The Curious Engineer

A Learning a Day

2019–2022

1,460 posts

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2022 365

December 2022

  1. The Ather Scooter
  2. Unnoticed
  3. 10 questions – Annual Reflection 2022
  4. The first step to getting some things done
  5. Strokes of luck
  6. Fire alarm batteries
  7. Much ado
  8. What makes life meaningful?
  9. The wisdom indicator
  10. The 2 questions
  11. The ocean and the question
  12. Television over exercise
  13. Kindness of strangers
  14. The learning trade-off
  15. Thinking and reading
  16. AI Bias and Lensa
  17. Driving at night in the fog
  18. A corridor with motion activated lighting
  19. Communication and trust
  20. Speaking about referees
  21. Successful days and missteps
  22. Back bencher or front bencher?
  23. You’re right
  24. Inconvenience today
  25. Socially obligated
  26. Income and experienced well-being
  27. The freemium coconut water strategy
  28. Rarely as good or bad
  29. The wisest mind (with a catch)
  30. Victoria’s Secret

November 2022

  1. Grown-up relationships
  2. On the ball and off the ball
  3. Tchotchkes
  4. Delegation is not management
  5. In service of the future
  6. Hoped for 3 things
  7. 85 per cent
  8. A metric for our mental health
  9. The biggest execution challenge organizations face
  10. Too easily, too lightly
  11. Worries and celebrations
  12. Planning and the plan
  13. The quality of our questions
  14. To be of use by Marge Piercy
  15. The timbres and variations
  16. Please get your act in better order
  17. HVAC -> Heat pumps
  18. The law of painful cleanups
  19. The coldest village on earth
  20. Bad weather
  21. Meeting effectiveness and urgency
  22. Responsibility and skills
  23. Moving from anxiety to action
  24. Unspoken and unclarified expectations
  25. Free couch to paid couch optimization
  26. Money and class
  27. Moving goalposts
  28. The simplest way to waste a day
  29. Amazon Music to Amazon Prime
  30. Dilip Mahalanabis

October 2022

  1. Making good players great
  2. The merchant in Baghdad
  3. Surprise and learning
  4. Controlling the fire
  5. Charity – redemption and liberation
  6. The comfort zone decision
  7. Yelling
  8. The rules of friendship
  9. Facetime on Jetsons
  10. Life in three words
  11. The 13.8 km run
  12. The stick-on number plate holder
  13. Graduation
  14. The last word
  15. The delivery window discount
  16. Careful the wish you make
  17. Won’t feel like opportunity
  18. Nail in the tire
  19. Secret ingredient soup
  20. The 3 exponential technology transitions
  21. Becoming the go to person and looking at source data
  22. Education in the playground
  23. Laughing for the same joke
  24. The stars
  25. The downside that’s easy to overlook
  26. Tipping points
  27. Behavior change and check ins
  28. Your understanding of a domain
  29. Understanding the Patagonia move
  30. Anxiety, thought, and action
  31. 5 lessons from buying a home

September 2022

  1. The jar of marbles
  2. Trying things you haven’t tried before
  3. The self-love-care paradox
  4. Resetting macro expectations
  5. Letting our past be part of us
  6. Attempting to explain something complex in writing
  7. Satisfaction with the process
  8. The tension that forces learning
  9. Requiring a response
  10. Make your bed
  11. Checklists – growth mindset in action
  12. Embracing imperfections
  13. The 1 major project heuristic
  14. The first teacher
  15. Changing the horizon
  16. When there is doubt
  17. A conversation with Seth Godin – coming live this Friday
  18. Cutting through the noise of opinions
  19. Mrs. Vanaja Vimal
  20. Amazing Nature shows – Disneynature
  21. When we can’t seem to be able to take a break
  22. Face to Face
  23. Counting another person’s money
  24. Gardening on this journey
  25. Policy trade-offs and solar covered canals
  26. Unsustainable hard work
  27. Hetch Hetchy
  28. Mistakes
  29. Making decisions faster
  30. Requesting people we don’t know well for help

August 2022

  1. Values to virtues
  2. Closing an inactive account
  3. Big kids, bullies, and power
  4. Regularly overwhelmed
  5. The Code Breaker
  6. Not what they seem
  7. Feedback – 1% and 99%
  8. The choice map in one word
  9. Being in the driver seat of our journey
  10. Writing – why it matters and 5 steps to hone your craft
  11. Pain we can’t get rid of
  12. Clues that you might not be trying hard enough
  13. Business strategy x macroeconomic conditions
  14. Walking every day
  15. My Shot
  16. Systems and levers
  17. Incredible – the energy transition that is unfolding
  18. Errors of judgment
  19. 4 x 6 months
  20. Natural talent
  21. Awareness
  22. If it isn’t a hell yeah
  23. Notification settings
  24. The deeper we dig
  25. Disproportional reaction
  26. Best shop practice
  27. Process, outcomes, goals, systems
  28. Open book
  29. The license saga
  30. The “Breaking down a” series
  31. Self-confidence and paranoia

July 2022

  1. An ankle knock and 2 truths
  2. Constructiveness ratio
  3. Reframing the elevator problem
  4. Learning to win
  5. Internal confidence and Will
  6. The Ocean Cleanup Project – 100K kilos
  7. Rough and early
  8. Keeping a sense of humor
  9. The macro environment in Jul 2022 – a synthesis
  10. It makes no sense
  11. Tiredness and the test of learning
  12. What has become clearer
  13. Being Human by Naima Penniman
  14. Appreciation and the end
  15. Aspens and Pando
  16. Air conditioning and Ronald Reagan
  17. Better feedback questions
  18. James Webb and the pale blue dot
  19. Peace with the undone
  20. The hallucinated model world
  21. Mentality
  22. Parking in perpendicular spots
  23. Are we aligned on the problem?
  24. The Jim Sinegal story
  25. Dissatisfaction and productivity
  26. Inspiration from the Colorado river
  27. The return of the wolves and understanding ecosystems
  28. The price of consciousness
  29. Tiredness, mistakes, and optimism
  30. Public reactions to mistakes
  31. The first no

