Every year, IT professionals at colleges have to deal with an influx of newbies, all of whom ask precisely the same questions as the newbies did last year. It's Sisyphean. Of course, every day on the internet is like September,... | Continue reading
There are three kinds of problems: The first can be fixed with money. There's a defect in the plumbing and you can't get a permit to open until you fix it. The design team needs to hire a UI expert... | Continue reading
Of course your behavior is justifiable. That's not the question. The question is, "is it helping?" It's easy to justify our mood or our actions based on how we've been treated by the outside world. Justification isn't the goal, though.... | Continue reading
The self starter creates a spark, turning nothing, or what certainly appears to everyone else as nothing, into something. The self starter doesn't see it that way. That 'nothingness' was actually an opportunity, a chance to make a connection, to... | Continue reading
American Airlines doesn't know what to say. And they're having a lot of trouble saying it. They're making a fortune this year due to low oil prices, and one way to manage shareholder expectations for the future is to put... | Continue reading
Good, better and best were the three price points. Organizations had an easy way to distinguish between their various products. Adding more features cost more money, and so the Cadillac cost more than the Chevy. Customers learned to associate more... | Continue reading
That means you have a choice: Spend a lot of your time in whimpering moments. or Be prepared to blow things up, declare victory/failure, walk away—even if it feels easier in the moment to timidly and slowly fade away, whimpering.... | Continue reading
If you moved to Norway or Haiti or Bolivia, you'd notice something immediately: People don't move at the same speed you do. The same thing is true about different organizations and different pockets of the internet. Or months of the... | Continue reading
There's a difference between speed and acceleration. This is hard for novice physics students to grasp. Velocity (speed) is how fast you're going. Acceleration is a measure of how quickly you're getting faster. Brands today are built on relationships, and... | Continue reading
It's tempting to believe that left to our own devices, we'll all maximize our health, make smart investment decisions and generally follow our instincts on the road to happiness. But it turns out that cigarettes are addictive, that financial distress... | Continue reading
The race to the bottom is unforgiving and relentless. I ordered some straw hats for a small party. The shipper sent them in a plastic bag, with no box, because it was cheaper. Of course, they were crushed and worthless.... | Continue reading
Stuff's going to break. Then what? Air conditioners, for example, gradually lose their charge. When they do, icing can occur. When that happens, the drain pans overflow and water seeps away. The smart builder, then, anticipates all this and has... | Continue reading
Throwing tantrums, calling names, not doing the reading, making things up, demonizing the other, impulsivity, egomaniacal narcissism, breaking big promises... Waiting your turn, asking hard questions, thinking about others, slowing down in key moments... Telling the truth, taking … | Continue reading
Is almost never the one that's worth talking about. The urgency of the day, today's celebrity crisis, the thing of the moment... that's what the media wants, that's what creates urgency, and that's what is most definitely not important. We... | Continue reading
The first step is to invent a thing worth making, a story worth telling, a contribution worth talking about. The second step is to design and build it in a way that people will actually benefit from and care about.... | Continue reading
Before you create intellectual property (a book, a song, a patent, the words on a website, a design) with someone else, agree in writing about who owns what, who can exploit it, what happens to the earnings, who can control... | Continue reading
You have two choices when you want to move forward (grow a business, sell an idea, get a 'yes'): Have such an insight and deliver such innovation that people will choose to make a new decision, adopt a new habit... | Continue reading
Every organization or project that succeeds begins to erect a bureaucracy around that success, because keeping success from going away is a basic need. When you show up offering change, understand that the status quo isn't the enemy of the... | Continue reading
Here's how you end up with a bully in a position of authority at an organization: Someone points out that the bully is a real problem. And the boss says, "I know he's a bully, but he's really productive and... | Continue reading
The essence of a belief is that we own it, regardless of what's happening around us. If you can be easily swayed by data, then it's not much of a belief. On the other hand, the key to making a... | Continue reading
You're going to have to fight for every single thing, forever and ever. It's really unlikely that they will pick you, anoint you or hand you the audience and support you seek. No one will ever realize just how extraordinary... | Continue reading
If you'd like to teach a kid to ride a bike, training wheels are a bad idea. You're much better off with a small bike with no pedals. All training wheels do is confuse, distract or stall. The same thing... | Continue reading
Of course, each of us is different. Different histories, different narratives. You have an appendix, she doesn't. You are different from everyone else, from your DNA to the kind of morning you had today. No one can possibly understand you... | Continue reading
