I shared this earlier on LinkedIn, but thought that it was worth sharing it here too as a reminder to myself: Six Myths of Product Development I came across the article above while researching why a team that traditionally does great work may sometimes stumble (yes, mine). The past few weeks had been a whirlwind... Continue Reading →
The need for theory in prediction models
I'd like to share this wonderful quip by philosopher Robert Long, that was quoted in the (also insightful and actually pretty good) book A Richer Life by Philip Roscoe: Let's say that in early 2001 I formulate a theory to the effect that there is a Constant Tolkienian Force in the Universe that produces a Tolkien film... Continue Reading →
Playing Baseball without a Bat – a great example of effective statistical visualisation
Came across a very interesting and persuasive video on baseball via Kottke.org today. It's a great example of what an interesting question, effective visualisation, and some statistical knowledge can do. The question the video seeks to answer is the following: what would happen if baseball player Barry Bonds, who happened to play one of his greatest... Continue Reading →
On meritocracy, luck, and giving back
Kottke's post on meritocracy, a concept that I had in my younger days considered infallible, reminded me that even those of us who have worked hard and achieved so-called "success" have much to owe to "luck". Even the smartest, hardest working, most beautiful of us all, would likely have not fared well, had we been born... Continue Reading →
What you do determines what you see
Author's note: This post was originally titled "Déformation Professionnelle", but I had trouble understanding it myself and have renamed it for easier future reference! This post in three words: Profession -> Perception -> Truth The following text is taken from the excellent book The Art of Thinking Clearly, by Rolf Dobelli. A man takes out... Continue Reading →
A Chinese perspective on business
I'm currently reading a book called Dedication - The Huawei Philosophy of Human Resource Management, by Huang Weiwei. I'm only in the first chapter, but I'm already in love with it. It's so, so different from the most western-centric business books that I'm used to. I'm just going to leave you with a couple of... Continue Reading →
Great, but incompatible
It's painful how sometimes you can put in lots of effort and sacrifice into a project (or a career) in the hope that it will pay off, only for it to fall through in the last moment. It's worse when the motivation that was used sustain that effort was based on the fact that "there's... Continue Reading →
If it’s not a ‘Hell, yes!’, it’s a ‘No.’
The title of this post, "if it's not a 'Hell, yes!', it's a 'No.'" comes from a Tim Ferriss book I'm currently reading called Tools of Titans, and is one of Ferriss' favourite rules of thumb. Here's a little more context (Ferriss is quoting Derek Sivers here): Because most of us say yes to too... Continue Reading →
Business Experimentation
Imagine for a moment that you want to implement a new sales initiative that you think will transform your business. The problem is, you're not too sure if it'd work. You decide, prudently, that maybe a pilot test would be good: let's roll out the initiative to just a small subset of the company, the... Continue Reading →
Developing a Culture
Seth Godin wrote a wonderful post on how we sometimes need an external push (through laws, policies, cultural guardrails) to do what's best for us. It can be basically summed up by the following statements (from the post): We know that wearing a bicycle helmet can save us from years in the hospital, but some... Continue Reading →
Donn, fragments 