As soon as Covid sent my office home I immediately needed to find a way to replace informal team communication. I decided that every Friday I would have a global team meeting that would not be status related, no about work, it would be team building. I knew there were a few team building activities we could do via video chat, and some games so the first few weeks were easy. But as the weeks wore on, I needed to be more creative. I always wanted the games to have a point, a message or to engage people in communication. There are a lot of limitations, I want it to be 30 minutes, needs to be done on a video call etc.  

Four years later, and the meeting is now every other Friday, but I keep the notion that I create a team-based activity. I often made jokes about writing the activity the night before and even a few times a few hours before the meeting. Some team members gave me kudos for being creative each time, and my reply was that creativity comes with last minute panic.  

Even though it was a joke I wondered does procrastination relates to creativity? While I was in the shower, I thought of an idea to write a post about it. The first thing I wrote was why do I get ideas like that in the shower? I often get other ideas while walking the dog in the park, working out doing something other than the activity. If I sat down and wanted to be creative, I was somehow less creative. How many times did you get that idea in the shower? 

When I write my posts, I use my old friend Google to help with my research. In this instance I was able to find a study titled “When Putting Work Off Pays Off: The Curvilinear Relationship Between Procrastination and Creativity.” This allowed me to dig into the why. When you realize there are two key things that are happening when you are in the shower thinking of a brilliant solution. 

First, you already know what the problem is. In most cases, you already thought about it, talked with others, and tried to solve it once already. Your brain has the idea in your head and is somehow working on it without you consciously thinking about it. If i asked you name a clear thought you had yesterday, not like ‘I am hungry’ but a full sentence. Of the thousand or so thoughts, unless you wrote something down most likely you do not remember much of it. The brain is working on it in the background. A study seemed to back this up titled ‘Inspired by Distraction: Mind Wandering Facilitates Creative Incubation.’ This knowing of the problem is called incubation. 

Second, you stepped away from the problem. The focus away from the problem allows your brain to think more clearly. There are some people who can be creative and think on demand, but that is more the exception and the rule. A google search brings up a study that backs this up, the title ‘Give Your Ideas Some Legs: The Positive Effect of Walking on Creative Thinking.’ Though it focuses on walking, the act of getting away from your problem seems to give the brain some boost.  

So go ahead, when you have something that requires creativity let it simmer, do not rush it. Let yourself think about it in the shower, in the gym, anywhere. Keep a notebook handy to write ideas down and remember you forget most of your thoughts. This way you can be more creative. I also will not go crazy, get upset when I have not created an activity and its late Thursday night. I know somewhere something is percolating and by the morning I will have the solution.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them. 

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

My kids said something to me yesterday that I should have known before. After having some struggles in the past year or so (physical, illnesses and some mental) I finally got myself back on track health and fitness wise. I hit one of my goals before Thanksgiving and was looking better than I have in a while. My kids did not seem impressed at all. Friends, family and even coworkers commented on how good I looked. My kids were not impressed at all. 

My daughter said, ‘You did this before, why should we be impressed?’ I never thought about it that way. She was right, every time I somehow got off track, I was able to get myself back on track fitness wise. That magically I had something that would appear when I needed it.  

To do it, I found my spreadsheet that tracks my weight, my workouts, and my food. I whipped it out, put a start date on it and began my journey. I know what I need to do diet wise, exercise wise and sleep wise. I know what works for me, and I went back to the same plan.  

The results started slowly and continued slowly. I tracked every day, weighed myself every day etc. There were days that the scale went the wrong way, but the general direction over a longer period was downwards. I did not worry about the bad days, and I did not worry about cheating as I went back to my plan. I have written before about planning your dive then dive your plan. And I also have written about the fact that having goals is one thing, but you need a system to achieve them. 

Once I realized I had a system in place that was successful all I needed was to follow it. The thought that hit me in the short conversation with my kids was that in many of the successes I obtained over the years I have often looked for patterns and then replicated them. In fact, I had built up a series of systems that I would reach into my bag and pull out without thinking about it. While I wrote about building a system to reach your goal, I may want to revise some of that. 

If you succeeded previously you need to figure out what you did that led to success and create some system out of it to reuse. Once you create the system, the next thing is to practice it, and refine it as necessary. The key is to make them second nature like muscle memory like any athlete. The key is to be able to make them available at any time.  

