Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
The power of basics
Big topic!
I was inspired by an edition of the Harvard Business Ideacast I listed to this week. It's here.
Basic concept is one that I share with Greg Unruh. When looking to solve some problem, look at how nature solves it, and find / devise an analogue. It's very much worth a listen for the concepts of economic impacts and sustainability. But for this post I key in on a simple concept which Greg opens with. He describes and observation that, in nature, most of everything we see and "are" come from 4 basic elements. So out of the whole periodic table, only 4 elements are combined, decay, and recombine into the multitude of organic forms on earth ( and elsewhere ). I immediately thought of how most rock and blues is composed from 3 or 4 basic chords.
That same night, my guitar teacher, out of the blue ( no pun ) mentioned a funny video he saw by the Axis of Awesome, in which that band played through 35 pop songs using 4 chords, and never varied the progression.
It'll be interesting to keep this concept in mind and see how widely it applies. In IT we frequently bring up the KISS principal. ( Keep it simple, stupid! ). Hard to do when technologies don't blend well, new ones come out each day, and our tasks revolve around rapid integration rather than elegant ( sustainable ), rationalized creation.
I was inspired by an edition of the Harvard Business Ideacast I listed to this week. It's here.
Basic concept is one that I share with Greg Unruh. When looking to solve some problem, look at how nature solves it, and find / devise an analogue. It's very much worth a listen for the concepts of economic impacts and sustainability. But for this post I key in on a simple concept which Greg opens with. He describes and observation that, in nature, most of everything we see and "are" come from 4 basic elements. So out of the whole periodic table, only 4 elements are combined, decay, and recombine into the multitude of organic forms on earth ( and elsewhere ). I immediately thought of how most rock and blues is composed from 3 or 4 basic chords.
That same night, my guitar teacher, out of the blue ( no pun ) mentioned a funny video he saw by the Axis of Awesome, in which that band played through 35 pop songs using 4 chords, and never varied the progression.
It'll be interesting to keep this concept in mind and see how widely it applies. In IT we frequently bring up the KISS principal. ( Keep it simple, stupid! ). Hard to do when technologies don't blend well, new ones come out each day, and our tasks revolve around rapid integration rather than elegant ( sustainable ), rationalized creation.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Drinking Seawater
There are so many great quotes from various distinguished thinkers on the value of a plan. T. Boone Pickins father told him "A fool with a plan will beat a genius with no plan every day of the week." Another I just read was "Show me a clerk with a plan and I'll show you a CEO. SHow me a CEO with no plan and I'll show you a clerk." Didn't catch who it wrote this. Will research and update if I can find it.
The concept is still something I think about daily. Especially important in this age where we have a million distractions ( such as blogs, podcasts, itunes, facebook, etc...) Here's my take.
Going through a day, a week, or a life with no goals leads to destructive self-indulgence. I think we've all noticed that "doing whatever", doing only what comes to mind, and doing only "what you want to do" does NOT lead to fulfillment. And yet it is still our natural tendency. We like to take care of our own needs, seek "satisfaction" by doing, buying, eating whatever we want. My general observation is that this leads to momentary, temporary pleasure, but not to the true sense of pride, confidence and accomplishment that comes from doing the difficult.
If we set goals, we have to consider and plan actions from among a virtually unlimited range of options. Goal-setting leads us to evaluate all these possible directions, and "value" them. It forces us to assess what is "the right" thing to do. When we set goals, if we truly believe in them, we will endure much hardship, discomfort, and inconvenience to attain the goal. In doing so, we often discover or develop new abilities, which we need to overcome some obstacle. This leads to internalized sense of strength, which builds confidence. Often THIS set of experiences end up being more important than the actual attainment of the goal itself.
So in setting and working toward difficult goals we often experience the opposite of the comforts that we will otherwise seek. But the result is actual growth, strength and health. Achieving these qualities gives true comfort. You achieve the opposite of where you started. Whereas constantly seeking immediate "comfort" and "pleasure", we will neither achieve any goal, nor discover what we are truly capable of. We will not build health, but instead suffer illness. I liken this to consuming endless food and sweets in a sedentary lifestyle. Doing so will cause you to gain weight, lose strength, and probably develop diabetes or worse. So again, we seem to achieve the opposite of what we initially take as our first steps.
Saying another way, seeking only self-fulfillment, and the lazy path, is like drinking seawater. It is wet but it will only make you more thirsty.
