Not for dog lovers…
A Child’s Search for the Perfect Deity, a Slight Detour
The problem with the status quo is that it works for enough people. Overcoming it requires a significant sacrifice.
Have I learned enough to show them a different way, or will I lead them astray? Will it matter?
Are you rushing to be last in in line? Our pre-COVID commutes were a hellish thing. Finding relief on the barber’s chair made you appreciate the simpler things. It made you realize how confined we are to the world. Maybe music can make us free. (Part 3)
When is it a poem? A song? Or just a rant? (The second excerpt from my book, “West of Western.”)
The first excerpt from my book “West of Western.” I plan to post all the chapters here for free reading. If you’d like a hard or digital copy, you can find it on Amazon.
A reflection on modern finance history: What if you created a crypto backed by something tangible, like stuffed (plush) toy animals?
The Freakonomics podcast recently started covering the topic of what it takes to be CEO, and was happy to hear that there is no secret formula, zilch. Though I couldn’t help but feel like yelling the whole time “you are asking the wrong question!” I think they could have spared us the other follow up episodes to this series - while entertaining, I feel that exploration has come at the expense of a deeper analysis. There are many other factors to consider – like composition of support teams, the organization’s history, and current economic conditions. How then do we end, or least tone down, the infatuation on leadership?
A moment of self-reflection after the prospect of my family growing by 33.3% (i.e. having a second child) becomes more real. There is more nuance behind the question of whether people change or not. At this point of my life I've found that there is a core and life's events add layers. The changes to the core depend on the significance of life events, with the added layer that we continue to evolve. This idea made me think of first and second order changes.
In a random flutter, my mind tried to find a connection between origami and financial markets. The complex software behind computer-aided origami design leads to the creation of some amazing origami figures. It's like putting that single sheet of paper on steroids. The idea of ETFs and increased stock correlations crept into my mind, then Mandelbrot... so I kept chasing that thought.
How should a society approach education given the diversity of the student body it is trying to serve? Focusing the outcome on learning growth instead of specific, prescribed metrics. The model of step-by-step movement through grades on an annual basis (i.e. school year) feels odd and outdated. If learning happens more organic and at different intervals (pace and amount), then the framework and models should reflect reality instead of the outdated widget model.
It's a good enough business to buy, why bother trying to integrate it and risk disrupting it? What is the risk of spending your time changing a good thing and running your best people out of the business?
I'm having trouble remembering why I put up with you NFL, and it's not because of the obvious. I think you have a flow and competitive problem. I started wondering where you may have gone wrong, put aside all the obvious reason and considered them side distractions. I offer my humble (un-researched) analysis.