Behind any great product is a dumpster full of mediocre products. The one you see is the result of tiresome work that you often do not see. It isn’t just that the creators are better than average (though that is probably true too), but rather that they set their goal higher and work harder, longer and with more resolve. Creating greatness is an inefficient task. Behind the record breaking four minute mile there were four years of training. No one remembers the first man to run a 4:10 mile. Breaking 4:00 takes four years, but it is remembered for 400.
Third quarter was not good for reading. Of the 6.5 books I should have read, I only completed 1.5. I think I hit a stretch there where I didn’t read anything for a whole month. Time to get back on the horse. To date this year I’ve read: The Omnivore’s Dilemma Death on the Nile No Country for Old Men Fluke A Scanner Darkly Managing Brand Equity The Kite Runner 7 Men: And the Secret of Their Greatness I am currently reading: Life of Pi
It is faster for me to split a small pile of wood than to teach someone to use an axe. But to stockpile wood for the town to last the winter, we will need many axes swinging. Mine will be solely for instruction.
I did it. I stepped foot at the top of the tallest peak in the contiguous United States of America. There isn’t a ton to report here, this was a fairly uneventful challenge. Recalling back to when I decided on it, one of the main reasons I selected this hike as my challenge was because it was the least intensive item on my bucket list. Once I got a permit, and thanks to not sustaining any injuries this year, it was a fairly low risk endeavor. I considered finding ways to make it more challenging, bringing my 18 month old son along, doing it with nothing but a knife, trying to set a record – but, I stuck to my decision and kept things simple. Now all of this isn’t to say hiking the 22 mile round trip which climbs over 6k ft of elevation was easy. It was physically difficult. I was out of breath,
‘I can’t afford it’ – a common and well understood phrase that clearly ties a rejection to reasons regarding finances. Its counterpart, ‘I can afford it’ is a little more complicated. I offer my thoughts on what a number of hypothetical people mean when they say it. 1) The Hopeless I am able to get someone to give me the item in exchange for nothing but a promise to make future payments with interest. I am borrowing the full value and, if I did the math, I would not see a clear path to me being able to actually make the full payments. If I did the math I would probably also see that I will end up paying much more than the listed cost of the item. Most likely they will be reclaiming the item shortly and I will have wasted any money I gave them up to that point. 2) The Naive Optimist I am
I’ve long wrestled mentally with the idea of ‘normal’ and what it means to to fit that definition. To be a part of the middle section of the bell curve. To be one with the masses. I don’t think anyone in my acquaintance would describe me as wholly normal, but when facing decisions I often ask myself if I want to move closer to it or away. Should I reject or embrace the long tail? There is a part of my history where this dilemma surfaced itself in shallow ways. In college I stopped liking bands once they became popular enough to sell out shows at my favorite local venues. It became a matter of principle rather than just musical tastes. But, is liking only obscure bands solely a point of elitism? Or is there in fact value to that thought process? Even if the band and music did not change,
I read 6.5 books in the first half of this year. Half of what I needed to be on pace, meaning I’m 6.5 books behind schedule. To date this year I’ve read: The Omnivore’s Dilemma Death on the Nile No Country for Old Men Fluke A Scanner Darkly Managing Brand Equity I am currently reading: The Kite Runner Looking at the positive side, I’m doing pretty well at my sub-goal of reading more fiction. I wanted to split things 50/50, since I usually tend towards non-fiction. Of the 6.5 books I’ve read so far, 4.5 of those were fiction. I’ve been enjoying my selections so far. Most of them have also been made into a movie – I’ve made a habit of watching them afterwards while the book is still fresh in my mind to compare the two. Another positive, I am also doing better than last year when looking at books read as opposed to
creating excellencI got to go on a tour of the Pixar studios this week. A friend & former colleague now works there and invited me for lunch. The campus is awesome – everything about it exudes the excellence you would expect from Pixar. I loved seeing first hand the the strength of their culture. The company doesn’t just create great stories, but it falls in love with its own characters. They are present everywhere on campus in the form of sculpture, paintings, lego, etc. That shouldn’t be surprising if you’ve ever spotted hidden references in one Pixar film to a previous film – they like to reference their successes. One thing really stood out to me, though. As I entered the campus I walked past a giant logo for Cars 2. I didn’t even think to take a picture of it, but found one online so you can see what I’m
“I am here NOT to sell what I produce but I am here to solve a set of customer problems that I want to own.” – Ranjay Gurati, Harvard Business School This is a great way of looking at product management. Our goal isn’t to build something and sell it. Our goal isn’t even to build what customers want. Our goal is to take ownership of a certain set of problems for a certain set of people and then solve them in the best way possible. Ideally in doing so, you create enough value for them that they can afford to then pay you for your services, which is how you put bread on your table. I read a quote from a former Googler recently that explained how their job in search was to solve every customer problem. If the customer couldn’t spell, it was the product managers problem, if the
When I started thinking about rest, I had this vision in my head of a spectrum where rest was at one end and productivity was at the other. That made sense to me. You were either working hard or you were resting. I realize now that I had it wrong. Rest & productivity are two separate axis, like this. All things we can do with your time fall somewhere in this space. But before I can talk more about how we can & should spend our time, I need to define the terms. Productivity: That which fulfills your purpose or helps you get closer to it. I had a limited view of this term when I started thinking about it. I was thinking of productive as synonymous with efficient – getting a lot done – but this is in fact a huge misconception. You could be getting a lot done or be