The second key if figuring out how to reuse them in other situations. For getting fit, it was knowing what metrics are key, tracking them daily and making the adjustments as needed. I was holding myself accountable on a daily basis. Not everyone can mirror that but find the strategy that works for you. That is the magic, what works for you. Everyone watching from the outside will think your magical, but you will know it is. 

Of course maybe this post was just an excuse to show off my results…

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them. 

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

Immediately after writing the previous blog post, I started to think more about skills and talent. What I thought most about was all the things I wanted to learn but did not. The challenges and hurdles that we face can prevent us from reaching any goal. The excitement when you first see someone playing a song, cooking something amazing, or fixing something and think ‘I can do that’ is often lost and forgotten when you embark on the journey. Let us explore some of the hurdles and solutions so that you can move forward. 

The Fear of Failure: I am starting out with one of the biggest challenges. Everyone fears that when they try something new, they are not going to succeed, or in some cases are not as good as someone else. The first part of solving that is realistic expectations, and the second part is understanding you may need to make a lot of mistakes before you get it right. One reason it took so long for me to publish any of my writing was I thought I was going to fail. I turned it into that each writing was practice, and the only way to improve was to do it. Some posts were ok, some were bad but over the years I improved. 

Feeling Embarrassed / What other people think about what you are doing: Other people are going to judge you on first trying the skill, and then how well you are doing at it. Guess what, the only person’s opinion that should matter is yours. If you are worried about someone else, think simple who is more important in my life, me, or them. It is you. There will often be people who will see you trying and reach out to help, these are the people you want around you.  

Lack of Time: Every year I regroup with my team, and I ask them to lay out personal goals. Usually I want to read more, lose weight etc. The second thing I ask them to do is now block out time on their calendar to do it. If you want to read more, book a reading slot. If you want to get in shape, book the time to work out and time to meal prep. If you treat these things like appointments, you are more likely to do them, as well as making the time. Sometimes it is only 15 minutes a day that is needed to practice. 

Lack of Motivation: Often when learning a new skill, we lose our motivation due to lack of progress, frustrations etc. The first thing that must be done is to define what your motivation is, why are you trying to do this. The next is to set small goals and milestones and celebrate them. Remember when climbing a mountain, it is important to look at how far you have gone, not just how far you need to go. Surround yourself with people who support you and find a mentor or someone who is willing to help you. 

Distractions and Procrastination: If you read any of my articles previously you know I do have ADHD. This is a huge issue for me. In this day in age where we are constantly bombarded with distractions as our attention is money for them it is often hard to focus. Here is where the booking of time in your calendar helps as well as a second part which is designing the right environment for you to work on your skill. This includes having a consistent space where you practice, you can remove as many distractions as possible. Lastly, get yourself a pomodoro timer and set it. It is an ADHD technique that works well. 

Lack Of Patience: Skill acquisition is often a time consuming and slow process. Often the progress is not noticeable for a period of time. One of the skills I want to learn is patience! And working on other skills is helping me learn it. There are going to be plateaus, setbacks, and bad days and with the right expectations and goals you can hopefully increase your patience with the process. There is no harm is changing goals and timelines if the progress is not perfect. In my current journey getting fit I did change the timelines out, as at 56 it is not as easy as it was when I was 30. 

As we gain wisdom with age, I would think that it would be easier to get past these challenges. But every time I want to learn a new skill, I find myself fighting with these same things, and working on how I resolve them. Some things do come naturally, and that is due to talents, but others do not. It is often the ones that do not come naturally that I desire more, and then need to work harder it. If you spent time training for a year, and then climbed Mount Everst the view is not only breathtaking, but the journey to get to the top makes the experience so much more. If someone were to bring you up there in a helicopter, although it may look beautiful, not having to do the work to get there takes some of the beauty away. And yes, I am still trying to play the guitar and piano, and failing miserable at it so it is time for me to go practice.  

Disclaimer 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

If someone told you that you were talented what is your reaction? But what if you were told that you had just picked up that skill, that others could do it? Does it change the way you think of the compliment? What is funny is they are both compliments, yet your reaction is vastly different. 

Talent can be defined as an innate, natural aptitude or inclination towards a specific activity or field. It is often regarded as a gift that some individuals possess from birth. Some believe that talents can manifest in various forms, such as artistic abilities, musical prowess, or exceptional athletic performance. I almost prefer that it is characterized by a sense of ease and proficiency, allowing individuals to excel effortlessly. 

