Read the Words

Digitally speaking, writing or blogging is one of the coolest and easiest ways to share thoughts and insights (often referred to as opinions) that are outside the usual. Look for fresh insights and stories each week.

The Art of Not Forcing

Have you ever thought about flow? I know, it sounds woo-woo, doesn’t it? But bear with me. Some old writings on Taoism crossed my desk recently. Specifically, something I hadn’t read in decades, and I read the same passage three times. In Chinese, Wu Wei is written 無為. The first character means “without” or “absence.”...

Apprentices to Ripening

Last week, I argued that efficiency is a manufacturing concept we swallowed whole and have been choking on ever since. This week, the harder question. If that’s the wrong metric, what do we replace it with? I want to start with a word. Ripening. Not growing. Not scaling. Not optimizing. Ripening. The kind of...

The Lies We Swallowed

The other day, someone who will one day be a client asked me if my diagnostic process could make her more efficient. I sat with that for a while. Then I wrote back: Efficiency is a word that should be banned for all time Particularly when it comes to humans. Here’s where it came from....

Fifteen Years Too Late (Don’t Be Me)

One of the hardest lessons I’ve ever had to learn is how to graciously receive. Today I’m asking you to learn it faster than I did. Because your heart will rejoice, your shoulders will lift, and you will stand so much stronger in your own skin. Don’t be like me. Please don’t be like me....

What If They’re All Someone’s Child?

Is there someone who crossed your path and permanently altered the way you see the world? Not a mentor you sought out, but someone who found you at exactly the right moment, with exactly the right idea? I never met Bob Chapman personally. I stumbled across him the way the best discoveries happen: the right...

What AI Can’t Give Your Kids (and why that’s actually good news)

Everyone is talking about the jobs. Which jobs AI will take. Which jobs are safe. Which skills to learn, which to abandon, which to pivot toward before the window closes. It’s a reasonable conversation. It’s also missing the point by a considerable margin. Because entry-level jobs were never really about the work. Yes, they paid...

Forget Freezing Their Heads. Preserve Their Thinking Instead

Behind this button is the accumulation of a lifetime of work. Nearly twenty books, countless lectures and papers, and who knows how many notes. Written and spoken by one of the world’s smartest brains. (Not my superlative. That’s straight from Forbes.) Ask anything. And listen. Really listen. To the answer. Mind-blowing. Ai Richard I’m...

What Happens When There’s Nobody Left to Conquer?

YES, I know there are multiple wars going on. NO, this is NOT specifically about any of them. But if you see similarities …… Did you hear that Unilever is buying McCormick’s spices? It’s a bit complicated. Unilever is spinning off its food business to merge with spices leader McCormick & Company in a ginormous...

The Grudge that Outlived its Reason

Last week was Easter. For Christians, it’s the season of atonement, forgiveness, and renewal. Even if you don’t follow that tradition and you simply feel some kinship with a source greater than yourself, you likely understand forgiveness at its most fundamental level. It has nothing to do with the other person. It has everything to...

Your Personal SPAM and FOMO Are Wrecking the Planet. Yes, Yours.

Here is an uncomfortable idea to sit with. The climate crisis is not just a story about oil companies, corrupt politicians, and the occasional billionaire with a superyacht. It is also a story about you. About me. About the completely normal, socially rewarded things we do every single day without a second thought. Stay with...