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“Modeling the world as it is, is one thing. But as soon as you being using that model, you are changing the world, in ways large and small. There is a broad assumption underlying many machine-learning models that the model itself will not change the reality its modeling. In almost all cases, this is false.”

Brian Christian

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“The proper method for hastening the decay of error, is not, by brute force, or by regulation which is one of the classes of force, to endeavor to reduce men to intellectual uniformity; but on the contrary, by teaching every man to think for himself.”

William Godwin

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Back in the 1970’s (maybe 80’s) Arie de Geus suggested “the ability to learn faster than competitors may be the only sustainable competitive advantage” and the idea of a business in perpetual motion was solidified. Well. That is assuming you were paying attention to Arie and agreed with him.

Business has, since then, gussied up constant learning with scale, velocity, and a variety of other nifty terms to communicate ‘business being in perpetual motion.’ At the core of all of this is that systems (business) are internal models of their environment which progressively and iteratively improve as systems accumulate knowledge and experience. In other words, systems learn. I share that because effective motion is a derivative of understanding systems and people and decision-making.

Which leads me to Motion (in general).

To do lists are endless with lots checked-off but never get shorter. People are working long hours but what is done never seems to create any meaningful progress. This is motion while being stagnant. It’s like a hamster in a wheel. It’s not only unsatisfying for the people in the wheel, but the business itself doesn’t gain any satisfying results (although managers are usually quite creative in result presentations to make it seem like shit is moving everyone forward).

What I am suggesting is motion is always about decisions. What I mean by that is there is never any lacks of things to do in a business but some just aren’t worth doing.

Meaningful motion projects fall into 2 slots:

• value creation initiatives which increase motion of value offered
• motion initiatives which increase the motion of the organization itself & indirectly enhances value

Choose your projects wisely. Meaningful motion is all that matters. That said. Motion will always inherently contain some ambiguity. What I mean by that is even with the existence of the best information available <and learning> it will be simultaneously true that (a) people will not agree what that information says and (b) people will not agree what the future will bring. This means goal commitment may be necessary, but not sufficient in accomplishing goals.

“Don’t confuse a flurry of activity for progress. That’s a magician’s trick.”

One of my past Bosses

What do I mean?

How often do we see a company doing lots and lots of shit yet we don’t really see any progress? That’s a business in love with motion in and of itself. That’s a business which justifies return off of doing and not progress. In the end. Motion has a direct relationship to ‘doing shit’ (progress type projects, not speed or stagnant projects) and “doing shit with utility”.

Which leads me to decision utility.

Motion, at its core, is about decision utility, i.e., which decision will create the greatest return. I call it Return on Choice (ROC).  In business you face a relentless onslaught of decisions to be made. Success is often dictated by how well you choose what is important versus what is not as important versus what is not important at all.

Let’s face it. No matter how good you are you will not always get this right.

Let’s face it. We could all become more adept at making choices because, let’s face it, if anything, we seem to have become worse at making thoughtful choices.

I would be remiss if I didn’t point out there is a direct relationship between ROC and impatience, i.e., too impatient poorer ROC and just enough patience higher ROC.

Now. I am all for, and a huge proponent of not dicking around <the technical term for ‘wasting time overthinking’> when a choice needs to be made. But there is a difference between making speedy decisions and making a decision because speed is the main criteria. The latter encourages impatient decision making which lessens decision utility.

This happens for two reasons:

• Impatience exacerbates our typically poor prioritization skills
• Impatience emphasizes Personal bias

That said.

A key part of decision utility and motion is prioritization skills

Since we live in a world of infinite possibilities, it’s so hard to figure out what to do, when, and where.

If you start thinking this way … well … you begin living in a world strewn with hypotheticals.

If I do A, then this will happen. But what if I do B?  Will it be better?  Will I get back more? Will everyone around me be more satisfied? Or what about C? That looks good. Oh. But someone suggested D.

You get it. There are 26 letters in the alphabet and while most of us stop way before Z, even getting to D can be maddening. It seems like the world is your oyster, everything is possible, but you don’t take advantage of any opportunities because you’re not sure of what’s best.

This is where I remind everyone what US President Dwight D. Eisenhower supposedly said: ‘The most urgent decisions are rarely the most important ones’. Misreading the urgent from the non-urgent and the important from the unimportant may create impatience at the wrong time and waste energy & focus. Smart business patience, and motion, at its simplest is grounded in the The Eisenhower Matrix. While Stephen Covey is often credited with the decision-making matrix it was actually Dwight Eisenhower, considered a master of time management, who developed the matrix.