On the other hand, skill refers to the acquired knowledge, expertise, and proficiency gained through practice, training, and experience. Skills are developed over time and can be improved in any area of interest or endeavor. Unlike talent, skills are not necessarily innate but can be cultivated and improved through dedication and hard work. 

When you go to see a band live in concert and the guitarist really shreds do you think he is talented or skillful? If you go on YouTube, you will find 1000s of guitarists who can shred, it is not as rare as I once believed as a kid. When you are watching your favorite sport and you see a player do something unreal, do you think how much he practiced that move? Or were they born with the ability to do that? How are you able to know the difference between them? 

I mention this cause one of my favorite musicians has posted videos of him playing the guitar and keyboards at the same time. I first thought I could never do that. If you read my posts, you know there is a post about you should be responsible for your second thoughts, not your first one. My second thought, is this a skill, could I learn how to do this? I can play both the keyboards and guitar, and I am not Eddie Van Halen, Nuno, Joe Satriani on the guitar, or Geoff Downes, Keith Emerson, or Jordan Rudess on the keyboards, I am average at both.  

While embarking on this endeavor it made me think more about the difference between the two. First if you are naturally talented at something, it may lead you to work on it more. Thus, continuously adding to your proficiency and observed talent. In other words, if you have a talent and work at it to build skill on top of that, this is where you are special. The musicians listed above meet that criterion. But if you have desire, work ethic, or even just challenged you can spend the time to pick up a skill. You may not be the greatest, but you could be good enough (remember perfection is the enemy of good). Often when I am afraid to do something, I need to figure out where my fear is coming from. Am I worried I will not be perfect, that I will not be the best, or that I will not put in the time to be able to do it? Once I get through the thought process, I can decide to learn a new skill. 

As a manager and giving compliments to the people you report to you, using those words can be touchy. As I asked in the beginning how do you feel when you are told one over the other. If someone is told they are talented, they feel a sense of pride but also can feel a sense of expectations. If someone is told they are skillful, they can feel a sense of satisfaction that the work they put in is recognized. Of course, the downside is that they also realize other people can pick up that skill. Using the right word in the right situation with some details on why you picked the word is needed. A wise approach would be recognizing both. 

While talent may provide a head start, skills can be developed and refined through dedication and perseverance. Recognizing the unique qualities of both talent and skill enables us to appreciate the diversity of human abilities and encourages us to pursue our passions with determination. Do not let the fact that something looks like talent prevent you from learning and try to find your talents and improve on them. Now back to trying to play the guitar and piano. 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

A few years ago, I started doing pizza tours with a few friends.  A pizza tour is where you hop in a car, call ahead to pizza places to time it when you get there the pizza is coming out of the oven. In a day we did anywhere between ten and fifteen parlors. After tasting we would rate the pies, and I tracked it on a spreadsheet. Leveraging social media, we would pick the places that people rave about. My friend Mike started this during covid, he is a pizza enthusiast, I liked Pizza but never really was a expert in tasting and rating them.   

After the first time we did this, I thought my local Pizza place was really good. After, I was like he is just average. But worse, as people bragged had good some places are we went to expecting them to be this unreal experience that would blow us away. What started to happen is I found myself disappointed often, and in one case almost shocked. The best story was of a place down the shore, where the disappointment was so bad, I had my daughter try a slice, she was like it is not that good. After that I gave a piece of crust to my dog, and the dog refused it!  What happened also that going for Pizza at the local guy was out of the question, now driving a half hour to get a good slice has become the norm (if we were having pizza). 

What I realized was that it was not the Pizza that was bad (though the dog refusing it was funny). It was my expectation that this was going to be one of the best pies ever could have aided in my disappointment. Expectations are not bad per se, in fact they are an integral part of being human. We have them for multiple situations like relationships, career, personal goals, or our favorite sports teams. In the case of the Pizza, it was a very conscious expectation and explicit expectation, but not all are. Some can be explicit or implicit, conscious, or subconscious. The expectation was also driven by outside influences (other people who rated the pizza place). But often expectations can come from our desires, past experiences, or societal influences. 

I realized I have fallen into the trap of too high expectations. Something as simple as a slice of Pizza, was now a mental issue. I have been disappointed many times in my life, but just eating a slice of pizza should not cause disappointment. When your team loses a championship game, when your review at work is not superb, when you go on vacation and the trip was just so-so. These are normal things that happen. Of ourse you can find yourself in cognitive dissonance and make them sound better than they were but face it the lofty expectations made the experience worse.  

