David Rock writes an intriguing review of neuroscience findings on how the human mind works and how we can use that information to help us do a better job at work. While many of the topics it covers might be coined "common sense", there are a few nuggets of new information that add substantially to what we know about work, productivity, and cooperation.
The book is broken up into scenes which tackle a different topic of neuroscience. The technique the author uses to discuss each topic starts with a fictitious couple who struggle with common productivity issues like information overload, procrastination, distractions, uncooperative coworkers, etc. A discussion of the science follows in why these issues are common and how to overcome these limitations. Then, the fictitious story is re-told, except this time the actors avoid the inherit limitations of our brain and instead perform the ideal actions that best take advantage of our brain's strengths. I found this technique great for motivating the reader while concertizing the science into useful practices understandable to everyone.
For me, the first half of the book seemed to re-iterate much of what I already knew about productivity. Such lesson as avoid distractions, stay focused on one subject at a time, break down big decisions into smaller easier to handle decisions, handling uncertainty, etc. are all practices I am aware of and practice. The biggest lessons learned came in the last half of the book discussing how we interact with others. In particular, I was struck by how to effectively deal with other people, especially when they feel threatened or intimidated. When others go into a defensive mode, it is hard to get their cooperation. And here, the science suggests something similar to what I learned from some parenting books of all places (Positive Discipline and Between Parent and Child). In order to build cooperation, we should not direct but collaborate on answers to questions. We should respect others' ability to find answers on their own (sometimes this requires directed questions). If we want to change other people's behavior, we need to get them to see the need to change themselves without putting them on the defensive. Using a stick is often NOT the best method. Nor is using arbitrary rewards.
While there are many other great discussions in the book, I'll leave it up to you to find the rest. I found the book to be a well written, practical guide to improving your productivity at work. By aligning your actions with sciences' best practices, we can achieve high levels of capability to our work. It's a great read for anyone interested in improving their productivity at work.
11.26.2011
11.10.2011
The tale of two passions
What should you do when you can't decide between two equally passionate directions for your career? For many of us, there are many things we could do that would make us happy. Sometimes, you can whittle down that list to one or two great passions. Sometimes a great opportunity comes along that diverges from your current career. What happens when you cannot decide between your two highest passions. Should you do both? Unfortunately, splitting your efforts between two careers usually ends up with failure in both. The more directed and focused you can be in your career, the greater success you will reach along with a deeper happiness from a job well done. So, how can one decide? Here is I dealt with this issue.
First the background. For a while now, I have struggled with deciding between two different career tracks. I attempted to integrate those passions in my career as an academic, but I am still drawn to specializing in one or the other. Both passions fall in line with my central purpose in life. Both passions have long-term viability in my career as an academic. Both have potential for a consulting/expert business beyond academy. The first of these passions is to think, write, and educate about making decisions using applied philosophy, particularly extending Objectivism's moral and epistemological foundations. The second passion is to think, write, and educate about making decisions for developing a web presence, particularly with emerging web technologies. I have tried, unsuccessfully, for the past couple months to decide which career tracks offers the most potential happiness and financial gain.
Here is how I propose to deal with this dilemma.
For a short time, I will do both - equally. I will set up two dueling frameworks. Two blogs, two twitter accounts, and two facebook pages interconnected so that I can hit maximum exposure of my ideas with minimal effort. I will then set up dual marketing schemes, targeted at the appropriate audiences. Then I will proceed to blog once a week in each framework and post status updates/ micro-blog 5 times a week for one month. At the end of the first month, I will evaluate three things for both passions 1. market response 2. difficulty in finding and writing content and 3. how much did I enjoy the process. The last of which being the most important. If there is no clear winner after the first month, I will continue for a second month and re-evaluate again - perhaps even a third and fourth month, if needed. I need to convenience myself which career track focus will create the greatest enduring value for me. The other passion will be regulated to a hobby.