Yeah. Decision utility is often driven by effective prioritization, i.e., what to do and what not to do.

“Mental clarity ain’t for the faint of heart.”

Katerina Stoykova Klemer

Which leads me to the battle between Motion and Personal bias.

Decision utility has to navigate the ‘personal bias’ maze.

“Being aware of our own biases doesn’t mean we aren’t still susceptible to them.”

Faris Yakob

When impatient we get, well, lazy. We lean in on our bias which is unfortunate because thinking takes hard work and every choice has opportunity costs. Unfortunately, most of us are not good at assessing ROC <return on choice> when viewing things thru a bias.

People need to invest in working to eliminate bias.

Invest in developing the choices <and however many we need to feel like we have enough to assess assuming that is a finite number>.

Invest in actually assessing the choices <better, betterest & best assuming a best can be actually identified>.

Invest in the actual choice.

Invest in learning so the choices make more and more sense.

I imagine we are talking about the proper investment in time because organizational impatience leads to the permitting of poor choices <and a quicker death of a thousand cuts>.

Let me be clear. Dealing with impatience and balancing impatience & patience ain’t for the faint of heart. Managing decisions is all about a thorough understanding of the decision’s hierarchy of needs, navigating bias & understanding the attributes in a span of time that generates the most rewarding outcome. Being impatient doesn’t mean you ignore this thinking but rather you incorporate it into your impatience <and it can dictate how patient you are in your impatience>.

Successful impatient decision making is about having, well, a rigid policy of flexibility.

Ok.

Translation. Effective impatient patience is all about mental clarity. Creating mental space to see things, feel things, absorb things and make those things into a decision or choice <that is learning by the way>.

Which leads me back to decision utility.

When you are facing a choice, making that decision <yes or no, do it or don’t do it>, you go through a cost-benefit check that may last anywhere from a split second to days, weeks, or even months <and yes even months can be an impatient patient choice>.

Such choices come up many times a day and time is a factor in virtually all of them.

It is easy to see how impatience can be abused if we regard life in today’s world as an almost unbroken fast-moving river of choices/decisions. In that world, utility becomes blurry and learning is a luxury.

Anyway. It is easy to see how with everything moving so fast all the time you can actually feel like you are speeding along even without making any good ROC choices. But 99 times out of a 100 there is little meaningful motion, just motion. I imagine my large point is that to ensure learning is useful and sustainable, you should probably iterate (OODA-ize) your motion. OODA makes tangible decision utility and learning value.

Which leads me to reductionism (which, OODA, used poorly, can lead to).

Reductionism never works because, well, it kills motion. Ok. It reduces larger motion of the whole system. It ‘right sizes’ motion under rationalizing energy use and thereby not only restricts expansiveness of motion but also the expansiveness offered by the larger system.

That said, to protect the ‘effective doers’ a bit, deliverers of effective consistency <let’s call us ‘the everyday working schmucks’> are kind of screwed in today’s business world in that you can clearly have focus and your consistency may be less clear to those around you.

If I have two major gripes in today’s business world, it is that we, leaders & managers, need to:

–      Better recognize the unseen portions of consistency <the focus within the inconsistency>

–      Better accept the unseen portions of consistency <the focus within the inconsistency>

Inconsistency and consistency <embracing both> is a skill & an art. I would note embracing some inconsistency and yet maintaining some consistency is kind of the key to successful perpetual motion in business.

Which leads me to motion in a complex, dynamic, environment.

Learning should seek to harness aspects of the system and complexity to enable perpetual motion. Yeah. Complexity is not an issue. The world is complex, an industry is complex, a business is complex, people are complex, heck, even learning is complex. We deal with complexity every day. To enable motion, we need to ‘de-confuse’ complexity. this does not mean dumbing it down or stripping it of important detail, it means making it understandable . The more things are understandable, the simpler they appear. When things appear simple, they become useful. On the other hand. Too simple is not useful. In addition, contrary to popular belief, complexity is actually interesting and people engage in complex environments BECAUSE they are dynamic. It has an inherent feel of motion (versus stagnancy) which people find appealing. Now. Too much ‘motion’ (or too fast), or being confused, kills the appeal. Therein lies the challenge with complex systems and business in general. Once again, I would argue information, well delivered, addresses everything I just noted and creates the sustainable advantage.

