Anatomy Of A Failed Consultant
Other than writing pithy blog posts and tweeting, a big part of what I do to pay the rent is consult. Over the years I’ve become a lot better at it and have, through trial an error, gathered a few...
View ArticleThe Sales Pitch
It was a Friday afternoon and I was sitting in a surprisingly comfortable chair in a set of offices tucked away on the ground floor of a Major Hotel Chain. I was gripping one of those tiny bottles of...
View ArticleStop Buying Banner Ads
There is a simple formula I use when determining how much money a startup should spend on display advertising in its first year. First, I take whatever budget they had arrived at through careful...
View ArticleThe Grand Narrative of American Life
I sit here having just finished reading article number 345,576 about how hard it is to find work. This storyline is rapidly becoming the grand narrative of modern American life, and quite possibly the...
View ArticleIntroducing the Polymath
The first working airplane was built by a pair of brothers who knew next to nothing about the air, and nothing at all about planes. The Wright brothers, the most famous duo of aviation to ever grace...
View ArticleExecution is Everything
You can be too smart. You can be too strategic. The world is often moved on the back of blind, stupid execution. The problem with “smart” people is we tend to believe, truly believe, that there is a...
View ArticleMake Your Feedback Brutal
If you are putting your product in front of the right people, they are telling you what a piece of crap it is. It’s really easy to find people who agree with you. It’s really easy to find people who...
View ArticleHammer Nail Problems
I make a lot of bad decisions, even when I know what the corresponding “good” decision is. I do this for the same reason that programmers try to solve everything through code, and sales guys try to...
View ArticleWhat I Learned On My Istanbul Vacation
“Hello friend!” Silence. The man pauses for a moment, adjusting his wide smile, “Hello friend!” He repeats. More silence. His expression transforms at the edges — becoming thin, neutral, teeth still...
View ArticleI Want To Be A Meaning Machine
I want to have a fancy cup of coffee with a fancy VC in a fancy restaurant and never ask for a dime. I want to get a transhumanist, a militant utilitarian and a techno-anarchist in the same room at...
View Article
More Pages to Explore .....