June 2022

  1. The end of day choice
  2. Advice from Yellowstone
  3. Advice from strangers
  4. Summoning the warrior
  5. Decision making principles rooted in dated assumptions
  6. Wonky circumstances
  7. Mishaps and memories
  8. Replying to the order confirmed email
  9. Trust and accountability
  10. The Leaded gasoline trail
  11. Something in the middle
  12. Bad luck?
  13. Paper by default
  14. Hello COVID, 2 reflections
  15. Appreciation and absence
  16. Will our plans change
  17. Giving advice and living it
  18. Life and laundry
  19. Ottm
  20. King Richard
  21. The librarian’s service
  22. Scma and phishng
  23. The toothpaste tradition
  24. Crisis
  25. The pursuit of less work
  26. LDA, PCS, BSM, PBD
  27. 7 Billion people and that one
  28. Two kinds of problems
  29. Getting marked as spam on my own email
  30. Where perspective begins

May 2022

  1. Notes on cold emails
  2. Burnout
  3. Harry’s Marketing Examples
  4. Encountering skeptics
  5. Short-form debate = low quality debate
  6. Buffer
  7. Uvalde
  8. Learning and love
  9. Facilitating team events – feat. icebergs, smiles, tears, and intensity
  10. The anatomy of a mistake and the response
  11. The S&P 500 – shifting horizons
  12. 15 minutes for a quick chat?
  13. Number translations
  14. Million seconds, billion seconds
  15. Investing truisms
  16. Integrity and momentum
  17. 30 thousand square foot
  18. The Power of Regret
  19. 14 years
  20. This or that?
  21. When you lead
  22. Renewal emails and good copy
  23. Burning Up
  24. Unlearning our instinct to minimize effort
  25. A full cup
  26. Leverage and trust
  27. Small things with great love
  28. Child mortality data and public health priorities
  29. Perspectives and stories
  30. Google Apps and user trust
  31. Holding two conflicting thoughts at once

April 2022

  1. The returned bag
  2. Kevin Kelly’s 103 bits of advice
  3. A reminder to change up the energy
  4. Humility and looking
  5. When there is doubt, there is no doubt
  6. The security check response
  7. 5 lessons – a synthesis of the Product Management series so far
  8. Think complexly, talk simply
  9. No amount of wealth
  10. Taste the success once
  11. Timebox it
  12. Comfort in solitude
  13. Two more stories
  14. Love and things that do not scale
  15. Purely for the reward
  16. That quick reply
  17. Writing habits of successful academics
  18. Attitude and responsiveness
  19. Prosthetic limbs, carbon fiber, and trade-offs
  20. System glitches and a personal finance takeaway
  21. More to lose
  22. 5 whys
  23. No prizes for spotting problems.
  24. What makes it unbearable
  25. Mechanical idiot
  26. The amount you keep
  27. Choosing the next IC PM role – one dimension that matters
  28. Q1 look back – self-care
  29. The circumstance or the response
  30. Absurdly, terrifyingly, insultingly short

March 2022

  1. The Wizard and the Prophet
  2. Wonderfully insoluble problems
  3. Two strokes of dumb luck
  4. Reverse parking
  5. We have a hole in the floor
  6. Stay on the bus
  7. Spirit
  8. Problems money can’t solve
  9. Career changes and managers
  10. Eyes on the road
  11. Building a compelling design vision
  12. What a person chooses to let bother them
  13. Clarity and ticket bookings
  14. V33
  15. Picking collaborators
  16. Mo’ money, mo’ problems
  17. Great managers
  18. An awesome UK COVID visualization
  19. I’ll be happy when
  20. A misnomer about learning
  21. Kintsugi
  22. Micromorts and nukes
  23. Frustrated, less kind
  24. FOMO to JOMO
  25. And that’s okay
  26. Let’s talk about Bruno
  27. David Attenborough
  28. When we’re feeling mentally out-of-sorts
  29. The hoverboard prize
  30. Unexpected joy
  31. The more consequential the decision

February 2022

  1. Running effective team meetings (feat. written discussions)
  2. Geography defines so much
  3. Accepting constraints so they don’t feel constraining
  4. Nothing good, except its ending
  5. Narratives and consistency
  6. Behind well-written documents
  7. Truecaller
  8. Reframing mistakes
  9. I don’t mind what happens
  10. Discipline during breaks
  11. Judging progress, making progress
  12. Remember who brung ya to the dance
  13. Why are successful people so lonely?
  14. Age and maturity
  15. Kick Offs feat. the 2 dysfunctions of a Product team
  16. Reflections from health setbacks
  17. Romance is theory
  18. Amir, Sam, and excuses
  19. Wasting emotions
  20. Decidere
  21. Good strategy
  22. The cancel-return adventure
  23. Akal, not shakal
  24. Costco and deterrents
  25. Saying no to things we do want to do
  26. Shipping and ready
  27. Silent planting and invisible growth
  28. Expectations unchecked

January 2022

  1. Exploration OKRs – feat. The Law of Shitty Planning
  2. I think we’re making progress
  3. The trouble tree
  4. Health, mortality, and perspective
  5. A data hygiene habit – asking for the median
  6. External validation – what kind, to what end, and how much
  7. The 1/10 review
  8. The challenges of managing our psychology – and habits that help
  9. Apple Fitness plus
  10. Write 5x more, 5x shorter
  11. Find your cohort. The generous ones.
  12. Turn it off and then back on
  13. Privacy rights notice friction
  14. When things don’t look as sunny
  15. Missing commitments to recommit
  16. Effective 1:1s – a field guide
  17. Changing our minds
  18. Mistaking agreement for truth
  19. Optimistic about ourselves, pessimistic about others
  20. The metronome
  21. Taking it personally and not doing it enough
  22. Mountain or mole hill
  23. Don’t Look Up and the Goat
  24. Strong and imperfect
  25. Expecting more
  26. Details and micromanagement
  27. Exercise themed new year resolutions
  28. Plainspoken x constructive
  29. 14 Peaks
  30. Checking – an exercise in self-sabotage
  31. Simplicity in prioritization
  32. When will we have enough

