Compulsively worrying about sleeping is one of the primary causes of insomnia. People with sleep problems tend to worry about being able to go to sleep which in turn makes it harder for them to go to sleep. Harvard professor Daniel Wegner calls this “the ironic process of mental control.” People become increasingly anxious as…
There’s a classic story called ‘prepare three envelopes’ which provides advice on leadership transitions. There are versions which apply to business, government, and sports teams but they essentially all have the same advice. Here’s a version: A new executive is hired to take over a struggling business unit. During the handover meeting, the previous executive…
Sometimes I’m directionally accurate but not precise. My lack of precision isn’t an attempt to mislead or misinform. After all, my motto is words matter so I usually choose my words carefully. Instead, this imprecision stems from the desire to tell a compelling story or when my memory is cloudy. Here’s a recent real-life example:…
“We are made to persist. That’s how we find out who we are.” ― Tobias Wolff Earlier in my career, I preached the Silicon Valley mantra of “fail fast, fail often” as a way of encouraging incumbents to take more risk. I even catalogued motivational quotes about failure. Over time, I realized that failure was…
Have you ever done something completely embarrassing and assumed that everyone is staring at you, only to later discover that no one really noticed? The reality is that other people pay much less attention to you than you think. This is called the Spotlight Effect. The spotlight effect is the tendency for people to overestimate…
If you want someone to achieve a goal, you should give them a head start – even if that head start is really just an illusion. Loyalty programs are based on the idea that consumers are more likely to repeat purchase if they are given incentives to reach specific goals with well-defined rewards. A classic…
If you’ve listened to a talk from a tech company over the last few years, you’ve almost certainly heard someone proclaim that data is the new oil. The phrase is widely attributed to British mathematician Clive Humby way back in 2006 who explained: Data is the new oil. It’s valuable, but if unrefined it cannot…
If you were to ask people in the technology industry to name the best commercial ever made, the majority would likely cite “1984” from Apple. That commercial, which aired during the 1984 Super Bowl, introduced the Macintosh personal computer. In fact, Advertising Age ranked “1984” as first on its list of the 50 greatest commercials….
I stumbled on an insightful definition of being stupid from Adam Robinson: Stupidity is overlooking or dismissing [conspicuously] crucial information. Robinson argues stupidity is not the opposite of intelligence. Instead, stupidity is impaired judgement due to one or more factors: Rushing or urgency Information overload Physical or emotional stress Intense focus on an outcome Being…
During a recent catch-up, a close friend pointed out another person in the restaurant and commented that it was a little early for him to be two sheets to the wind. I was amused – not because 7pm was indeed early for someone to be drunk in a restaurant – but because I had always…