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“You’re not like other girls.”

“Shut the fuck up … don’t ever compliment me by insulting other women. That’s not a compliment; it’s a competition none of us agreed to.”

(via aussie-with-glasses)

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This is about competitions we don’t agree to in Life, in a society that creates them and a sense of “self” in which we are constantly trying to find meaning in the competition of ‘doing’.

So. Most of us can go through life doing the best we can trying to get along and, in general, view most things in life as a journey and not some race and … well …, unfortunately, sometimes people, things and society have a different view.

What this means is you are demanded to compete in some competition you really never agreed to.

Let me explain. There are absolutely a bunch of people out there who define themselves by competition. They seek to find validation and actualization through some comparison versus what others are doing <this, basically, is competition>. And then there are people like me <I do not know how many there are of us but I imagine it is a fairly significant %>. While I like winning and, on occasion, a good competition gets the heart rate up and ‘ups my game’, the majority of the time I don’t view Life when I wake up and go to work as a competition with anyone and anything but myself. I simply want to do good things <epic shit if possible> do the best I can and better than I did yesterday. I guess my competition is my yesterday not other people. That said. I am not naïve. I know that everyday I wake up and go to work I am entering into ‘the Thunderdome’ and entering into some competition that I didn’t really agree to.

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“Life doesn’t get easier or more forgiving, we get stronger and more resilient.”

Steve Maraboli

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I don’t like it. But I recognize it. As often as I can, I avoid the competitions I don’t agree to.

By the way, if you google “how to deal with competitions you do not agree to” you will get zilch, zero, no results on that topic.

None.

Ponder that for a second.

All that said.

What this does mean is that you receive compliments, as well as criticisms, based on competitions you didn’t agree to.

And that is aggravating. Incredibly annoying in fact.

It is like you are being judged by the Race Walking Olympic judges, with scores you don’t really care about, because you were just out jogging that day. Day in and day out people who really do not want to compete, other than with their own standards, are faced with having to accommodate competition they didn’t agree to.

What a fucking pain in the ass. I would also point out it sounds incredibly inefficient and time wasting.

Look. I am not suggesting some competition isn’t bad. I am suggesting that we go fucking overboard with regard to ‘forcing competition’ into all threads of Life & society & culture.

I do believe it is healthy for young people to understand that in competition some people win and some people lose and that some people get trophies and not everyone gets one <although getting a trophy is not all there is to success & Life>.

I do believe it is healthy in youth to understand that some people are smarter than others, that some have skills you don’t have and that some people more easily learn some things than you do.

I do believe it is healthy for young people to learn how to compete and that competition can be healthy.

But at some point I think it would be good for society and culture to either turn that switch off or maybe learn how to turn on the dimmer switch because I think part of being an adult is knowing what you are good at and what you may not be good at and deciding for yourself <some would call that personal responsibility> how you want to achieve the best version of yourself.

I am not convinced that society, and business, creating some false versions of competition which almost encourages me to compete in some competition I really didn’t agree to, let alone really want to compete, is a good thing.

I tend to believe people like me think our competition is harsher and more challenging than any competition society can create for me and because of that I tend to want to dismiss outside competitions.

Yeah.

That choice is fraught with peril. Suffice it to say just knowing that there is peril in not wanting to compete in some competition I didn’t even agree to is aggravating. But that is the world we currently live in. We are asked to compete against other flowers when all most of us want to do is bloom.

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“The thoughts we choose to think are the tools we use to paint the canvas of our lives.”

Louise Hay

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So.

This is about thinking.

Louise Hay is a motivational author who writes a lot of bullshit about ‘How to Love Yourself’ in self-help books. That said. This is an outstanding quote and thought.

We paint the canvas of our lives with thoughts.

Which leads me to thinking and happiness.

Thinking, happiness, and how all the researchers & self help analysis and rules to follow truly impinge upon our overall happiness.

Bottom line?

Those sonofabitches are facilitating our grumpiness; not happiness <aside to myself: ‘bastards’>.

“The third-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the majority. The second-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the minority. The first-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking.”

A. A. Milne

If I could have sat down with A.A. when he said this I would have suggested that he add “the 4^th rate mind is only happy when its over-thinking thinking.”

Academics and researchers tear apart thinking to an absurd extreme.

Rational versus irrational.

Logical versus intuitive.

This versus that.