2021 363

December 2021

  1. 10 questions – Annual Reflection 2021
  2. The essence of zen and eating problems for breakfast
  3. Proactive and reactive online security
  4. Thinking about money
  5. The Rescue
  6. The morning walk and the styrofoam cup
  7. Technology, life spans, and time
  8. Mcbetter
  9. Getting to scale
  10. Moments of tension
  11. Absence of consequences
  12. Comparing real and virtual selves
  13. Ease of removing a charge
  14. Voice memos and notes
  15. The Q1 reopening
  16. A tool for unpleasant situations
  17. Behavior change and friction
  18. The 4 trade-offs
  19. There’s always something broken
  20. Keeping track of misfortunes
  21. Wind direction
  22. Uybj
  23. Showing our work
  24. Jackalope wisdom
  25. Ask specificity
  26. How bad we think we will feel
  27. One way to think about how well a weekend went
  28. The Buy Now Pay Later rebranding
  29. That’s why you fail
  30. Externalizing optimism
  31. Focusing on problems vs. products

November 2021

  1. Switchback Travel
  2. Omicron
  3. Visuals and text
  4. When things go wrong
  5. Well explained data
  6. Grief and love
  7. The online forum and the kidney donor
  8. Comparison mode and happiness levers
  9. Kasoor
  10. When the tide is in
  11. Facilitation and urgency
  12. How to say no
  13. But that’s the job
  14. What we seek and what we find
  15. Social media and the game we’re playing
  16. Heart of life
  17. Privilege and what we spend time thinking about
  18. Communication breakdowns and lessons
  19. Anticipation and skill
  20. The Metaverse and (near-)infinite economic growth
  21. The Cobra effect
  22. The best decisions
  23. Fusion
  24. Brute force and furniture
  25. The goal is not to avoid mistakes
  26. Happiness as parents
  27. Irrigation and wine
  28. Popular and good
  29. Halloween and Diwali

October 2021

  1. Permission to stop feeling bad
  2. Color match
  3. Long memory for mistakes
  4. Remote and hybrid opportunities
  5. Growing up
  6. Progress happens unevenly
  7. Focus and politics – an Indra Nooyi note
  8. Discipline
  9. Listen to me. Don’t listen to me
  10. Prof Mihaly
  11. Career conversation disclaimer
  12. How much I know
  13. Greetings Mass Email
  14. The happy or unhappy decision
  15. The highest forms of wealth
  16. Before it becomes urgent
  17. Haircuts and hairlines
  18. Reacting to executive feedback on documents
  19. Re:stacks
  20. Indra Nooyi on mentors
  21. So much magic
  22. Blemishes and character
  23. That parking spot
  24. When the list gets long
  25. Tools and utility
  26. Privilege and long-term thinking
  27. 3 truths about fixing things
  28. Clear copy – renewal reminders
  29. The Ikea effect – with a twist
  30. Innovation and basics
  31. Stimulus and response

September 2021

  1. Words and magic
  2. First and last
  3. 3 questions for urgent collaborations
  4. Labors of love
  5. Our approval
  6. Good deal, great deal
  7. Going through the unimaginable
  8. Responding to “Tell me about yourself”
  9. The games we play
  10. Some days you’re the pigeon
  11. Series of wants
  12. I don’t have enough time
  13. After the iPad launch
  14. Gifts of perspective
  15. Good strategy – 10x, 1x, and 0.1x
  16. Using spreadsheets for a round-the-room
  17. Two agents, same problem
  18. Graveyard shifts and moments of privilege
  19. The return
  20. Standing up to people we know
  21. Like my father
  22. Checks and the future
  23. But I thought I would be beautiful
  24. Examining a relationship that matters
  25. Something you are willing to do
  26. Don’t think
  27. The cost of giving extra
  28. Win-win or no deal
  29. (Re) learning to disconnect
  30. Relative progress

August 2021

  1. Allowance for careless mistakes
  2. Wirecutter
  3. Sleep and possibility
  4. The last 90 days
  5. Living the dream
  6. Attempting to get good vs. look good
  7. Hours and short-term strategy
  8. Small positive responses
  9. Quality time and quantity
  10. Surviving bad weather
  11. Habits and breaking the chains
  12. I don’t know enough
  13. Everyone is fighting their own battle
  14. Careers and visualization
  15. Remembering bad luck
  16. Setbacks and responses
  17. Giving someone what you feel you need
  18. Moving fast by moving slow
  19. Self-perception and the stories we tell
  20. Simpler takeaways and simple messages
  21. That IPCC report
  22. The Gabon experiment
  23. Belief systems
  24. Sharing the gold
  25. Asking why is brave
  26. How much we have to say
  27. Few things that move the needle
  28. Protein folding
  29. The happiness x time spent equation
  30. Strawberry leaves, assumptions, and learning

July 2021

  1. Professor Cowen
  2. “If it all goes as per plan”
  3. Form and iron-air batteries
  4. Missteps and learning
  5. Hidden in the most unlikely places
  6. Celebrating constructively
  7. Giant goldfish and connected ecosystems
  8. Transformation
  9. Death and perspective
  10. Problems, solutions, and worries
  11. It’s never going to be ideal
  12. Past and ego, future and pride
  13. The Post Office feedback survey
  14. Learning to sell as a product manager
  15. Lessons learned from feeling stupid
  16. Executive communication – meetings, speaking, and writing
  17. I’m not as…
  18. Stoic notes – part II
  19. Stoic notes – part I
  20. Silenzio Bruno
  21. Skechers and shoe hacks
  22. What we optimize for
  23. Being constructive
  24. Potential for remote work
  25. The French football team and reputations
  26. 10 years of a low news diet
  27. The Packard second act
  28. The Uglified Ducky
  29. Fires, heat waves, and silver linings
  30. Saying the right things vs. doing what we say
  31. Building strategy, changing strategy

June 2021

  1. Psychic elephants, math, and getting fooled
  2. Soft and hard skills
  3. Esld
  4. Christian Eriksen
  5. If you want to get in shape
  6. Much of what we call talent
  7. The Tony Hawk story
  8. Overestimating our contributions
  9. Gap between two cars
  10. How we make big decisions
  11. Picking watermelons
  12. Am I doing it right?
  13. Liz Fosslien’s sketches
  14. Fit and individual ability
  15. First day back in the office
  16. Values and decisions
  17. The things we admire and detest
  18. Learning and the infinite game
  19. Turnout areas
  20. The courage to be disliked
  21. Is this consistent with the person I want to be?
  22. Problems you want to obsess about
  23. If you love someone, let them go
  24. Two levels
  25. The IEA Net Zero by 2050
  26. Intermittent fasting – 18 months in
  27. Write what you repeat
  28. How many iterations
  29. Collaborations and incentives
  30. Kurt Vonnegut and drama

