What can we do to get out of your way? I’ve shared a bit about Danny Meyer (founder of Shake Shack, among other restaurants) before, as he has some amazing insights on leadership. In a recent podcast with Adam Grant, he shared a few more gems. One in particular was a quote about hiring. Danny believes in hiring great people and then allowing them to be great. Specifically, he says:“If you hire great people, get out of their way and let them succeed. Yes, give them the tools, but don’t do stup...

What can we do to get out of your way? I’ve shared a bit about Danny Meyer (founder of Shake Shack, among other restaurants) before, as he has some amazing insights on leadership. In a recent podcast with Adam Grant, he shared a few more gems. One in particular was a quote about hiring. Danny believes in hiring great people and then allowing them to be great. Specifically, he says:“If you hire great people, get out of their way and let them succeed. Yes, give them the tools, but don’t do stup...

Your calendar must be telling the truth I’m a stickler for my calendar. If I’m on a call and someone asks if I’m available next Thursday, I want the calendar to be able to tell me exactly how that day is looking. Problems arise when I fail to put something on there (“No worries, I’ll just remember that”) and then lose track of it in the heat of the moment. I often will even tweak the calendar throughout the day to reflect what really happened in case I need to go back to it later, though my p...

Your calendar must be telling the truth I’m a stickler for my calendar. If I’m on a call and someone asks if I’m available next Thursday, I want the calendar to be able to tell me exactly how that day is looking. Problems arise when I fail to put something on there (“No worries, I’ll just remember that”) and then lose track of it in the heat of the moment. I often will even tweak the calendar throughout the day to reflect what really happened in case I need to go back to it later, though my p...

What books do you like? Another great segment from the recent “Founders” episode about Sam Walton is related to finding ways to hire creative people. More specifically, how do you determine the creativity of someone during an interview? Here’s a bit from the show:One of the best ways to find creative people is to ask a simple question. What books do you like?* I’ve never met a creative person in my life that didn’t respond with enthusiasm to a question about reading habits. Which books people...

What books do you like? Another great segment from the recent “Founders” episode about Sam Walton is related to finding ways to hire creative people. More specifically, how do you determine the creativity of someone during an interview? Here’s a bit from the show:One of the best ways to find creative people is to ask a simple question. What books do you like?* I’ve never met a creative person in my life that didn’t respond with enthusiasm to a question about reading habits. Which books people...

The Sunday Summary: Respect, looking bad, and calendars that never lie In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week. Mon, August 5: Know, respect, trust “Know, like, trust” –> “Know, respect, trust”? Tue, August 6: Founders shouldn’t be hireable “Really, the way I think about a founder is like you’re developing skills that you can’t hire for. You’re gonna hire for everything else, but you shouldn’t be hireable.”...

The Sunday Summary: Respect, looking bad, and calendars that never lie In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week. Mon, August 5: Know, respect, trust “Know, like, trust” –> “Know, respect, trust”? Tue, August 6: Founders shouldn’t be hireable “Really, the way I think about a founder is like you’re developing skills that you can’t hire for. You’re gonna hire for everything else, but you shouldn’t be hireable.”...

Using RSS to sniff out AI While RSS has almost completely disappeared from the tech landscape, I’m still a big fan of it. I get the majority of my information via RSS, and it’s fantastic. If you’re not familiar with RSS, it’s essentially a way to subscribe to news sites and blogs. It’s not unlike getting email updates on every new story they publish, but instead of my email inbox they all go into my RSS reader and I catch up when I have time. I’ve been using RSS for a few decades, though I’ve...

Using RSS to sniff out AI While RSS has almost completely disappeared from the tech landscape, I’m still a big fan of it. I get the majority of my information via RSS, and it’s fantastic. If you’re not familiar with RSS, it’s essentially a way to subscribe to news sites and blogs. It’s not unlike getting email updates on every new story they publish, but instead of my email inbox they all go into my RSS reader and I catch up when I have time. I’ve been using RSS for a few decades, though I’ve...

Bad days are better measures than good ones We’ve all heard the phrase “if you can’t handle me at my worst, you don’t deserve me at my best“, but it seems to me to be more of a red flag than actual advice. How someone behaves “at their worst” is often what matters the most. A few years ago I talked about people who are consistently good versus those those are intermittently excellent. Consistently good is almost always better than intermittently excellent. Being excellent from time to time is...

Bad days are better measures than good ones We’ve all heard the phrase “if you can’t handle me at my worst, you don’t deserve me at my best“, but it seems to me to be more of a red flag than actual advice. How someone behaves “at their worst” is often what matters the most. A few years ago I talked about people who are consistently good versus those those are intermittently excellent. Consistently good is almost always better than intermittently excellent. Being excellent from time to time is...