How do you stay happy? It is not possible to have low expectations every time you do something. You can try to fake yourself out, but subconscious expectations may get in the way. The first thing is you must understand what is valuable and second what is realistic. Going to my local pizza parlor because I am in a hurray and need quick sustenance is not a situation where I expect to have a mind-blowing slice of pizza. Going to a Michelin star restaurant is a different matter. Thus, we go back to framing the situation we are in.  

After we frame what we are doing the next step is to understand outside influences are often just well outside. 5 Star reviews on the internet are most likely fake. A review that matters is one that has close to the same taste, values and/or view that you do. But even then, it is a single data point, your personal experience may differ greatly. Was it a different chef that night, were they able to get their regular delivery of ingredients, were the tomatoes in season etc. So many things could impact the experience that taking outside opinions as fact can lead to disappointment.  

Lastly, expectations are not the only thing that will make an experience enjoyable or miserable. No one and no individual thing can control your happiness. Things like practicing gratitude, helping others, and improving yourself can help you find happiness. When going out for a slice of pizza think what the goal is if it’s just to satisfy the hunger then enjoy the average slice from your local place. On a pizza tour, find a way to blank your mind of reviews and opinions and try to savor the slice.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

When hiring someone the first impression you get is their resume. Applicants can use professional resume writers and even GPTs to assist them, but it still represents them. Immediately you make some judgement on whether you want to interview them or not. Many companies now have prescreening applications that will make some first judgements for you, as the selector you make that decision. What on the resume are you looking for? Did they go to the right college? Do they have a title from a respected company? Do they have gaps? There is always something that you are looking for. 

Now compare that to when you are making friends. You do not have a sheet of paper to review. Often you meet people at school, at work, or in other social settings. In all three scenarios without the resume in hand there Is some judgement that is made. Based on where you met them you assume they made it through some selection process. At college or a job, the person must have the same qualifications that you did to get in. In social settings you assume that if your friends know them, that they have the same values as your friends.  

If you are unfortunately single right now and the way many people meet is online your first introduction is their profile page. This is filled with pictures and some usual comments about themselves. But, from this profile page you make judgements about them. Do they look good enough? Do they have a word or two you like? You swipe left or right and move to the next one.  

Why do I compare those three? Why am I connecting three things that may not normally be connected? Why do I use the word judge so many times? 

Before I answer those questions there is something that I am doing and would ask my reader to do the same. Look at the people around you, your partner, your friends, and your coworkers. There is a famous quote “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with” (Jim Rohn) but your work mates’ number more than five, as well as your friends and family. Are these the people you want to be around? Are these the people with the same values you have? Look at your resume and are these the companies that fit your values? This self-reflection may not be easy, in fact use the time to be critical. 

You should be able to now understand why I all four are mentioned together. I have stated simply that “you cannot change the people around you, but you can change the people around you.” And this introspection exercise is to do just that. It is not about a new year’s resolution, not about an impulsively rash decision, or telling you to cut off everyone that does not fit. It is about making you think about your values, what you yourself think is important and making a conscious effort to spend time with people who have those values. If someone has a trait that they excel in and you lack, being around them can mentor you.  

Now I am going to add a fourth scenario. Look at your last purchases. Discretionary or non-discretionary. Are you spending money that matches what is important to you? Are you spending money on things, experiences, for family, for yourself?  

I write a lot about things I see and view and what I try to change in myself. The best way is to be around people who are successful in the things you want to change, and even asking them for assistance. But just being around those who share your values allows you to be yourself and you do not need to pretend to have other values. For money, everyone is going to have what they spend their money on. And there is no right answer, but make sure when doing things together, that you are getting the value you want. The value could be friendship, and the activity does not matter, but make it based on your value. 

This exercise is something I may add to my quarterly routine, but the key thing is living with myself and within my values is something I need to make sure I follow.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

Some strong leaders state the words ‘You are with us, or you are against us.” For us Americans in was a rallying cry after 9/11, but the origin of the saying goes well before 2001. There are even references in the bible. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller states “You’re either for us, or against your country.” Even as I type the quote I cringe at the exact wording. 