Sum it all up and you get a confusing picture of a human mind that is alternatively strong and weak, pliable and inflexible, constantly overwhelmed yet inevitably insatiable and … well … always contradictory.

After all this research, inevitably they all shake their heads and say ‘how we think is often irrational.’

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm …

Labeling thinking as ‘irrational’ is, well, irrational.

And silly.

Not because we don’t make irrational decisions when we think <because sometimes we actually do, but I would also suggest that irrational is in the eyes of the beholder>, but rather that we invest so much energy trying to analyze thinking.

In all of this analysis we obscure the true beauty and joy of thinking, in other words, the happiness found in thinking.

Thinking is expansive not constrictive – and we should discuss it that way.

Heck.

It often shouldn’t even be constructed.

And there certainly is no “how to” guide for everyone to follow <oops … a bunch of self-help authors are gonna send me some nasty emails now>.

The guard rails, or the steps, are pretty basic.

We hunt <for information>.

We gather <the information>.

We consider options <information>.

We cook up an idea or a thought <typically as informed information>.

** note: this can happen in 5 seconds, 5 minutes, 5 hours, 5 days … but the process remains the same>

Some people call this ‘stimulus – response.’

Some people call it common sense.

Beyond that?

It’s maddening if you try and analyze how people think.

Is there an art and a science to taking time to gathering more input versus making a decision?

Or how to sift through all the information you have?

Or how to make big decisions versus small decisions?

Or, shit, how to even identify a small versus a big decision <and how often do we get that wrong looking in hindsight>?

It seems kind of maddening to try and unravel all of that.

Why?

Its mental masturbation.

You really cannot do anything with the information you gain from all the research and analysis <there will be no “how to think” pamphlet to hand out to everyone when they are born>.

Look.

The best thinkers tend to need both logical and analogical thinking. They use subconscious and intuition combined with logical analysis. Sometimes even using what you don’t even know that you know as you utilize linear thinking and pattern recognition.

And the best of the best recognize some level above the logical. They somehow recognize an elusive “why” that will drive the idea.

Sound maddeningly unteachable?

It should,

Because it is not teachable.

In the end.

You have to consciously fill your brain with experiences, facts, knowledge and learning and then it is really the subconscious that makes all the breakthrough thinking.

Heck.

It is really the subconscious that makes all the thinking good.

It’s the subconscious which sifts through everything you have gathered and, well, you think.

Now.

Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do the thinking hard lifting or the analysis or the background work necessary because that stuff is the nutrition for healthy thinking. But. Recognize that the maddening part in really good thinking resides somewhere in the unplanned, i.e., in the subconscious.

By the way that’s the stuff that really cannot be taught or analyzed or researched or shared in some business book.

In a world where we put such a high value on completion and destination and results, thinking’s value is most likely found in the journey … the ‘looking.’

“Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but less interesting than looking.”

Goethe

We seem to try and teach thinking, and analyze thinking, with the intent of improving results. Uhm. This ultimately suggests you should be unhappy with your thinking if you do not generate results.

Nuts.

We should encourage more looking; more thinking.

Thinking makes us happy.

If we listen to all the self-help pundits we begin thinking that thinking is an unhappy experience without results.

Nuts <again>.

Our thoughts, and thinking, create the canvas of our lives; not results.

Anyway.

Here is the only thing I truly know <without gobs of research>.

Thinking is good.

Thinking well creates happiness.

Ponder.

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“The woman who doesn’t require validation from anyone is the most feared individual on the planet.”

Mohadesa Najumi

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“Everybody is looking for validation, no matter who you are, and I think that’s a need of the human condition – to look for affection or recognition or validation.”

Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu

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So. We all need validation.

It would be silly to suggest you don’t.

That said.

If you type in ‘seeking validation’ in google you get about 341,000 results in about .57 seconds and, well, they are almost all about ‘approval seeking behaviors you need to stop. ’

Well.

That sucks.

Basically what this means is that if you went solely by what you could find online you could quite possibly think that you should simply “damn the torpedoes and go full speed ahead without anyone’s approval or validation at any point in the trip.”

Basically this suggests “fuck what other people think … fuck approval.”

That seems slightly out of whack from reality to me.

Look.

I am not going to suggest you should be waiting around for someone to validate your behavior or your existence … but … it kinda seems to make some sense to receive at least some validation ‘nudges’ on occasion.

Why?

Well.

Maybe just to make sure you are still within the guardrails of what makes sense and that you haven’t completely lost any sense of direction.

