Betterment

A lot happened for me this year. I continued learning the details of fund accounting at Carta, which is likely the most complex product domain I’ve worked in. My third book was published, and I did a small speaking tour to support it. We started the unironically daunting San Francisco kindergarten application process. I was diagnosed with skin cancer and had successful surgery to remove it. All things considered, it was a much messier year than I intended, but with many good pockets mixed in with the mess.

Working solo has its difficulties. For one, my income is somewhat tied to my productivity, and my productivity highly correlates to my state of mind. This is...

I’ve been part of the internet startup scene for a while. There are so many different camps: the bootstrappers, the VC-backed tech-bros, the crypto “investors”,

My process for starting new projects

How I'm using paper notes as a supplement to my digital note-taking.

New years bring resolutions, but those resolutions rarely stick. Creating change is difficult, and it’s hard to do it alone. New years remind us that we might need a better strategy. A philos…

Writer Karen Attiah recently wrote about the pleasure of perusing other people’s personal libraries and then asked her followers what their “personal foundational texts” were…those books that people read over and over again durin

I’m now rounding out the third month in my year-long project to improve my foundations. 
This month’s focus was money. In particular, the keystone habit I asked students of my course to work on this month was setting up a system to track their expenses and reviewing it at least monthly. Monthly expense tracking has […]

Don't demote yourself to a passive processing machine. Start with an intent when you process a chapter. Ask yourself: What do I want to build?

there is nothing lamer than a ill-planned dinner

There is a parasite, I see it everywhere. It consumes your health and wealth. It preys on ignorance and is easy to catch. It’s so common you may not even not...

Specialization is too heavily encouraged as a career path. The world needs more hybrid people.

40 questions that delve into your personal philosophy and traits, for you to reflect on now and revisit in 10 years.

Every year I ask myself these 40 questions. I’ve shared this list with my family and closest friends, and always enjoy discussing answers as we reflect on th...

The term “vanilla” is often used to describe something ordinary, plain, or standard. In my book, there’s nothing less vanilla than vanilla.

A world where knowledge is captured and categorized, interpreted by the masses almost instantaneously digested, regurgitated, masticated, ruminated.

My passion is teaching coaches, health professionals and educators evidence-based tools and techniques so they can confidently help their clients achieve long-term success through the power of habits.

Humans are unique. We give names to the days of the week (we even have weeks). We eat something different for breakfast than dinner. We chronicle the passage of time. In fact, our chronicling of ti…

Organizations lie all the time. Big lies, sometimes, but usually small ones. Is the call volume actually unusually heavy? Did a chef really prepare this meal just for me? These fiblets are so commo…

“You can try this at home…” But you probably won’t. The secret recipe isn’t the reason Coke is successful. And the recipe for KFC isn’t much of a recipe at all. …

When I include links to various books and items on this blog, your purchases generate a small royalty that I earmark for worthy causes. This year, we were able to help BuildOn and the community in …

“A complex system can fail in an infinite number of ways.” -“Systemantics” by John Gall   Incidents are stressful but inevitable. Even services designed for availability will eventually encounter a failure. Engineers naturally find it daunting to defend their systems against the “infinite number of ways” things can go wrong.  Our team found ourselves in…

Orchestras are difficult. One reason is that we’re really good at noticing when they’re out of tune. Just a tiny bit off changes our perception of the sound. The other reason is that if…

Marketing as we know it happened because of machines. Machines made factories dramatically more efficient, which meant that producers could no longer easily sell everything they made. When you go f…

It’s Christmas Eve and the Holiday Season is in full swing. Christmas, Hanukkah, New Year’s, all the good stuff. All of these traditions are very old, of

Automation How would you like to have notes automatically …

Capacitive touch buttons are a great way to turn just about any (non-conductive) surface into a button, but people generally dislike the lack of tactile feedback.  [KontinuumLab] apparently agreed …