May 2021

  1. Stubborn and persistent
  2. COVID-19 notes – May 2021 edition
  3. True learning
  4. Three rewrites
  5. Transforming a poor shopping experience
  6. Knowing defeat, suffering, and struggle
  7. Walking and mindfulness
  8. Honored and cultivated
  9. Specks and the pale blue dot
  10. Bankrupt
  11. Sharks and perspective
  12. Refunds and customer service
  13. Trade-off
  14. 13
  15. Building relationships with Product Executives
  16. A few reflections on Caste
  17. How personality and character show up
  18. Maybe you’re trying to do two things at once
  19. Transfer to this device
  20. Impatience and the default impulse
  21. The seemingly urgent
  22. Should I be negotiating?
  23. Subtracting emails
  24. Lumpy rugs
  25. Sh*t hill
  26. Fallibility, facts, and puzzles
  27. Product problems and business goals
  28. Einstein on what is infinite
  29. Levels of confidentiality
  30. Taste and hunger
  31. The essence of a career journey

April 2021

  1. Drought intensity
  2. The Ithaca wish
  3. To do lists and peace of mind
  4. Soccer and moments of extra effort
  5. High-flow teens and mall teens
  6. The magical car door
  7. Experience and bad judgment
  8. Scout Mindset
  9. Calendar blocks and priorities
  10. Rudolf Abel and would it help
  11. Growth mindset – what it sounds like vs. what it is
  12. Molehills
  13. The upside point
  14. The world will roll on
  15. Hat tip – Mukesh’s vaccine app
  16. Dan Goodman’s patient
  17. Wake up calls
  18. When things go wrong
  19. Financial freedom
  20. Learn, earn, or quit
  21. Calm at gunpoint
  22. Best of
  23. Tune ups
  24. Don’t say yes when you want to say no
  25. Prestige
  26. The Osprey guarantee
  27. Vaccine rollout gratitude
  28. Working through a knotty situation
  29. Out of balance
  30. The London cab driver study

March 2021

  1. Imperfectly walking our path
  2. Something to look forward to
  3. Product ramps, launches and an 8 point checklist
  4. Searching for that perfect box
  5. A reflection on the Suez canal blockage
  6. Crimes, heaviness, and caste
  7. Novelty and repetition
  8. Questions and opinions
  9. Imposter syndrome is real
  10. Our instinct for when something is wrong
  11. Shah Rukh Khan and pasta
  12. Feedback and onions
  13. Comparisons and daily happiness
  14. V32
  15. The fall and the bounce
  16. Time it takes to brute force your password
  17. The LBLF check in
  18. Edging coal out
  19. Enchiridion
  20. Flying a kite
  21. 3 lessons on getting better at verbal communication at work
  22. Wish that they happen as they do
  23. It won’t be any easier tomorrow
  24. The next right thing
  25. Clinging to hate
  26. I’m surprised you’re surprised
  27. Routine flexibility
  28. The driver who was about to turn
  29. The Keeper Test
  30. Because we read a book
  31. The kind interpretation

February 2021

  1. Malaria and RNA vaccines
  2. Problems have solutions
  3. The queen, king, and context
  4. Replacing walking 1:1s
  5. Riding shotgun and joy
  6. Prince Philip and the astronauts
  7. On the clock
  8. The store credit card deal
  9. A small boil
  10. The video interview whiteboard
  11. Dick Bass – on listening
  12. Obsessing about the middle
  13. Marcus and perspective
  14. Signals and interpretation
  15. Out of balance
  16. The start of the weekend
  17. Becoming disciplined
  18. Mastering Aikido
  19. Noahpinion on carbon removal
  20. Process and spot
  21. When we lose our temper
  22. One player
  23. Organizing photos
  24. The #1 priority test
  25. What is delayed is not denied
  26. Seneca on loss
  27. Your call is important to us
  28. Step changing PM-Engineering Collaboration

January 2021

  1. Burning hurry
  2. Remaking the world champions
  3. The right way to lift weights
  4. Reluctance and necessity
  5. Positive attitude and problem solving
  6. On being yourself
  7. Throwing away matches
  8. The trouble tree routine
  9. Engagement and Perfection
  10. For there is always light
  11. Drew Dernavich’s desk
  12. That which can’t be learnt too thoroughly
  13. Solving for Feasibility
  14. But that’s how I did it
  15. Notes on writing for yourself
  16. Trends on working hours, wealth, and parenting
  17. The 20 slot investment card
  18. Ideas with merit are common property
  19. Excess capacity
  20. Has vs. craves
  21. Discipline problems and clarity problems
  22. Opposite reactions and an inner compass
  23. Deciding to paint a masterpiece
  24. Rules and exceptions
  25. Archetypical cycle and the internet
  26. Giving good advice – the first rule
  27. Dissents
  28. Government applications and ETAs
  29. Failures of kindness
  30. Doctor Katalin Karikó
  31. Perspective and hugs

2020 366

December 2020

  1. Values to virtues
  2. Transition words
  3. 4+ books that might change your mind – 2020 Edition
  4. 10 questions – Annual Reflection 2020
  5. Stoic camp
  6. The password audit
  7. Notes on blogging
  8. Why David Graeber’s Debt is an special book
  9. Global currency reserve system 101
  10. Patience, flexibility, and tact
  11. Sound of the true
  12. Bikes and optionality
  13. A modern(a) leap
  14. Ozark and slippery slopes
  15. The Morgan Housel compilation
  16. A hierarchy of feelings we need/crave
  17. A tree that grows quickly
  18. Getting distance
  19. Flow is something the reader experiences
  20. Who we spend time with, by age
  21. Good? Bad? Who knows?
  22. The person making the pass
  23. Tony Hsieh and notes on happiness
  24. Worrying and failing
  25. Dr Jim Yong Kim on vaccines and 2021
  26. Where learning happens
  27. Lemons from life
  28. Help with a connection
  29. The price of electricity from new power plants – 2009 vs. 2019
  30. Wearing blinders
  31. Wishing us bad luck