Maybe just to make sure your head hasn’t got too big … or too small.

Maybe just to make sure you are still … well … doing the right things and making the right decisions.

To be clear. You absolutely should not assess self-worth from solely from external validation. That is not only crazy, but basically means you are chasing Life and not leading Life.

All I am suggesting is that external validation, when viewed as some sign posts in your Life road, ain’t a bad thing.

And, yes, even good external validation can be tricky.

Most people seek validation <for who they are, their behavior, response to a situation> because they worry they cannot be objective or that they might be prejudiced/biased by their own beliefs.

And, yes, that is a fair worry.

We are all influenced  in some degree by our own personal perspective on things.

But here is the big problem looming in front of you if you do not trust yourself because of this self-distrust – you are then assuming the external validators will actually be objective themselves.

Uh oh.

99% of the time that is a really really bad assumption.

Sure. You may assume that they don’t have the same prejudices as you.

Sure. They most likely don’t have the same things at ‘stake’ so are at least one step removed from any natural stress of the situation.

Sure. They will definitely have their own prejudices, perceptions, beliefs and attitudes.

While we all want that occasional validation from someone else because we consciously discount our own feelings, perceptions and opinions, you have to be careful to not make someone an expert even if they aren’t qualified to actually be an expert.

Here is what I know about validation and business leadership.

Decision making Validation.

You will need it on occasion if you are in a constant decision making position.

Even the best decision makers can get slightly overwhelmed. Not overwhelmed in terms of “I cannot make any more decisions”, but rather ‘it is hard to reflectively assess decisions when smothered in decisions’.

** note: this is important because most great decision makers adapt and assess contextual learnings>.

Part of what makes good decision makers good is decisiveness once decision has been made. Occasional validation maintains the decisiveness muscle.

Leadership validation.

You will need it on occasion if you are in a leadership role with responsibility.

This one varies by person.

Some people don’t need this often — kind of like maybe once a quarter you receive some validation that you don’t suck as a leader.

Some people need this a lot — kind of like every day.

Neither is good or bad, it just is.

One last thought on leadership validation.

This validation can be required in a variety of ways:

maybe you want to make sure you aren’t too much of an asshole

maybe you want to make sure you are communicating effectively

maybe you just want a general sense that people think you are doing an okay job as a leader.

The worst business leaders look for shallow validation – better than predecessor, well liked, ‘strong’, etc. they tend to seek a linear ‘cause & effect’ validation which tends to reside in the ‘look who is at the door’ type feedback.

The best business leaders look for deeper validation – the organization is optimistic, vision is embraced, confident of future success. They tend to seek what I call “ripple validation” which tends to reside on the horizon type feedback.

Anyway.

We all need some validation on occasion.

And I get a little concerned when the only advice out there is about ‘how to ditch approval seeking behaviors.’

I kind of wish we had more ‘effective ways to gain some validation to maintain effectiveness’ type advice.

Because we all need some validation on occasion.

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“A person’s success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have.”

 Tim Ferriss

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“I await with patience a catastrophe that is slow in coming.”

Albert Camus

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Have you ever noticed that in business when someone says “go big or go home’ someone else will immediately attempt to break it down into measurable components? Well. That’s fear.

Fear drives us to make things smaller. What do I mean? ‘Bigness’ is to be feared so we “break things down into measurable components”, i.e., “small”, to eliminate fear (under the guise of driving objective driven results). While seemingly smart, its actually dumb. It puts you on a results treadmill which, when stopped, brings everything crashing down.

It like what Zach Mercurio says, “live by results, die by results”, in which once you have made things small the only thing people fear is not making the “goal” … over and over and over again.

But the more important issue is this fear separates. This type of fear attempts to be “anti-systems” in that it attempts to defy systems thinking that improving a part does not improve the whole and that you need to work the system, not the parts, to optimize the whole. Everything gets compounded by a growing attitude that the more you actually BELIEVE things are separated, and better separated, the less you are actually part of reality. In other words, you separate yourself from the reality of connectedness. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out this separation also applies to measurement of self. Time sheets, accounting for activities, project lists to be checked off – at home counting calories, timed runs, etc. each ‘separate’ activity looks and feels healthy and important when isolated but, in its isolation, it ignores the connectivity to other things on which success is dependent. And we wonder why shit doesn’t happen? And we wonder why we fear attempting anything? If we break things down, separate, the pieces and parts may meet some random objective, but that objective becomes meaningless in the greater whole of things (reality) as important other things aren’t done or reality, in its wholeness, is more important than the individual part separated out.

