The... | Continue reading
The week between Christmas and New Years is notoriously quiet. Your phone buzzes less often, there are no client meetings, no deadlines. If you work for yourself, this might be the perfect week to take my freelancer course. Not merely... | Continue reading
That's not true. Your mileage will vary. Of course it will. Of course everything won't be precisely as you imagined it, as it was described, as you deserve. Sure, then what? Will you react or respond? You could react in... | Continue reading
Racist and sexist verbal attacks ('remarks' is too mild) never make sense. Over time, people who judge others by their origin or chromosomes are always proved wrong, always shown to be afraid, not wise. The fear that provokes these attacks... | Continue reading
Just published, a three-minute TED talk from 2014: It follows on the ideas in this TEDx talk from a few years before: Have a happy holiday and a peaceful (and worthwhile) New Year. | Continue reading
It's almost certain that there's confusion about what's being decided. | Continue reading
About twenty years ago, Permission Marketing was getting ready to go to the publisher. We sent a copy to Jack Trout, co-author of the classic book, Positioning. Surprisingly, Jack replied with a long letter, letting us know that my book... | Continue reading
It took 500 years to figure out how to make something this magical, this permanent, this heartfelt... and get it delivered to you in time for the holidays, for just a few bucks. You may have heard of most of... | Continue reading
A simple algorithm for most endeavors: Don't try to do things when everyone else is doing them. Just about every system degrades under stress. It costs more, takes longer, gives poorer results. The harder it is to resist the pressure... | Continue reading
That airline is biased in favor of pilots with many hours of experience. Is it possible that a newbie pilot might be safer flying this jet than someone with twenty years of daily flying? Perhaps. But it's not worth the... | Continue reading
Actually, you do. It's likely that you don't know the last thing. But the first? You know enough to know you don't know everything. You know enough to know that there might be a pitfall or a trap ahead, and... | Continue reading
I was paging through a photo set that someone sent along and when I hit the left button one too many times, the screen popped up and said, "you've reached the beginning." I guess that's right here. And right now.... | Continue reading
It's not enough. There are more people, better off, with more freedom, more agency and more power than at any other time in our history. That's not enough. As we use technology and culture to create more health, more access... | Continue reading
We're woefully unprepared to deal with orders of magnitude. Ten times as many orders. One-tenth the number of hospital visits. Ten times the traffic. One-tenth the revenue. Ten times as fast. Because dramatic shifts rarely happen, we bracket everything on... | Continue reading
If you need to be perfect, it's hard to press the 'ship it' button. Difficult to hire someone who makes things happen (because you'll be responsible for what happens). Frightening to put yourself into a position where you're expected to... | Continue reading
It is possible to deliver amazing service without being servile. Omotenashi is the Japanese word for treating people the way you'd want to be treated, for a posture of customer service that builds long-term trust and loyalty. Why the split?... | Continue reading
The intelligent writer who dumbs down her work in order to make it more popular. The successful small businessperson who gives up the edge that made the business work in order to make it bigger. The entrepreneur who stops leading... | Continue reading
It might happen to you. Many markets have a base (people seeking a solution), a middle (people seeking some originality, something new, something a little better) and a top (educated and passionate consumers willing to go extra miles to get... | Continue reading
The downward quality spiral: You cut some corners, saving some time and some money. For a little while, you can coast on that. But then demand goes down, you can't get the same pricing, there's less money, which means you... | Continue reading
It's easy to be confused about the difference. "Most" as in the best, the fastest, the cheapest. "Enough" as in good enough. And that means just what it sounds like. If you run an ambulance company, you need to be... | Continue reading
If you've worked hard for it, it's a skill. If it's something that other people have that you believe you can't possibly achieve, it's a talent. Of course, they think the same thing about your skill, don't they? Being jealous... | Continue reading
Some can only win when others lose. Others seek to win by helping others succeed. One of these approaches scales far better than the other. | Continue reading
Here's an interesting choice that most people leave unmade: How comfortable are you engaging in projects where there's a likelihood that you'll lose by just a hair? What makes a project worthwhile and interesting is that it might not work.... | Continue reading
Joi Ito and Jeff Howe have a new book called Whiplash. Joi's the head of MIT's Media Lab and an extraordinary thinker. Jeff brings the ideas and the lessons of the Lab to life. This is a big think, well... | Continue reading
"What's it like around here?" It's a fair question to ask about an office, a home, a town... "Why do people act like that, talk like that, treat others that way?" The only reason they do is because we let... | Continue reading
Always right about feelings. About the day he just experienced. About the fears (appropriate and ill-founded) in his life. About the narrative going on, unspoken, in his head. About what he likes and what he dislikes. You'll need to travel... | Continue reading