November 2020

  1. Mind blown
  2. Frequency of home runs
  3. Getting scammed
  4. Want it or need it?
  5. Reflection season 2020
  6. Good or bad
  7. Assiduity
  8. Fixing the pedal
  9. Making sentences
  10. The amateur player pool table conundrum
  11. It cannot be COVID
  12. The savings equation
  13. The top priority test
  14. Things are often not what they seem
  15. Solving for usability
  16. Light and knowledge
  17. I wonder vs. this is what I think we should do
  18. Ronald Read
  19. Noticing that inner disturbance
  20. Problem solving velocity and blame
  21. Out of ideas
  22. Socrates’ legacy
  23. Soaking in lessons
  24. Circuses and changing the world
  25. Up to our neck in mud
  26. Sugar cookie
  27. The munchkin crew
  28. Getting into Product Management – II (Interview prep + 3 things that help)
  29. Reflecting on some dumb mistakes
  30. Persimmons

October 2020

  1. Team of Teams – efficiency to leverage
  2. Advice for the other person
  3. Noticing and authorization
  4. Improvement feedback and doing the opposite
  5. The tree in front of our home
  6. Getting into Product Management – I
  7. The cheapest electricity in history
  8. Writing short sentences
  9. Upload speed
  10. We will make mistakes
  11. Furniture assembly and brute force
  12. The marketing email checkbox copy
  13. Sleepy kids and complex systems
  14. Arise solutions – missing ethics and misplaced incentives
  15. Coming through when it counts
  16. Find the energizers
  17. The feedback wish
  18. Partnerships and how
  19. Community and habits
  20. Sharing activity
  21. Ormie the pig and immigration
  22. The first time parent advice question
  23. Things we’re afraid to do
  24. Eyes on cars around us
  25. Pete’s white shoes
  26. The problem that appears
  27. Excuses to reset
  28. Animals 101
  29. Testing a gratitude app idea [would you be interested?]
  30. A few rules – a few excerpts
  31. Listening and an implicit commitment

September 2020

  1. Impatience and the vacuum sealed container
  2. 5 habits that help build high velocity product teams
  3. When feedback works
  4. The 2 hour story
  5. Randomness and stoicism
  6. Consistent joy, loss, and appreciation
  7. Just keep swimming
  8. As per plan
  9. Not breaking the chain
  10. Validating our Problem Statement and Hypothesis
  11. Is that the most important thing?
  12. Rbg
  13. Charles and Helga Feeney – giving while living
  14. Success and the rear view mirror
  15. Ford’s Weekly Business Plan Reviews
  16. 3 questions to ask when we’re feeling stuck
  17. Problem Finding + Solving with Executives
  18. Being in the set of the Mandalorian
  19. Stakes and risk
  20. A recipe for better habits
  21. The orphanage routine
  22. Braintrust meetings
  23. Walgreen, Rite Aid, and CVS – the mission statement story
  24. The Culture of the Product team
  25. Teacher’s Day
  26. Space Jam and the All Star game
  27. The new abnormal
  28. Attempting to give
  29. Executives and the top 3 company priorities
  30. Will and resources

August 2020

  1. A willingness to begin again
  2. Habitual comparisons
  3. Read from cover to cover
  4. Mood and creativity
  5. The most accessible form of therapy
  6. The Pygmalion effect
  7. Standards
  8. Recomitting to NVC
  9. What we see and what we miss
  10. Serena Williams v Kim Clijsters
  11. The job struggle answer
  12. Water Fluoridation
  13. Background app refresh
  14. Data, awareness, and perspective
  15. The first timer in the crowd
  16. The Sameness
  17. An observation about undesirable behaviors
  18. Upstream thinking question
  19. The price of consciousness
  20. Greg LeMond on cycling
  21. Notes from Yoda of the Science Geek council
  22. Water and thirst
  23. The sinusoidal nature of events
  24. 3 career perspectives
  25. Welcoming feedback – a new quest
  26. People who are not going to love you
  27. Useful feedback
  28. Rare health conditions
  29. The Hymn of Hate
  30. Intermittent fasting update – 7 months in

July 2020

  1. Before Bruno
  2. What great educators do
  3. Good days, bad days, busy days, quiet days
  4. Activating teams – the two highest leverage actions
  5. Andy Slavitt and the playbook
  6. Moments of one-ness
  7. The panda and his weight
  8. Permanence and peace
  9. Chicago and plastic bags
  10. Home screen v4
  11. The 3 hour power outage and 5 reflections
  12. Assigning permanence to one-time mistakes
  13. Richard Feynman on the process of looking for a new law
  14. Strong character and the painful failure
  15. Worrying about shots not taken
  16. Vanmoof and bike boxes
  17. Lack of clarity at the end of a day
  18. The Frozen pizza explainer
  19. Five frameworks/heuristics for higher quality decision making
  20. COVID-19 and the global leadership test
  21. List of influences
  22. Trust and speed
  23. The Logitech webcam shortage and Cx tweaks
  24. Focus, intensity, hard work, and inevitability
  25. Intentions, belief, and actions
  26. Eating better – in 2 steps
  27. Being at the bottom of things
  28. Signpost, victory, and fulfillment
  29. Dr Anders Ericsson
  30. #OpenToWork
  31. Solitude and leadership – a few excerpts

June 2020

  1. High signal reference checks
  2. Getting a refund on airline tickets
  3. COVID-19 – June notes
  4. Be kind to yourself
  5. Doing and presenting
  6. Meeting size
  7. Hardship and necessity
  8. Graduating during a downturn
  9. Damian Lillard on looking good
  10. The danger of single stories
  11. Smooth seas
  12. Popular opinion over fact
  13. Three elements of situational feedback
  14. Trust and vulnerability to the actions of someone else
  15. 6 questions for the next 6 months
  16. Power and friendship – seeing what we seek
  17. Daily demonstration of courage
  18. Oogway on Destiny
  19. Smart work and hard work
  20. Folks who know better
  21. The thing about hope
  22. SATs, standardized tests, and admissions
  23. Kicking it forward
  24. Flip for the other emotion
  25. Most warning systems do not warn us they can no longer warn us
  26. Ordinary and extraordinary – a poem
  27. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar reflects
  28. Anti-intellectualism and racism – revisited
  29. Euthymia