Regardless. All of this simply ignores the bigger issue – fear of big, seemingly uncontrollable, often difficult to measure, rarely obvious cause/effect, impossible to predict, things (the things that actually drive business success).

And while that last sentence I just offered will generate a lot of agreement, everything prior will sound crazy to productivity-focused people who believe there has to be extrinsic guidance or people will never be ‘maximized’ or optimized if they aren’t ‘challenged” by some stretch goal <i.e., something measured>. They see each separate objective as a whole in and of itself. They see separation as a way to meet the “whole’s needs”. They see the path to success in having ‘leaders’ lead separated parts (teams) to challenge other teams in achieving a larger vision. Inevitably they will warp separation into some coherence story in which the guiding light on the hill is the grander company vision.

The aggressive pursuit of a specific short term effort cloaks fear of pursuing something bigger.

This fear is driven by a desire to rationalize. I believe organizational design experts call this “rationalizing organizations.” Rationalizing organizations exhibit a tendency towards hierarchies, reductionism and the maximization of efficiency, predictability, quantification (measurement, milestones, results) and control. Well. That does sound rational, doesn’t it? All organizations desire efficiency, plan against some predictability, like to measure results, and control as much as is possible. Each, in and of itself, sounds quite reasonable. It even sounds like the most manageable way to manage large quantities of work and complex business dynamics (making sure things get done when they need to get done, resources applied when they need to get applied (or used, and things get to market when they need to get to market). The problem is it is reductionist and therefore shrinks potential, condenses opportunities and actually scales down the organization. This problem gets compounded by the fact if each separate part is chugging along there will always be some dashboard with some asshat standing next to it suggesting the business is actually scaling up to market needs – but its not. its not scaling at all. It is simply meeting condensed objectives and, well, smallness. But in that smallness, fear is diminished and confidence increases. It increases confidence in, well, task completion. And encourages the business to increase the # of tasks. And, in general, that could be a good thing, but, in general, it simply means output is always proportional to input and by measuring you ensure the input is always proportional to the output outlined. Yeah. Read that again. It’s a doom loop of measurement logic. It is reductionist business management in a dynamic market begging for expansive ideas and doing.

And while what I wrote may sound harsh in its critique, to a rationalizing organization it sounds, well, rational. It attempts to make trying to make systems, inputs, outputs, and even people, behave deterministically.

But there is an even more insidious aspect to this fear-based productivity thinking. The rationalizing organization convinces themselves by doing business this way people will be happier. Yeah. In business we are infamous for creating tangible milestones and objectives and in doing so we expect people to be emotionally invested in achieving the ‘thing to do’. Its kind of like the industrialization of happiness. Personally, I think its nuts. It is simply shit that needs to be done and the organization is cranking out that shit how they deem best for the business – not people.

The reality is a business driven by this type of fear, separates to create priorities (under the guise of efficiency and predictability). I can almost guarantee every rationalizing organization has a fantabulous vision but they have decided people will not really know how to get there on their own so they, inevitably, create a separate priority to replace the vision.

This can even get compounded into a worse space when each ‘separate’ thing is communicated as ‘the main thing we need to do.’ Created main things, if you are not careful, are rabbit holes. You can follow a created main thing as persistently & stubbornly as if it is a real main thing and end up in a really really bad place.

I would be remiss if I didn’t point out managers in rationalizing businesses are infamous for creating ‘main things.’

What these managers don’t realize is that their employees see right thru the created aspect. Far too many times managers step back saying things like “I don’t have the right people to implement the important objectives’ or the ones with good intentions focus on the wrong things like ‘I need to learn how to motivate my people’ <only to implement some of the wackiest motivational shit you will ever see>. Not enough times managers don’t look in the mirror at the actual stimulus, the identified separated ‘main thing’, and truly challenge whether it really is a ‘main thing’ rather than simply a business objective we need to attain for the good of the business.

Let me suggest that, in general, embracing an ‘outcome is the most important’ Life philosophy is a slippery slope. A ‘destination-based business model’ <continuous objectives, goals, targets> is simply putting your people, and business, in cage after cage after cage, all under the assumption by doing so your business will fly.

This is nuts.