The reason that Uber drivers will always struggle They don't have a relationship with the customer. It turns out that finding a customer and knowing where he wants to go is almost as valuable as having a car and knowing... | Continue reading
Sometimes, news comes along that confirms something we've wanted to believe all along. It usually amplifies our skepticism. But sometimes, it reinforces our trust. The goal is to build a brand with a story that, when you do the work... | Continue reading
Of course it is. You can learn to be more patient. What about good judgment and maturity? Yes, also skills. | Continue reading
A simple test for brands, organizations and individuals: When you exaggerate the things that people associate with you, your presence and your contribution, does it make you a better version of yourself? | Continue reading
Risk mistake number one: Risk means failure. This worldview equates any risk, no matter how slim, with a certainty. If the chances of hurting yourself skydiving are 1%, it's easy to ignore the 99% likelihood that it will go beautifully.... | Continue reading
At any gathering of people, from a high school assembly to the General Assembly at the UN, from a conference to a rehearsal at the orchestra, the really interesting conversations and actions almost always happen around the edges. If you... | Continue reading
A career is often based on one of these three stances: The Scientist does experiments. Sometimes they work, sometimes they fail. She takes good notes. Comes up with a theory. Works to disprove it. Publishes the work. Moves on to... | Continue reading
The woman sitting next to me on the plane is successful by any measure--she's happy, engaged, making a difference. And she confessed that she doesn't buy anything from Amazon, doesn't use Facebook, rarely connects online. How is this possible? I... | Continue reading
Shortcuts taken, corners cut, compromises made. By degrees, inch by inch, each justifiable (or justified) moment adds up to become a brand, a reputation, a life. | Continue reading
(So said Hemingway on seeing fake books in his fancy hotel room.) Of course we are. We always are. We're always headed down for the count. It's unsustainable. We corrupt our best stuff, don't take good enough care of each... | Continue reading
A deal, whether in writing or orally, is not to be considered lightly, because you fully expect to keep your end of the bargain. Three things to consider before saying, "yes": What happens now: Who owes who what? What, precisely,... | Continue reading
When your small business is struggling, the thought of raising money feels like a life preserver. That possible infusion of cash is a beacon of hope, the thing you can work on tirelessly. It's the one thing that appears as... | Continue reading
Our feelings (anger, shame, delight) appear almost instantly, and, left alone, they don’t last very long. But if we invent a narrative around an event or a person, we can keep the feeling going for a very long time. Pavlov... | Continue reading
If you believed what he believes, you'd do precisely what he's doing. Think about that for a second. People act based on the way they see the world. Every single time. Understanding someone else's story is hard, a job that's... | Continue reading
You may be right, but that doesn't mean that people will care. Or pay attention. Or take action. Just because you're right, doesn't mean they're going to listen. It takes more than being right to earn attention and action. | Continue reading
Should you put all your best material up front? Later seems really far away. Now is far more urgent. But what if it's a marathon, not a sprint? A fast start is often overestimated. If you're truly capable of delivering... | Continue reading
One of the easiest ways to build a positive personal P&L is to re-establish your monthly expenses at a dramatically lower level. If you cut your burn rate to the bone, you suddenly will find the freedom to say 'no'... | Continue reading
A palliative is a treatment that soothes even if it can't cure the illness. By all means, whenever you can, fix the problem, go to the root cause, come up with a better design... But when you can't (and that's... | Continue reading
Every day, we change. We move (slowly) toward the person we'll end up being. Not just us, but our organizations. Our political systems. Our culture. Are you more generous than the you of five or ten years ago? More confident?... | Continue reading
Eager (and less-talented) designers often get confused about this instruction, turning it into: "It doesn't have instructions, therefore it's simple. Consider a hotel shower. It has 11 things that might be dials, and five that actually are. The alert person,... | Continue reading
There's a space between where you are now and where you want to be, ought to be, are capable of being. A gap between your reality and your possibility. Imagine that space as a gulf or a chasm and you'll... | Continue reading
Umberto Eco said that when he was talking about the form of paper books. But I think it raises a challenge for just about anyone who seeks to do something truly great in the world of design (in any of... | Continue reading
Tracy Chapman was outsold by the Doobie Brothers by 40:1. But the Doobie's aren't 40 times as singular an artist as she is. Lou Reed was outsold by Van Morrison at least 40:1. But again, our image and memory of... | Continue reading
Most people are okay with living with the consequences of what happens. The hard part is living with our narrative about how it happened and why. If your plane is late and you miss the meeting and you don't close... | Continue reading
Something rare is happening, and it might not last long. Today, right now, anyone with a $300 laptop can use the very same tools as the people at the top of just about any industry. If you want to write,... | Continue reading