May 2020

  1. Remembering training wheels
  2. RIP George Floyd
  3. Fewer meetings – short and long term solutions
  4. Competition and abundance
  5. Control in theory vs. practice – consumer product research
  6. Solar’s future is insanely cheap
  7. Agency and validation
  8. 7 billion people and the one person
  9. Michael Lewis and stories we tell ourselves
  10. See something
  11. Meetings with executives – making them useful and messing things up
  12. The Three Sides of Risk
  13. Speed of execution
  14. Showing up as we really are
  15. Nailing it and trying hard
  16. Boom de ya da
  17. Alexander and the morning dip
  18. Systems and results
  19. Careers and 5 words
  20. Remains of the Day
  21. 12 years
  22. Losing our sense of smell
  23. Kids and instincts
  24. Years on the job vs. Experience
  25. Inches and tiny margins
  26. Lessons on shifting energy
  27. Changing how we think about great listeners
  28. The “marathon, not a sprint” refrain
  29. Chocolate comfort
  30. Solutions and trade-offs
  31. The COVID-19 Vaccine – What we need to know

April 2020

  1. There is no such thing as good advice
  2. 68 bits of unsolicited advice
  3. Night guy, Morning guy, Day guy
  4. Money, Credit, and Debt
  5. Cocomelon
  6. Corona Corps
  7. Opposing ideas and mental progress
  8. Suspending Immigration
  9. Heartbreak and True Grit
  10. When a team seems unable to make progress on a problem
  11. Some good news – Carbios and plastic
  12. Can’t Help Falling in Love by Kina Grannis
  13. The frontlines
  14. All steps are purposeful
  15. A kiss and a stern word to help with pain
  16. 5 minutes to appreciate one relationship
  17. Viktor Frankl on success and happiness
  18. Attempting to build products remotely during a pandemic
  19. For a leader by John O Donohue
  20. Range, comparisons, and falling behind
  21. The last word
  22. Habits and new routines
  23. Email thread length rule
  24. Appreciation and peace of mind
  25. The post vacuum slippery slope
  26. Closing rings
  27. An ode to Source Sans Pro and typefaces
  28. The economics of building a coal plant
  29. Two seemingly contradictory truths
  30. Reflecting on reflections and the three crises

March 2020

  1. Questions you cannot answer
  2. 5 personal finance notes – volatile economy edition
  3. Weather and experiences
  4. COVID-19 #5: Mar 27 notes
  5. It is okay if it feels like everything sucks
  6. The habit casualty list
  7. Understanding data and the one metric that matters
  8. Thank to, and not due to
  9. 5 steps to building our Product Roadmap
  10. For when we find ourselves dealing with irrational anger
  11. COVID-19 #4: Flatten the curve optimism/roller coaster
  12. No one can explain why planes stay up in the air
  13. Replace social distance with physical distance and social closeness
  14. V31
  15. Mantra for the week
  16. 2 drivers to developing and mastering a skill
  17. What you see and what you get
  18. COVID-19 #3: Mar 13 notes
  19. You only need one to work out
  20. 7 notes on COVID-19
  21. Purging the list
  22. The daily practice of focus
  23. Violence and suffering
  24. Relationships by Olivia de Recat
  25. Remote work and doing it right
  26. Games we’re trying to win
  27. The Coronavirus aided remote work experiment
  28. Bird by Bird
  29. Values and virtues
  30. Permanent confidence and challenges
  31. Coronavirus (COVID-19) PSA

February 2020

  1. Premium Subscription Gifts – Follow up
  2. Market dips and perspective
  3. Misalignment to alignment – starting with the document
  4. The diagnosis that changed everything
  5. Incremental execution vs. incremental thinking
  6. Notes by Ada and too good to be true
  7. Bob Iger and Twitter
  8. Nothing we can say or do
  9. Chernobyl
  10. Job seeking – staying in touch regardless of the outcome
  11. Premium Subscription Gifts – 2020 Edition
  12. Being lost and the path
  13. What is strategy and how do I build product strategy?
  14. On depression and anxiety by Johann Hari
  15. Time to stare out of the window
  16. Opportunities as parking spots
  17. But I had good intentions
  18. Effective responses to product feedback
  19. Firing the crow
  20. Getting started as soon as you know you need to write one
  21. Parking lots and character
  22. Spoiled
  23. Disagreements and context
  24. Simple dreams
  25. A commitment that does wonders to our career happiness
  26. How our insecurities define our responses
  27. Gunpei Yokoi and the Lefty Rx
  28. Kobe and nuance
  29. The windshield, mirrors, and the journey

January 2020

  1. Work-life balance – 2 anecdotal observations
  2. A simple measure of how fit we are
  3. Kobe, Clay, and kindness
  4. The 80% experience
  5. Great customer service and lifetime value
  6. The Joneses
  7. Trial and error
  8. Clay Christensen
  9. Bob Iger
  10. Milarepa and the demons
  11. Daily fluctuations, weekly consistency
  12. Your manager in the product team
  13. Ending legacy admissions at Hopkins
  14. Screaming kids and reactions that never help
  15. The answer is probably not on your phone
  16. Appreciation and psychological safety
  17. Worrying, fretting, fixing, and working
  18. Understanding the news and working with data
  19. Roy Disney and Bob Iger- Ego and Respect
  20. Intermittent Fasting – week 2
  21. Experience
  22. 3 hard learned people lessons
  23. Trombone oil
  24. Going Upstream
  25. Focus 5
  26. Bikram and bullying
  27. Aliveness
  28. Preliminary closing of the books
  29. Liverpool – humility and greatness
  30. What a good decision feels like
  31. Clarity in values and cultural tenets
  32. Reset milestones and compartments
  33. Looking ahead into the 2020s