The Sunday Summary: They love to read, power poses, and bad days In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week. Mon, August 12: The evolution of websites “Websites won’t go away, but they will need to evolve. When humans visit websites, the content could be AI-generated and personalized to the individual user. The era of thousands of web pages is no longer needed.” Tue, August 13: Reducing attachment “Attachment....

The Sunday Summary: They love to read, power poses, and bad days In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week. Mon, August 12: The evolution of websites “Websites won’t go away, but they will need to evolve. When humans visit websites, the content could be AI-generated and personalized to the individual user. The era of thousands of web pages is no longer needed.” Tue, August 13: Reducing attachment “Attachment....

Reducing attachment Something I’ve worked hard at over the last few years is reducing attachment to my opinions. As Daniel Kahneman famously said, “I do enjoy having been wrong, because it means I am now less wrong than I was before.“ The easy example is with mobile phones. I’m an Android guy, but I’d happily switch to iPhone next time if it made more sense to me. I think Android is fantastic, but I avoid being too attached to it. A bigger concern is with politics; people get too attached to ...

Reducing attachment Something I’ve worked hard at over the last few years is reducing attachment to my opinions. As Daniel Kahneman famously said, “I do enjoy having been wrong, because it means I am now less wrong than I was before.“ The easy example is with mobile phones. I’m an Android guy, but I’d happily switch to iPhone next time if it made more sense to me. I think Android is fantastic, but I avoid being too attached to it. A bigger concern is with politics; people get too attached to ...

The evolution of websites The internet is changing rapidly, thanks to big shifts in social media and the ongoing wave of AI. Websites have largely remained the same in recent years, staying strong as the home for every business on the internet. I don’t think that will be changing anytime soon, but the nature of the sites themselves may begin to shift. In a recent blog post, Jeremiah Owyang had some interesting predictions for where AI could be leading, I found two to be quite interesting. The...

The evolution of websites The internet is changing rapidly, thanks to big shifts in social media and the ongoing wave of AI. Websites have largely remained the same in recent years, staying strong as the home for every business on the internet. I don’t think that will be changing anytime soon, but the nature of the sites themselves may begin to shift. In a recent blog post, Jeremiah Owyang had some interesting predictions for where AI could be leading, I found two to be quite interesting. The...

Power poses actually generate power I tend to view the world through a very pragmatic lens, seeing things practically rather than theoretically. That’s why this section from Michael Port’s “Steal the Show” struck me so oddly. From the book:You know how body language affects how others see you, but it may also change how you see yourself. Harvard University social psychologist Amy Cuddy has done extensive research on how “power posing,” standing in a posture of confidence even when you don’t f...

Power poses actually generate power I tend to view the world through a very pragmatic lens, seeing things practically rather than theoretically. That’s why this section from Michael Port’s “Steal the Show” struck me so oddly. From the book:You know how body language affects how others see you, but it may also change how you see yourself. Harvard University social psychologist Amy Cuddy has done extensive research on how “power posing,” standing in a posture of confidence even when you don’t f...

They all love to read I recently decided to dig in to understand the reading habits of some of the most successful people in recent decades, and quickly found one common thread: they all love to read. All of them. I have no doubt that there are exceptions, but my initial digging didn’t find any. Here are ten people that I looked up, with some notes on their reading habits and a link to more. Elon Musk “Whenever anyone asks how he learned to build rockets, Musk replies that he read books. He d...

They all love to read I recently decided to dig in to understand the reading habits of some of the most successful people in recent decades, and quickly found one common thread: they all love to read. All of them. I have no doubt that there are exceptions, but my initial digging didn’t find any. Here are ten people that I looked up, with some notes on their reading habits and a link to more. Elon Musk “Whenever anyone asks how he learned to build rockets, Musk replies that he read books. He d...

Never manage people who don’t need to be managed I often see posts on Reddit that follow a similar path:An employee works hard at their company.They find new ways to do their job more efficiently.Management decides to tighten down on exactly how they should do their job.Things therefore become less efficient, they lose clients, and the employee quits.While I certainly appreciate that processes exist for a reason and there are times to square things back up, when people are working hard to get...

Never manage people who don’t need to be managed I often see posts on Reddit that follow a similar path:An employee works hard at their company.They find new ways to do their job more efficiently.Management decides to tighten down on exactly how they should do their job.Things therefore become less efficient, they lose clients, and the employee quits.While I certainly appreciate that processes exist for a reason and there are times to square things back up, when people are working hard to get...