While I am in a unique position to try both career tracks simultaneously, not everyone has that luxury. In cases where decisions have to made quickly (as in the case of once in a lifetime opportunities that expire in a few days), developing a weighted average matrix might help. Essentially, that is what I'm doing, but collecting real data rather than just estimates. In a weighted average matrix, you first identify the most important criteria to be used in your decision. If you were buying a house, you might identify criteria such as size, location, layout, etc. Then, for each criteria, you provide a weight as to how important that criteria is compared to the other criteria. Size might be 50% of your decision, location might be 25%, layout might be 10% and so on. After you have thought through how important each criteria is, you look at each option and measure how well it meets each criteria. When exact measures cannot be found, best guess estimates have to suffice. You put these measurements into a matrix and calculate the weighted average. The option with the highest score is the winner.
First the background. For a while now, I have struggled with deciding between two different career tracks. I attempted to integrate those passions in my career as an academic, but I am still drawn to specializing in one or the other. Both passions fall in line with my central purpose in life. Both passions have long-term viability in my career as an academic. Both have potential for a consulting/expert business beyond academy. The first of these passions is to think, write, and educate about making decisions using applied philosophy, particularly extending Objectivism's moral and epistemological foundations. The second passion is to think, write, and educate about making decisions for developing a web presence, particularly with emerging web technologies. I have tried, unsuccessfully, for the past couple months to decide which career tracks offers the most potential happiness and financial gain.
Here is how I propose to deal with this dilemma.
For a short time, I will do both - equally. I will set up two dueling frameworks. Two blogs, two twitter accounts, and two facebook pages interconnected so that I can hit maximum exposure of my ideas with minimal effort. I will then set up dual marketing schemes, targeted at the appropriate audiences. Then I will proceed to blog once a week in each framework and post status updates/ micro-blog 5 times a week for one month. At the end of the first month, I will evaluate three things for both passions 1. market response 2. difficulty in finding and writing content and 3. how much did I enjoy the process. The last of which being the most important. If there is no clear winner after the first month, I will continue for a second month and re-evaluate again - perhaps even a third and fourth month, if needed. I need to convenience myself which career track focus will create the greatest enduring value for me. The other passion will be regulated to a hobby.
While I am in a unique position to try both career tracks simultaneously, not everyone has that luxury. In cases where decisions have to made quickly (as in the case of once in a lifetime opportunities that expire in a few days), developing a weighted average matrix might help. Essentially, that is what I'm doing, but collecting real data rather than just estimates. In a weighted average matrix, you first identify the most important criteria to be used in your decision. If you were buying a house, you might identify criteria such as size, location, layout, etc. Then, for each criteria, you provide a weight as to how important that criteria is compared to the other criteria. Size might be 50% of your decision, location might be 25%, layout might be 10% and so on. After you have thought through how important each criteria is, you look at each option and measure how well it meets each criteria. When exact measures cannot be found, best guess estimates have to suffice. You put these measurements into a matrix and calculate the weighted average. The option with the highest score is the winner.
11.06.2011
When is debt, not really debt?
When is debt, not really debt? When other people pay for it... voluntarily.
That's the case I'm in right now. A few months ago, I was in a quandary. Our family was moving out of state and we wanted to sell our house. Unfortunately, we could not find any buyers willing to pay the amount of money equivalent to our outstanding mortgage. We couldn't even find buyers willing to pay $20,000 less than the amount of our outstanding mortgage. Our choices were getting slim until we realized that with that debt, came an asset. An asset we could leverage to pay off that debt. So we did a simple thing, we found someone else to pay off our debt in exchange for their use of our asset (commonly called renting). Of course we are dependent on a few things for this gamble to succeed. First, we needed to find and keep good renters. Given the number of foreclosures in southeast Michigan, there are many families who do not have the credit to buy a home in the near future. Our first tenants seemed ideal. An established middle-aged couple, one of whom is an executive in a small company, the other of which loves yard work. They decided to walk away from a $400,000 mortgage and rent for a few years. With a two year lease, we should have some stability in payments and they will have a home they can afford and enjoy. Win-win!
