Betterment

As soon as we mechanize, measure and perfect something, it becomes far less interesting. There’s not a lot of discussion about which factory made your can of Coke, because they’re all t…

This the fifth year that Huckberry will participate in the Murph Challenge and we've been humbled by how many of you have joined us. Tag a p

Factoid: In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson famously wrote about “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. Notice how he didn’t say, “the

From Strength To Strength, by Arthur C. Brooks. “Decline is inevitable”. Brooks has written a really interesting book about how to manage the

The big leadership story of recent times is from President Zelensky from Ukraine. When offered safe passage by the Americans out of Kyiv when the Russians

We love this quote from Viktor Frankl. Culture is at its core, about creating meaning. Designing purpose. it is about finding that which unites us all. In

Suppose you’re learning a skill like algebra, programming or drawing. Consider two different strategies for studying: Examples first. Before you try anything on your own, study examples of how other people solve similar problems. Problems first. Before looking at any examples, try to solve the problem independently. If you fail or don’t get very far, […]

The internet has provided all of us with an advanced class on using innuendo, piercing invective and anger to make a point with our writing. Now, instead of simply seething or ranting, just about a…

It has been nearly a month since I posted something around here. I have been busy with work, life and reading. A lot of reading. Given the noisy state of media, I find books are a good source of in…

In 1993, when I was raising investment for one of the first internet companies, there weren’t any firms that specialized in this sort of thing. They were VCs from a different era, looking for…

This is a common sort of feedback/criticism/brainstorming, and it deserves a name. Show up toward the end, when most of the work has been done and it’s almost time to ship… Make a sugge…

What if organizations had a division that simply did the bad stuff? The people who were responsible for creating system updates that slow down old computers, that cover up bad behavior by employees…

It’s a stepping-stone, not a compromise. The media and our culture push us to build something for everyone, to sand off the edges and to invest in infrastructure toward scale. But it turns ou…

During World War II, Henry Beecher, an anesthesiologist serving in the U.S. Army, noticed that 32% of the soldiers he treated for horrific battle wounds felt no pain. A further 44% experienced only slight or mild discomfort, despite the fact they had shrapnel embedded in their bodies. Beecher hypothesized that the euphoria of surviving battle […]

Just Have a Think, a YouTube channel created by Dave Borlace, is one of my best sources for news about, and analysis of, the world energy transition. Here are some hopeful developments I’ve e…

The paradox of most tightly-knit communities is that they have an internal culture. And that culture often makes it difficult for a new person to join. It’s hard to have insiders if you don&#…

Data is everywhere, but turning it into information isn’t free. It takes focus, effort, consultation and time. More information is only useful if it helps you make a decision. Knowing the tem…

Well, not everyone. Just most people. When you do something that everyone else is doing, you’re likely to get what everyone else is getting. But in almost every population, “everyone&#8…

Many knowledge-economy employees say that the main cause of dissatisfaction at work is lack of agency. Lack of control over our time and our decisions and our output is demeaning. It turns people i…

On this Q&A with Adam Savage, he answers a few questions with answers that really resonated with me. First, he was asked if he shares his project ideas with family and friends. His very sincere…

If you’ve been following AoM long enough, you know I like philosophy. I’ve written about philosophy on the site and talked to lots of philosophers on the podcast.  Philosophy isn’t some esoteric practice for me. It’s practical. I turn to philosophy to figure out how to live a good and meaningful life.  But it’s also […]

When we’re close to an answer, there are two easy paths–name it, right now, and move on. Or avoid the answer and the responsibility that comes with it and stall. The best path is the th…

When writing Green Hills of Africa, Ernest Hemingway titled one of its sections “Pursuit as Happiness.” The heading, a riff on the Declaration of Independence’s celebration of “the pursuit of happiness,” not only well described Hemingway’s feeling about the safari he undertook which the book recounts, but his entire life’s philosophy.  Hemingway was ever in […]

Aristotle referred to humans as the “state-building animal.” Other names our species has proposed for itself, in various writings: Homo absconditus: “man the inscrutable” Homo adorans: “worshipping man” Homo aestheticus: “aesthetic man” Homo amans: “loving man” Homo animalis: “man with a soul” Homo avarus: “man the greedy” Homo creator: “creator man” Homo demens: “mad man” (the only creature with irrational delusions) Homo discens: “learning man” Homo domesticus: “domestic man” (because he builds his environment) Homo duplex: “double man” (because of his animal and social tendencies) Homo economicus: “economic man” Homo educandus: “to be educated” (we require education to reach maturity)...

Tips on how to comfort someone who’s sad, so you can help them in their time of need and be a better son, friend, and husband/boyfriend.

I love teaching myself new subjects. I have been doing it for the past 15 years, ever since I was 11. Having said that, I am a big believer in frameworks. Over the years, I have been working on a framework for learning a new subject: GAMP. Using this framework

If 2% of a population takes coordinated action, it makes a difference. If 5% do, it can change everything. This simple math also means that most people rarely do anything. Perhaps they don’t …

Some situations seem to call for an opponent. It might be our personality, the structure of the engagement or the way we’ve been taught to behave, but having an enemy seems to focus individua…

Nobody you know speaks more slowly than I do. Please don't refute that — I have no way to record my voice here and even if I could, it might

If you care about a creative practice, my guess is that you’ve already seen Peter Jackson’s new Beatles movie. If not, go check it out. It’s a miracle that the movie exists at all…