2019 366

December 2019

  1. The 10 question annual review – 2019 edition
  2. Deleting Tumblr – by mistake
  3. 3 books that might change your mind – 2019 edition
  4. Games and prizes
  5. The TV decision
  6. You are what makes us great
  7. Pandemic Legacy
  8. Yelp and Tripadvisor
  9. Cost over value
  10. The Joys of Compounding and How to think about investing
  11. Checks in spreadsheets
  12. Roulette skill
  13. A growth mindset equation
  14. Teaching and rigor
  15. Alexa background music
  16. When everything around us is made convenient
  17. Sexual abuse
  18. Soul food
  19. The J P Morgan reminder
  20. The snorkeling in choppy waters analog
  21. 2/10 effort for 8/10 outcomes | Personal Finance
  22. Appreciation as a second tier activity
  23. Kicking off reflection season
  24. Stuff and enough
  25. Internalizing the sine wave
  26. Bullies – scared and scary
  27. Making peace with limits
  28. Wasted envy
  29. Getting feedback on that workshop
  30. Priorities, lists, and focus

November 2019

  1. Do more? or less but better?
  2. When in Rome…
  3. A day to give thanks…
  4. The Alexa Top 50 most played
  5. Something to get offended about
  6. Magical abilities
  7. What perspective does
  8. Personal relationships and economic outcomes
  9. Sitting and standing right
  10. If only we had more time/money/resources
  11. Leaders and crises
  12. Working from home – what my friends think I do vs. what I actually do
  13. Learning and teaching
  14. Doing without labeling
  15. Credit card fraud
  16. Communication, trust, intent
  17. Personal IPOs and stock market tickers
  18. The mistake we make about mistakes
  19. Periodic reminder on values
  20. Response training
  21. Pyrrhic victory
  22. Staring out of the window
  23. Ikigai
  24. Being strategic with our time
  25. Oysters and your blogs
  26. Different ways of saying the same thing
  27. Marketing dog food and happiness
  28. Meritocracy – how life became an endless competition
  29. The unglamorous stuff
  30. The large the reward expected

October 2019

  1. Refining your gut reaction with data
  2. Dimensions to optimize
  3. Patience and change
  4. Magic and math
  5. Yoghurt and shortcuts
  6. Einsteinian perspective
  7. Discomfort and the obstacle
  8. In praise of the smiley
  9. A penny saved and an expectation lowered
  10. Landing that message
  11. We’ll need to work harder
  12. The solver and the finder
  13. Inconvenient good times
  14. Fewer new ideas
  15. One bin is rubbish
  16. Trust and good intent
  17. Don’t quote, make it yours instead
  18. Antifragility
  19. The 2 hour marathon
  20. Two commitments for the weekend
  21. Attempting to change behavior
  22. Setting the record straight
  23. Home is where the people are
  24. Confidence, insecurities, challenges
  25. What will she think?
  26. Reasons either way
  27. Holding two conflicting ideas
  28. Outcome, Strategy, Projects
  29. Quote of the day
  30. The room where it happens
  31. What makes it worth paying the tax?

September 2019

  1. A reminder a day
  2. Seek
  3. Pain without memories
  4. How well did those meetings go
  5. Working backward from instincts
  6. Uphill and downhill
  7. Talent is distributed, privilege is not
  8. Memories bring back
  9. Climate Crisis – the most important 5 posts
  10. Long term perspective and equanimity
  11. Climate Strike
  12. If only we had more time/money/resources
  13. Marcel Hirscher and Enough
  14. Eighteen years later
  15. Self talk – smart vs. adaptable, constructive, and thoughtful
  16. The path to lasting happiness
  17. Fitness-as-a-state
  18. Misunderstood introverts
  19. Talent and winning
  20. The challenge with how we measure our life
  21. The tire queue
  22. The 30 minute introductory conversation
  23. The dream upgrade
  24. All that remains and It’s later than you think
  25. Nana korobi, ya oki
  26. Sound writing style
  27. Why we value brands
  28. Just one thing this time
  29. Electric screwdrivers and the right tools
  30. A game of giants and cruelty

August 2019

  1. Turn the phone off
  2. Newton’s 3rd law applied to ideas
  3. Disjointed
  4. Implicit value of our time
  5. Nyquil
  6. Time to do it twice
  7. Giving good driving directions
  8. George Carlin on Save the planet
  9. The borrowed notebook
  10. Did I do well?
  11. The power of placebos
  12. Until you make the unconscious conscious
  13. The Friday effect
  14. A measure of how proactive we were in the past week
  15. The effect of uninterrupted sleep
  16. Gold gab ich für Eisen
  17. Upon our hearts
  18. Strategy creation process – ideal vs. actual
  19. Excuses to clean the slate
  20. Conflict to communication
  21. Fervent nods
  22. Letterman and Obama
  23. Mysterious technique
  24. Stay in the game
  25. Feeling like an imposter
  26. Ethiopia’s Green Legacy
  27. The unmet need social media addressed
  28. Floats, sea monsters, and tact
  29. Harrowing by Parker J Palmer
  30. Creating great learning experiences
  31. Reason as our legal and PR function

July 2019

  1. The Walkman decision
  2. Experimenting with different hows for the same why
  3. Speed of response to feedback
  4. The patience regimen
  5. Reflections on The Algebra of Happiness
  6. Showing we care
  7. Aggression and pain
  8. How we have more ideas
  9. Salvaging a bad day
  10. The relationship between have and be
  11. Right for many, just not for you
  12. What in the world is this blog about?
  13. Worry is suffering twice
  14. Reframing no
  15. KLM and flying responsibly
  16. Bad prioritization, Good prioritization
  17. The resounding yes
  18. 3 reflections from Wimbledon
  19. Seek not to make them like you
  20. Over-communication and incentives
  21. Raising the bar on worry
  22. A tale of two stories
  23. The story of Sandwich
  24. The inside track
  25. Company shutdowns
  26. Ending the goodbye debate
  27. Fewer
  28. Social needs and status games
  29. Our desire to be right
  30. Drafting a will
  31. Climate change and anxiety in kids