The second thing we were counting on is that the housing market in our area would turn around, or at least stabilize from the plummet it was in for the past 5 years. There was evidence back in June that Michigan had started a significant recovery and that evidence is looking stronger today. As Bloomberg states: "Michigan’s economy is recovering from the recession at the second-fastest pace in the U.S..." They further state: "Mortgage delinquencies dropped at the fourth-fastest pace in the U.S., and personal income and employment growth ranked in the top third, according to data compiled by Bloomberg." Granted, Michgian was at the bottom in terms of impact of the recession, but its recovery is solid and (hopefully) lasting. With more jobs comes greater demand for housing and hopefully increasing prices.
Even if the housing prices do not bounce back, the rent from our tenants will pay off the principle on our mortgage, so that in 5 or 10 years, the principle will decrease to a point where paying off the loan will not put us in the red. If the housing market does bounce back, we may be fortunate enough to walk away with some capital to invest in larger cash flow investments.
So while we do have significant debt, it is not debt that negatively impacts our personal financial picture. As Robert Kiyosaki, of Rich Dad, Poor Dad fame, would say, this is how the rich get rich. The rich have other people pay for their debt, but they do so in a mutually beneficial relationship leveraging their assets where everybody wins.
That's the case I'm in right now. A few months ago, I was in a quandary. Our family was moving out of state and we wanted to sell our house. Unfortunately, we could not find any buyers willing to pay the amount of money equivalent to our outstanding mortgage. We couldn't even find buyers willing to pay $20,000 less than the amount of our outstanding mortgage. Our choices were getting slim until we realized that with that debt, came an asset. An asset we could leverage to pay off that debt. So we did a simple thing, we found someone else to pay off our debt in exchange for their use of our asset (commonly called renting). Of course we are dependent on a few things for this gamble to succeed. First, we needed to find and keep good renters. Given the number of foreclosures in southeast Michigan, there are many families who do not have the credit to buy a home in the near future. Our first tenants seemed ideal. An established middle-aged couple, one of whom is an executive in a small company, the other of which loves yard work. They decided to walk away from a $400,000 mortgage and rent for a few years. With a two year lease, we should have some stability in payments and they will have a home they can afford and enjoy. Win-win!
The second thing we were counting on is that the housing market in our area would turn around, or at least stabilize from the plummet it was in for the past 5 years. There was evidence back in June that Michigan had started a significant recovery and that evidence is looking stronger today. As Bloomberg states: "Michigan’s economy is recovering from the recession at the second-fastest pace in the U.S..." They further state: "Mortgage delinquencies dropped at the fourth-fastest pace in the U.S., and personal income and employment growth ranked in the top third, according to data compiled by Bloomberg." Granted, Michgian was at the bottom in terms of impact of the recession, but its recovery is solid and (hopefully) lasting. With more jobs comes greater demand for housing and hopefully increasing prices.
Even if the housing prices do not bounce back, the rent from our tenants will pay off the principle on our mortgage, so that in 5 or 10 years, the principle will decrease to a point where paying off the loan will not put us in the red. If the housing market does bounce back, we may be fortunate enough to walk away with some capital to invest in larger cash flow investments.
So while we do have significant debt, it is not debt that negatively impacts our personal financial picture. As Robert Kiyosaki, of Rich Dad, Poor Dad fame, would say, this is how the rich get rich. The rich have other people pay for their debt, but they do so in a mutually beneficial relationship leveraging their assets where everybody wins.
11.04.2011
Reshoring and Schiff
This news seems to contradict Peter Schiff's claim that America has lost its manufacturing ability.
DETROIT NEWS -- "A Royal Oak bead company expects to double its sales and bring jewelry manufacturing business back to America through a partnership with a design and manufacturing firm in Grand Rapids. Collegiate Bead Co., a 2-year-old manufacturer of licensed college and sorority beads and other collegiate jewelry, has joined with Terryberry LLC to bring the jewelry to market and expand its product line. After manufacturing in China for a year, Collegiate Bead founder Dave Schowalter decided to bring the manufacturing back to Michigan. The move goes against the outsourcing trend — something Burroughs Payment Systems Inc. in Plymouth also bucked a year ago, when it decided to locate six customer service representatives in Michigan after initially moving the work to India."
HT: Carpe Diem
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