I saw Dustin Hoffman speak on persistence and dedication to one’s craft by quoting Pablo Picasso. I loved it. He quoted Picasso as saying if someone took away his paints he would use pastels. If someone took away his pastels he’d use crayons. If he didn’t have crayons he’d use pencil on paper. If he didn’t have pencil and paper he’d spit on his finger and draw with the wetness[…] Keep reading →

I’ve written about my models for how to motivate doing things you aren’t good at. Such skills are important in many fields, but especially so in leadership. More than having to motivate yourself to do things for the first time, you often have to motivate many others to do things they haven’t done. One is my practice of having low standards the first time I do something, which motivates doing[…] Keep reading →

I wrote the following to a client and thought it was worth sharing here. I’ve written similar things before, but it bears repeating. I think it speaks for itself, but let me know if it needs more explanation or context. —————————– I find with passions you get out what you put in, so I think the advice to find your passion only gets half of it. You need to find[…] Keep reading →

I just read that Sweden is separating their trash so effectively, they’re buying garbage from other countries. That is, their reducing-reusing-and-recycling programs work so well, their waste-incineration program is running low. Needless to say, reducing waste reduces pollution more than incinerating garbage, so one program starving the other helps the environment. According to Phys.org, Europe’s average amount of trash ending up as waste if 38 percent. Sweden’s is 1 percent.[…] Keep reading →

In September, 2001, the company I co-founded, Submedia, was installing its first display in Atlanta for our first big launch. We anticipated a lot of press. Giving away part of how the story ends, we did get a lot of media attention. The night before launch was crazy — we had a few hours to finish installing the display, we had to prepare for the Fire Marshall’s inspection the morning[…] Keep reading →

A scene from the inspirational docudrama Apollo 13 based on the true rescue of a disaster in space illustrates a great example of how different models and beliefs can motivate different motivations and behavior. The scene is the control room after a lunar mission suffered an explosion and three astronauts’ lives were in peril as their ship hurdled through space with little chance at recovery. The characters are a fictional[…] Keep reading →

Do you ever find yourself trying to get someone to let go of something, to relax, or something similar, but they don’t? You know if they just didn’t worry so much or stopped caring about something so much, they’d have an easier time with the project, relationship, life, or whatever, but they just don’t let go? You may be motivated by compassion, but I suspect a lack of empathy may[…] Keep reading →