This saying sets up a simplistic dichotomy of being either “for us” or “against us” which does not allow for any nuance or complexity. It assumes that there are only two sides to every issue, and that people must either be for one side or against the other. This is simply not true. There are often many different perspectives on an issue, and people may hold a variety of different views. The world is not black and white, there are shades of grey and there are colors. Forcing someone to pick a side without understanding the nuances is divisive. 

The saying also puts pressure on people to make an immediate decision. They may not have the facts but demand one to pick a side. The goal of the statement is often to intimidate someone into allegiance. Knowing that people have this ardent desire to belong, they could make the wrong choice in haste.  

Once the choice is made it creates this adversarial situation. This is the “us” versus “them” mentality. The chasm between the two sides continues to grow. This chasm prevents productive conversations from happening and finding resolutions difficult. The divide even creates this unhealthy self-righteousness feeling and allows people to demonize anyone on the other side. 

People use this divide to justify their behavior. Including what could be seen as extreme. When there is a crowd with you it is easier to not only act worse, but to get apparent approval from the crowd. They are with you, thus whatever you do they must agree with. Promoting extreme measures on your side is fully justified but also supported. Social media can amplify both the measures and the backing. 

Once someone picks a side it is not always possible to speak out against something that side does. There is a fear that if you do speak up you will be thrown out of this clan that you selected. In the worst-case scenario, their extreme measure could be directed at you. This fear and intimidation silences many who otherwise would not have joined if they knew.  

Throughout history, leaders of politics and religion have used this divisive phrase to force people to take sides and strengthen their in-group. But most complex issues have more than just two monolithic sides. This saying boxes people into a false choice when truth is often far messier. 

I started thinking about this recently for a few reasons. A few weeks ago, in the US local elections were held. In my town we voted for mayor. I noticed something interesting on the signage of both candidates. Neither one stated their party affiliation. There were also signs stating that federal politics have no place in local elections. Both candidates did not want their voters to think that they were all in with their parties, that you were either pro everything one side or the other. 

Second, the war in the middle east continues. As I listen to some podcasts and relearn the history and what has been going on there for fifty plus years, I see the situation is more nuanced than ‘for us or against us’ statement.  

And third, Kid Rock who slammed Bud Light decided to change his tune. His latest statement “I didn’t want to be in the party of cancel cultures and boycotts that ultimately hurt working-class people.” A few weeks ago, I wrote about not being responsible for your first thought. Here I see Kid Rock got to understand the situation and now is on to his second thought. 

All three started me thinking about how we should approach the chasm that separates too many people. The optimist in me would like to see more nuanced thinking around ideas. People to be more open to perspectives outside of this one side or the other. For people to find the strength to speak up, as often there are more that are willing to agree with you. That strength will be needed to overcome those screaming the loudest, as they are not the ones we should be listening to. Though most sides of an issue have key divisions, there are also common values that should bring them together. In the end people care about freedom, safety, justice, family etc. It is finding those values that we can agree on to find a way forward.  

So now when I hear the following phrase ‘You are either with us, or against us” I will try to dig the strength to say ‘No, I am not, I can agree with you on one point but disagree other times.’ 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

My first job as a child was delivering the Daily Journal newspaper. A subscription was a few dollars a week and people got a morning paper and on Sunday an expanded paper with coupons. This was the first subscription I knew about. I remember some other delivery services, Milk, Charles Chips, etc. But I didn’t think about subscriptions that much; well, I was a kid.  

The first subscription shock was cable television. I remember all the talk about who would pay for something you get for free. At that time, most people got television via rabbit ears. But by 1988 52.4% of US households had cable television, the notion of people willing to pay for a subscription was debunked.  

In the mid 80s technology subscriptions started. At any point in time, I had Prodigy, GEnie or CompuServe. These predate the open internet. I think the most popular of these was AOL. Some people I know still have and use their AOL email address. These services gave you access to a walled garden of activities, information, and entertainment. These were all killed due to the open internet and high-speed internet access, which was another subscription service. 

Amazon started it streaming service in 2006 and it grew with its Amazon prime. 2007 Netflix, a video DVD subscription company, decided to move to online streaming. Hulu was also announced in 2007, but was not popular until Disney plus, ESPN plus joined it in 2019, and 2018. Some of this growth was helped by Apple allowing apps to charge subscription fees, so now apps and services were given easy access to potential customers. 

