“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.” [Oscar Wild] We all suffer from bouts of procrastination, and we may not even be aware of when these instances occur and understand how they hurt us until it's too late. It's become common practice to foc … | Continue reading
It is much easier to develop good taste than it is to create great products from it. To do something that stands out we should build a tremendous body of work. “You'll hit gold more often if you simply try out a lot of things,” says This American Life's Ira Glass. Making somethin … | Continue reading
In his annual letter to Amazon shareholders, Jeff Bezos says, “One area where I think we are especially distinctive is failure. I believe we are the best place in the world to fail (we have plenty of practice!), and failure and invention are inseparable twins. To invent you have … | Continue reading
After years of studying the dynamics of success and productivity in the workplace, Adam Grant discovered a powerful and often overlooked motivator —helping others. Grant's message resonates deeply at Conversation Agent. In Originals: How Non Conformists Rule the World Adam Grant … | Continue reading
“He only errs who thinks he knows what he does not know.” [Augustine] We're all familiar with the catchphrase “Fake it 'til you make it,” but we likely overlooked its genesis as a ready method to stave off pessimism and fight depression. Things having both intended and unintended … | Continue reading
“The way they are driving doesn't say that they are driving in England. They could be driving anywhere. They veer across lanes suddenly... they have no regard for anybody else,” says the driver of a delivery company to Alain the Botton. A situation that sounds familiar to many. O … | Continue reading
Why is asking “Can I fix it?” better than stating “I will Fix it!” The first is in form of a question —and because we love curiosity and learning here, we already like it more for the possibilities it opens. The second is a promise —and while we may be confident, our ability to d … | Continue reading
Intellectual curiosity and spirit of inquiry are part of the same continuum. There isn't a switch that activates one and keeps the other off. Rather, when we pursue inquiry we cultivate our ability to increase the number and richness of connections in our minds. Warren Buffet is … | Continue reading
This site is turning ten this year. Much has changed in how we find, consume, and share information in this time frame. What used to be engaging conversations in the comments and between dozens of blogs —through memes and topics we were finding better ways to talk about what we w … | Continue reading
“There is no substitute for knowledge.” [W. Edwards Deming, The New Economics] At Conversation Agent we believe in developing knowledge so that we can extract the right data at the right time to make decisions appropriately. Which is why there are no shortcuts to knowledge —it is … | Continue reading
“Working on the right things is what makes knowledge work effective,” says Peter Drucker. The subject of The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done is how we can manage our self for effectiveness. Half of the battle in managing ourselves is abo … | Continue reading
“The church is near but the road is icy; the bar is far away but I will walk carefully.” [Russian proverb] What makes some people see the glass as half full and others half empty? What is the connection between our minds and body? Does it leads us to see the world differently? So … | Continue reading
“A good story has a beginning, a middle and an end, although not necessarily in that order.” [Jean-Luc Godard] There's a big difference between working and communicating about our work —we may excel at the first and need help with the second. Writing and talking are also two dist … | Continue reading
“Literature is the question minus the answer.” [Roland Barthes] Our questions reveal our real intent more than we suspect. There is such a thing as a leading question —a statement camouflaged as question by the inflection, or a lazy question, for example “who is going to win?” “T … | Continue reading
When Susan Cain started research for her book in Quiet: the Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking, along with the story of Dale Carnegie's metamorphosis, she found the chain of events that led to the cultural transformation of a whole country. From a Culture of C … | Continue reading
“We fear death, we shudder at life's instability, we grieve to see the flowers wilt again and again, and the leaves fall, and in our hearts we know that we, too, are transitory and will soon disappear. When artists create pictures and thinkers search for laws and formulate though … | Continue reading
“Far less thought goes into making history than remembering it.” [Peter Tunjic] This is reason enough for a whack on the side of the head —but there are twenty five more where that came from. For example, what happens when we look for the second right answer? To make something re … | Continue reading
“If you want the whole thing, the gods will give it to you. But you must be ready for it.” [Joseph Campbell] This weekend's project was cleaning up the email account associated with this blog. To quantify the scope — from a starting point of 17,682, the account is now at 4,092. T … | Continue reading
Would we appreciate how precious they are? | Continue reading
“I don't think necessity is the mother of invention. Invention . . . arises directly from idleness, possibly also from laziness. To save oneself trouble.” [Agatha Christie] Grace Murray Hopper# was an American computer scientist, mathematician, and a pioneer in her field. She was … | Continue reading
