Archive for the ‘Required Reading’ Category

Love “Johanna’s Management Myths”, namely:

• The Myth of 100% Utilization
• Only the ‘Expert’ Can Perform This Work
• We Must Treat Everyone the Same Way
• I Don’t Need One-on-ones
• We Must Have an Objective Ranking System
• I Can Save Everyone
• I Am Too Valuable to Take a Vacation
• I Can Still Do Significant Technical Work
• We Have No Time for Training
• I Can Measure the Work by the Time People Spend at Work

More here and here

Press conferences are notoriously hard things to manage. I thought this was an amusing end to the President’s first press conference and the way to handle what inevitably happens at these events:

There was one last twist: Obama patiently listened to a high-decibel question after he had closed the presser by thanking the reporters for attending. Then he said it would set a bad precedent for him to answer a shouted question. Reelected presidents can do that.

Another great new digital magazine. Well worth a look.

And if you are into philosophy and the like – this article on Alan Watts is brilliant. As the story goes:

He was, if not the earliest, then certainly the foremost translator of Eastern philosophical ideas to the West. In some ways, his interpretations were radical — for instance, he dismissed the core Zen idea of zazen(which meant spending hours seated in contemplative meditation) as unnecessary. ‘A cat sits until it is tired of sitting, then gets up, stretches, and walks away,’ was his forgiving interpretation of zazen. Slightly less forgiving was his comment on Western Zen enthusiasts, whom he mocked as ‘The uptight school … who seem to believe that Zen is essentially sitting on your ass for interminable hours.’ It was a great relief to read this for someone like me, who found the idea of excessive meditation as unhealthy as the idea of excessive masturbation.

Watts also rejected the conventional ideas of reincarnation and the popular understanding of karma as a system of rewards and punishments carried out, lifetime after lifetime. It was this radical approach that made his ideas so fresh — he had no time for received wisdom, even from those who claimed to know Zen inside out.

Many Zen ideas have become debased into ‘new age’ philosophy, basely transmuted into wishful thinking, quasi-religious mumbo jumbo and the narcissistic fantasies of the ‘me generation’. But before the beatniks and the hippies got hold of it, Zen philosophy, as described by Watts, was hard-edged, practical, logical and, in some ways, oddly English in tone, as it had deep strands of scepticism and humour. (You’ll never see Christian saints laughing. But most of the great sages of Zen have smiles on their faces, as does Buddha.)

In an age obsessed with demand-centric marketing – which is all about harvesting – it’s too easy to forget or stray away from building and creating markets. This terrific quote (thanks Seth) reminded me of that:

Wenda Millard quotes a Mercedes Benz exec, “If the only time I show you a Mercedes ad is just before you’re about to buy a fancy car, I’ve lost.”

The fact is, advertising to build brand and recognition and demand is a very long-term proposition, not something you measure with clicks.

Damn right.

Great to see ETNZ’s big boat performing like this. Look closely, two hulls out of the water – up on its wings. Woohoo!