The concept is still something I think about daily. Especially important in this age where we have a million distractions ( such as blogs, podcasts, itunes, facebook, etc...) Here's my take.
Going through a day, a week, or a life with no goals leads to destructive self-indulgence. I think we've all noticed that "doing whatever", doing only what comes to mind, and doing only "what you want to do" does NOT lead to fulfillment. And yet it is still our natural tendency. We like to take care of our own needs, seek "satisfaction" by doing, buying, eating whatever we want. My general observation is that this leads to momentary, temporary pleasure, but not to the true sense of pride, confidence and accomplishment that comes from doing the difficult.
If we set goals, we have to consider and plan actions from among a virtually unlimited range of options. Goal-setting leads us to evaluate all these possible directions, and "value" them. It forces us to assess what is "the right" thing to do. When we set goals, if we truly believe in them, we will endure much hardship, discomfort, and inconvenience to attain the goal. In doing so, we often discover or develop new abilities, which we need to overcome some obstacle. This leads to internalized sense of strength, which builds confidence. Often THIS set of experiences end up being more important than the actual attainment of the goal itself.
So in setting and working toward difficult goals we often experience the opposite of the comforts that we will otherwise seek. But the result is actual growth, strength and health. Achieving these qualities gives true comfort. You achieve the opposite of where you started. Whereas constantly seeking immediate "comfort" and "pleasure", we will neither achieve any goal, nor discover what we are truly capable of. We will not build health, but instead suffer illness. I liken this to consuming endless food and sweets in a sedentary lifestyle. Doing so will cause you to gain weight, lose strength, and probably develop diabetes or worse. So again, we seem to achieve the opposite of what we initially take as our first steps.
Saying another way, seeking only self-fulfillment, and the lazy path, is like drinking seawater. It is wet but it will only make you more thirsty.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Being
It is much easier to learn how to do something than how to be something.
And no matter how good you are at the doing, success and happiness will be limited if your being is not proper. A professional "anything", who is extremely skilled but impossible to get along with, for instance, will lose a job that a lesser-skilled, but pleasant competitor will gain or retain.
And one of the most important "beings" is to "be" self-confident. How much easier is it to learn calculus, than to learn self-confidence. Is "being" learned through the satisfaction from many successful "doings"? While excellence in "doing" is active, and involves conscious repetition of logical steps, "being" is acquired whether we are aware or not. Some of being seems to be nature, but one can improve the being by certain doing. However it seems that to hone the being is a 360 degree operation, where doing is much less demanding.
What is your experience?
And no matter how good you are at the doing, success and happiness will be limited if your being is not proper. A professional "anything", who is extremely skilled but impossible to get along with, for instance, will lose a job that a lesser-skilled, but pleasant competitor will gain or retain.
And one of the most important "beings" is to "be" self-confident. How much easier is it to learn calculus, than to learn self-confidence. Is "being" learned through the satisfaction from many successful "doings"? While excellence in "doing" is active, and involves conscious repetition of logical steps, "being" is acquired whether we are aware or not. Some of being seems to be nature, but one can improve the being by certain doing. However it seems that to hone the being is a 360 degree operation, where doing is much less demanding.
What is your experience?
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Self Preservation
Among the numerous vivid ideas in the excellent cover story, "Risk", from New York Times Magazine 04-Jan-09 ( http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/04/magazine/04risk-t.html) was this one from Aaron Brown of Hedge Fund AQR:
...in crisis "you want to know who can kill you and whether or not they will and who you can kill if necessary. You need to have an emergency backup plan that assumes everyone is out to get you. In peacetime you think about other people's intentions. In wartime, only their capabilities matter. VaR is a peacetime statistic."
The article is in the context of, and focused on the VaR risk quantification system. But above that is a basic concept of competition for survival with parties who "in peacetime" may be peers or even allies, but whose "capabilities" to impact your own survival are ultimately important in crisis.
How far is that concept from how governments work across the globe? How far is that from how individuals work in the corporate office?
...in crisis "you want to know who can kill you and whether or not they will and who you can kill if necessary. You need to have an emergency backup plan that assumes everyone is out to get you. In peacetime you think about other people's intentions. In wartime, only their capabilities matter. VaR is a peacetime statistic."
The article is in the context of, and focused on the VaR risk quantification system. But above that is a basic concept of competition for survival with parties who "in peacetime" may be peers or even allies, but whose "capabilities" to impact your own survival are ultimately important in crisis.
How far is that concept from how governments work across the globe? How far is that from how individuals work in the corporate office?
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