Contrary to popular belief, the most effective salespeople score halfway between the poles of extreme extroversion and extreme introversion in personality tests. Adam Grant, associate professor of management at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania conducted resear … | Continue reading
“We are not as endlessly manipulable and predictable as you would think,” says Dan Pink in Drive. The results of an MIT study demonstrated that while there is a correspondence between effort expended and inventive expected for mechanical skills. However, when the task involved ev … | Continue reading
For some reason three of the links to today's Learning Habit went missing between the time I tested the new format and the time it sent. Maybe it got ahead of itself like the rest of our clocks for Daylight Time Savings. Here are the links: 2. / How informality is more than nice … | Continue reading
When we look to figure out how something works in first person, we become more intimate with how it works and add multiples of value to our own capacity to think about problems. Filtering through our own lens encourages exploration and an open mind. Richard Feynman was a practica … | Continue reading
“Don't be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.” [Rumi] If everything has been said and done before, it hasn't been said and done by us. In the same way we bring to life an original combination of the same ingredients and our own spin on … | Continue reading
In an interview with PBS, Steve Jobs says: “When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family life, have fun, save a little money. That’s a … | Continue reading
“Of all the things that can boost emotions, motivation, and perceptions during a workday, the single most important is making progress in meaningful work. And the more frequently people experience that sense of progress, the more likely they are to be creatively productive in the … | Continue reading
“Most of us are brave and afraid in the same moment, all day long.” [Brené Brown] We underestimate the power of feedback. It's useful to learn how to provide it, and to understand the types of feedback that are well suited to each situation. When we engage in a creative endeavor, … | Continue reading
One of the parts that resonates the most in Cal Newport's Deep Work is the section about quitting social media. To help us do a cost-benefit analysis to figure out whether our Internet habits are supporting our work or distracting us from it, he uses what he calls “the Craftsman … | Continue reading
“When forced to work within a strict framework the imagination is taxed to its utmost – and will produce its richest ideas. Given total freedom the work is likely to sprawl.” [T.S. Eliot] In the introduction to his award-winning book, Story, Robert McKee, held as the world’s top … | Continue reading
“His resolve is not to seem, but to be, the best.” [Aeschylus] It is no accident that the television series Mad Men was conceived and ran successfully for eight years in the United States, winning five Golden Globes. This is the land that coined lines like: Strangers' eye, keen a … | Continue reading
The job of a journalist is to ask reality to explain itself. This was what I took away from a conversation with The Philadelphia Inquirer Associate Editor John Timpane, one of my favorite writers and thinkers. In a column about the fortieth anniversary of Sgt. Pepper by the Beatl … | Continue reading
When we experience creative flow our mind fills with original associations -- one idea leads to the next almost effortlessly. Our behaviors change, too. We know we are in that mode because we remember where we put our keys, that package we wanted to drop off, and Monday morning's … | Continue reading
“When people believe in boundaries, they become part of them.” [Don Cherry] Don Cherry was was an American jazz trumpeter known for his association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman in the late 50's. Unafraid of breaking away from convention, he became a pioneer of world fusion mu … | Continue reading
It could have been worse for all involved. In early 2006, the Interwebs were abuzz with talk of a little booklet William H. Swanson, the then Chairman and CEO of American defense contractor Raytheon, had authored. The spiral-bound booklet's title was Swanson's Unwritten Rules of … | Continue reading
“Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave. Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us.” Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet is up there with his Letters … | Continue reading
Hierarchy is a fundamental aspect of social life -- it often emerges spontaneously from the interaction between people. In organizations, hierarchies are both implicit and explicit. We can identify two major dimensions in social hierarchy -- power and status. The differences betw … | Continue reading
“People who have better control of their attention, emotions, and actions are better off almost any way you look at it. They are happier and healthier. Their relationships are more satisfying and last longer. They make more money and go further in their careers. They are better a … | Continue reading
“It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction.” [Harry Frankfurt] Harry G. Frankfurt is one of the world's most influential moral philosophers. In a deeply satisfying book On Bullshit, which he followed wi … | Continue reading
According to Umberto Eco, “We like lists because we don't want to die.” He says lists create culture: “The list is the origin of culture. It’s part of the history of art and literature. What does culture want? To make infinity comprehensible. It also wants to create order — not a … | Continue reading