Why all the history? I started writing this a few months ago but two of my favorite podcasts started to mention it. This Week in Google and The Big Technology podcast last week had stories about what I have been thinking, as it appears after covid many of the blogs, YouTube channels and podcasts are starting to create subscription tiers.  It started more during covid where a few musicians I enjoy could not make money touring, so they went to a tipping model, or in some cases a subscription model. WIth the subscription they would give you more access to them, zoom calls, access to private Facebook, Instagram feeds, lessons, etc.  

In 2005 I was commuting to NYC and found podcasts to keep me entertained on the hour or so bus ride there and back. There were free, some had advertising in the mix. Every podcast I listen to now has some kind of paid tier, TWIT (Club TWIT), Hidden Brain, Huberman Labs, No Stupid Question, The Big Technology Podcast, Factually etc. If I paid for all it could add up to two hundred dollars a month. This is more than I pay for cable television and internet! Next add artists, including writers, musicians that I would like to support, it could add to close to three hundred dollars a month. This does not include my cell phone subscription to receive the information also. And what about all the ‘app’ subscriptions and things like Peloton etc.  

My mind is trying to wrap my head around a few things that are conflicting. First, I do need to manage my expenses, second if I stop paying which services may not exist and third is this the end of advertising supported content. The first is easy, I need to make choices, understand what I spend money on (yes there is a subscription app that will even help you with that) and give myself a budget.  

The second two are a bit more problematic. Now I do not think that Netflix, Disney etc. are going to go out of business, but some of the smaller ones may struggle. And lastly, if everything goes behind a paywall, how useful will the internet be? If the better writers and authors want you to pay to see the best content, what is left is going to be ‘lower quality.’ I am going to ignore the fact that search and things like Chat GPT will be useless if everything is behind a paywall. LLM’s like Chat GPT will need a walled garden they have control over to train; this is another post in draft already.  

I try to spend my time finding and listening to (or reading) quality content. In my efforts to get better every day it is one of the things I find helps. Some blog posts have been influenced by them, and this one got pushed out faster due to two other podcasts talking about it. If it all goes behind a paywall the ability to grow will be diminished. TWIT and Huberman both have stated their content will always be free which is wonderful, but that does not mean they will be able to survive as a business. I almost wish there were a service where you could just pay $100 a month, get all the content needed and based on what you read or listened to would get a percentage based on some metric. Someone can start that, but I can see we just end up with 2-3 giant cable companies.  

Just a note for those who do not know economics. First there are very few creators/influences that make the big bucks. The platforms will push them to make it seem that it is possible. The people making money are the platforms, and a few of the creators. Which is why the subscription would allow them to create quality content. Until a few months ago, I did not pay as much attention to how many I subscribed to. Writing this was supposed to help me pick which ones I should. It did not, in fact I am still torn. Does anyone who read this have some way to pick?  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

Looking at my notes I thought ‘Part 2 is going to be easy to write.’ Every day this week I spent looking at the ideas, trying to put them in an order that makes sense, and it was not. I was failing and trying to articulate how to limit or eliminate mistakes. Guess what people, you cannot prevent mistakes and or avoid failure. It is going to happen whether you like it or not. The line from Apollo 13 ‘failure is not an option’ is untrue.   There is nothing you can do that will ever be foolproof. In fact, there is a saying that I learned while studying the User Experience that a UX designer’s job is to create a user interface that even a fool can use, and the Universes job is the create better fools. So, what are you to do? 

If you know mistakes are going to happen, failure is an option and there needs to be some process on handling it. Yes, what I am saying is plan your mistakes, mishaps, and failures. To me the plans come in two parts. 

First, if you remember after 9/11 in the US, the government called on movie writers to produce ways that the US could be attacked.  Start with the premise of being creative.  When I worked on cars at Camp Sky Crest, one counselor would ask another ‘what does Murphy say?’ (as in Murphy’s laws) The thought was to think of anything that could go wrong and try to front run it.   Now this is not that easy, how can you get people to be creative in all the mistakes that can happen. Guess what, practice it, eventually you will get better. If you never do it, I guarantee at least of the things you would have thought of will happen.  

Second part of planning to fail is ‘what to do when something fails.’  In technology there is this notion of setting up when a system goes down, but that is only one part of failure.  Projects fail, code has issues, business users do things wrong, and so on.  A process needs to be in place for any failures on how to recover and change so that it reduces the possibility of it happening again.  