June 2019

  1. Auto malls and equilibrium
  2. Changing your ads
  3. John Snow, public health, and innovating in teams
  4. Surfacing a disagreement vs. finding a quick fix
  5. No longer hungry
  6. On how hard it is to learn something
  7. The top driver
  8. The Impossible Whopper
  9. 10 dollars extra for grouchy behavior
  10. Teams and self interest
  11. I have to and I choose to
  12. The ball in front of you
  13. Puzzles of the moment
  14. Scale of missteps
  15. Without the background music
  16. 3 notes for a better Saturday
  17. Appreciation for small mistakes
  18. Reality and the perception of it
  19. Periodic reminder on the definition of failure
  20. Turning a blind eye to climate change
  21. Finding solutions instead of problems
  22. World Oceans Day
  23. Finding the fun
  24. Getting good at things you don’t want to do
  25. Signals from the gut
  26. The bias for sensational events
  27. Joseph Heller and Enough
  28. Attention and Appreciation
  29. Writing is telepathy
  30. Anticipating holiday trips

May 2019

  1. Proving yourself
  2. Availability and site speed
  3. Warren Buffett on investing in yourself
  4. Fear and mistakes
  5. Moods and actions
  6. Skyspring Hotel New York
  7. On my radar
  8. Talk like you write
  9. Managers and advocates
  10. A calm mind, a fit body, a house full of love
  11. What good looks like
  12. Solve or surface
  13. What we’re paying attention to today
  14. Just believing is usually enough
  15. Flawed, edgy, and a continuous source of learning opportunities
  16. Transient
  17. Syrio Forel and Not Today
  18. That was really bad
  19. Societal success and scale
  20. 11 years
  21. Growth and The Conscious Parent
  22. The reasonable test
  23. Blaise Pascal on the shorter letter
  24. Benefits of good decisions compound over time
  25. The prioritization jedi continuum
  26. Human-size life
  27. On Bestseller ideas
  28. No one has the right answers on the difficult questions
  29. Minimizing contribution
  30. On days we are riddled with self doubt
  31. Efficiency and Leverage

April 2019

  1. Be the only
  2. The 48 hour break
  3. Gully Boy
  4. Blogging time
  5. Effecting change and being misunderstood
  6. The watch and time
  7. Going out of their way to say they don’t care
  8. The last word
  9. The day you were born
  10. Baking bread and writing good product specs
  11. Good relationships and great relationships
  12. Growing responsibilities and scope
  13. Satya Nadella and bad days
  14. Mistakes, chatter, and showing up
  15. Strategy and trade-offs
  16. Change and resistance
  17. Instant perspective
  18. Bend vs. squat
  19. Two ways we shape culture
  20. Learning one line
  21. Reversing counter factuals
  22. 10 days of McDonalds
  23. Organization and Volume of Activity
  24. 3 lessons on recovering from sickness
  25. The Bezos co-founder split
  26. Broken or imbalanced
  27. On Children by Kahlil Gibran
  28. What consistently good communicators do
  29. Complimenting others when they’re not around
  30. Filing tax returns
  31. The trim dashboard

March 2019

  1. More time, better prioritization
  2. Spending money where we spend our time
  3. The uhm ah project – unconscious popularity
  4. Awareness of base assumptions
  5. Work hard now so you can have it easy later
  6. Puzzles, not problems
  7. Ambiguity and over-communication
  8. Replacing guys with folks
  9. The Hatch Baby Rest example
  10. Long term games with long term people
  11. Self talk – taking note of what our good looks like
  12. Retirement and identity
  13. Fixing typos and email friendships
  14. v30 – Release notes
  15. Nursery rhyme and lullaby messages
  16. On making friends and building community
  17. Stopping shoplifting
  18. The millionaire who wanted to get involved
  19. 3 free subscriptions of LinkedIn Premium for 6 months
  20. People problems are generally system problems
  21. Filler words – 2019 edition
  22. Collective notification log
  23. Mailing in the last bit
  24. Skills, traits, and values in hiring
  25. The value of inspirational leadership
  26. Self made and some fascinating research on privilege
  27. Trading problems and progress
  28. Acceptable error
  29. Avocado toast
  30. Helicopter parenting
  31. Impactful work and credit

February 2019

  1. Landing and take off in headwinds
  2. Safari demos
  3. Channeling Zeigarnik
  4. Extenuating circumstances
  5. Sharenting
  6. Finding ways to differentiate
  7. Small margins in tennis – a historical look
  8. Decision making speed > accuracy
  9. Novak Djokovic and marginal improvements
  10. The next game is a big one
  11. A great question for the interviewer
  12. Indian roads and fair performance evaluation
  13. Mat leave reflection
  14. Reflection on Principles
  15. Creation, consumption, and critique
  16. 9 surprises from 2018
  17. Saying yes when we want to say a no
  18. Pens and circumstances
  19. Repetition – the smart version
  20. Your fiction recommendations
  21. Daniel Kahneman’s success equations
  22. Knowing when you need a coach
  23. SpyCloud – dealing with password breaches
  24. Reading non-fiction – breadth and depth
  25. The right way to lift weight
  26. Writing for executive audiences – a 3 step process
  27. The 3pm rush
  28. Endless streams and free space

January 2019

  1. Retirement and cognitive decline
  2. Dumb questions and perceived risk
  3. The problem with “Be humble”
  4. Unhealthy but comfortable – first and second order consequences
  5. Gregarious Simulation Systems
  6. Wanting more
  7. The challenge with behavioral interview questions
  8. The small things reminder
  9. Complicated systems and complex systems
  10. Finding your Someone Like You
  11. Same and different
  12. The Robo Advisor follow up – 4 approaches to investment management
  13. Maniacal prioritization
  14. Pay back and forward
  15. John Clifton “Jack” Bogle
  16. Your call is important to us
  17. Solution space to Problem space
  18. 2 million points and counting
  19. The Product Marketing Sales Manager
  20. Activation Energy
  21. Extreme opinions are useful for promotion and debate
  22. Making “be kind to yourself” easier to implement
  23. Heroic consistency
  24. The one thing learning loop
  25. That root cause
  26. Reflections from replacing a screen protector
  27. 3 reflections on the Echo Dot and Alexa
  28. Why millions of kids can’t read and a better way to teach them
  29. Writing for self vs. writing for others
  30. Misusing the word feel
  31. Themes for 2019
  32. Making the most of the opportunity to reset

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