This includes how to do the postmortem correctly.   Most cases people looking for the simple one mistake that caused the outage.  What I started to learn later was the blame never solved the problem. Bringing back my agile methods of development there is a practice called the five whys. This is a practice mostly used in requirements gathering to keep asking why, up to five times to get to the ‘real’ reason something is being done.  It could be a gorilla and bananas problem, a poor process problem, a people problem, a system problem, a management problem, a time to market problem etc. Unless you keep asking why, it is going to be hard to get to all the breakdowns to address.   

In last week’s writing I described one cause could be lack of reading emails. If an email is sent to too many people often multiple people think the other person reviewed it. In processes with say six or seven sign offs everyone thinks the other person read it, so I do not have to. The process is designed to make sure there are checks and balances, but too many checks people take the short cut, and no one checks.   

The other thing to make sure of is that all the small issues are included in the whys.  If part of the problem is reduced staffed so more workload led to the lack of people paying attention, it needs to be there.  There could be lack of documentation of the process, lack of knowing the process, and even lack of practicing the process so it is usable. Time to market often makes people take short cuts, incentives can drive behavior and egos can break things. Communication failures exist, whether it is a language issue, cultural issue, lack of people speaking up (silence is not always agreement) and simple different understandings of the same sentence.   If you do not work and find small breaks, build solid communication frameworks and practices misaktes and failure will still happen. 

If you are already good at postmortems, then doing the first part is the same thing. Look at your processes, look at what you are doing and challenge the premise that it is the right thing to do. But it becomes before versus after.  

Guess what I lied, there are not two parts but three. The third comes from Agile practices. Part one needs to be done often on some regular basis. In Agile Scrum, this is called a retrospective. Where the finished product is not what is being discussed but the process of how we got there. Mistakes are going to happen but understanding the cause of why things went awry and making minor changes reduces the changes of them happening.  

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” (Einstein) – But maybe it is also not thinking things can go wrong and planning on first how to prevent them, and second how to handle them when they do.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.  

You are healthy and fit, so you decide to have a cheat day.  That one day doesn’t hurt you and you are fine.  But then the next day you cheat again on your diet.  No big deal you will get back to it on Monday.  Six months later you find yourself completely out of shape.  You are wondering how that happened, what was the moment you went from fit to fat.  What was the day that you went over the cliff from being that fit to that fat person.  

I woke up one day and thought why I can’t fit into my skinny jeans and tried to pinpoint the day I got fat.  The problem was, there was not a ‘moment’ it was a six-to-eight-month small with hundreds of breakdowns that cumulated into a failure.  Now of course, I had to change course and get myself back into shape, but it made me start thinking about the cliff moment. In most cases there is no understanding of anything is wrong until it’s a bit too late.   

My day job is in technology (regular readers know that) and there are occasional outages or problems.  I am sure most people have been hit by an outage of either their cell phone, a software service or even their internet and wonder what went wrong.  Inside companies there is a range of reactions. The notion of finding the root cause and fixing it to restore service is the goal. Once service is restored then becomes the understanding of finding not just what went wrong, but why?  

Obviously, no one wants to admit that they made the mistake, but you will get called out if you were at fault. Let us assume that people do admit their mistakes and place in the analysis, what I have seen in thirty-five plus years of being in technology the answer is made simplistic. The goal is to obviously make it easy to display and then come up with a solution.  

Looking at most of the issues I encountered and now comparing it with weight loss, very few can be explained simply. most of them are a series of decisions and issues that lead to the failure. How do you tell someone that everything from hiring practice, location strategy, budget, architecture decisions, technology decision, time to marked pressure, poor communication, people not reading emails, lack of testing and more can lead to failure. These things are not easily repairable, so they are often ignored.  

The challenge in both personal and business situations is being able to figure out how to change. I am challenging myself to start looking at issues this way, and instead of blaming one thing look at everything that led up to the breaking point. If you don’t make your bed one day, a few weeks later your whole room is a mess, if the light on your car goes on, a few weeks later it dies, if you stop learning, years later the person next to you is smarter.  

How to we stop these failures? How do we make good decisions so that they do not add up to failure? I am going to dig into that next week, this week I think spending the time understanding how to see problems coming needs to be digested.

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain, I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  I do read all feedback, I mostly wont post any of them.

This Blog is a labor of love, and was originally going to be a book.  With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path.  I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content.  I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip.  I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.   AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information.Images without notes are created using and AI tool that allows me to reuse them.