Which, finally, leads me to the root of the fear: abstract versus tangible

Infinite is abstract. Finite is tangible. Unless you can tether the infinite with some narrative, some vision, some story, some metaphor, running a business with an infinite mindset is going to feel a lot like chaos. And it may actually be (although it may not be in that there are other surrounding principles which permits the organization to act in a coherent way).

Another abstract versus tangible aspect is value. Now. Most businesses do not discuss finite versus infinite in terms of Finite value versus Infinite value. They should.

In business Finite value can most often be found in maximizing a transaction (between purchaser and enterprise) – maximizing present value.

Infinite value can most often be defined in maximizing a life (of a business enterprise) – maximizing future value.

Ponder.

In the end.

While we cannot control the future, we can certainly control the conditions of how the future we want is constructed. This is actually probabilities management, not goals management (kind of the business version of “push versus pull” marketing strategy). That said. Business generally defies most planning (finite management) and embraces ‘smart strategic opportunistic” behavior (potential management). Yes. There has to be an artful balance of finite, self-interest/transactional, and infinite – the larger greater good, i.e., “self-interest cannot be separated in the long run from the interests of the business.” A good business demands a buy in between the individual and the collective wherein the individual ‘self authors’ (autopoietic) with an accepted vision of the larger group so that all decisions & actions remain coherent.

** Note: Autopoietic – self authoring.  Business is emergent in that people self-author their own definitions of success and self-narrative versus business establishing the definitions with which an individual should judge themselves (and be judged).

** Note: Autopoiesis (from Greek αὐτo- (auto-), meaning ‘self’, and ποίησις (poiesis), meaning ‘creation, production’) refers to a system capable of reproducing and maintaining itself. The original definition can be found in Autopoiesis and Cognition: the Realization of the Living (1st edition 1973, 2nd 1980)

Look. There is a difference between analytics and measurement. Analytics are the science behind a business success <measurement is the use of analytics>. Attitudinal is the art behind a business success. In my mind I lay both these pillars down and when I can figure out how to make them coincide <not remain separate> I believe the company/product/service has maximized value. Once again, not separate, but whole. Solely focusing on analytics, through measurement, is always tempting because it shows some aspect of ‘cause & effect’, but it also has a nasty habit of driving a business into focusing on ‘the tallest midget’ aspects of building a business <and it is absolutely short-term management>. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out here that discovery is actually the measurement.

Anyway. The truth is people, to be at their best, need to have some core consistency (passion, vision, character, what is valued, whatever), some finiteness, in order to be free enough in the infinite universe to be successful. Not to get too philosophical, but a successful business is always a fragile balancing act between being independent from the external environment and actually of the external environment. In other words, balancing the finite and infinite. Business demands not only recognition of the finite (some measurement) versus infinite aspects of business itself (some unmeasurable), but, most importantly, also the people who make the business work.

But.

Business will find none of what I just suggested by measuring everything.

Ponder.

====================

“And in that moment, I swear we were infinite.”

Stephen Chbosky

==============

—

“Somebody once said we never know what is enough until we know what’s more than enough.”

Billie Holiday

—

Happy Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving is about turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, stuffing and pumpkin pie.

Uhm.

Or how about a Bucket of Balls?

Yup. Turkey testicles.

—–

Have a ball at Timothy O’Toole’s Pub in Chicago.

This casual sports bar has made a tradition of serving up crispy, deep-fried turkey testicles during the holiday season. The meaty nuggets are ordered by the bucket and are accompanied by ranch, barbecue or buffalo dipping sauce. The balls have become so beloved that the bar holds an annual Black Wednesday (that’s the day-before-Thanksgiving) turkey testicle-eating contest where the winner takes home a frozen turkey.

—–

Sigh. Only Americans could create a bucket of balls for a Thanksgiving tradition.

Anyway. The first Thanksgiving was more like five deer and some birds, a shitload of shellfish, twigs, acorns and, well, no pie.

In fact, the feast the Wampanoag Indians and Pilgrims ate in 1621 was, ducks, maybe a swan <gulp>, shellfish <thin clams or mussels>, nuts <anything they could mash>, no sugar <so no stuffing or cranberries or, well, pie>. We know the colonists regularly consumed ducks, geese and swans. And, instead of bread-based stuffing, herbs & onions or nuts might have been added to the birds for extra flavor.

Turkey or no turkey, the first Thanksgiving’s attendees almost certainly got their fill of meat.

Fairly bland, but at least the Pilgrims & Indians weren’t killing each other <like many families do on Thanksgiving, uhm, I note that so noone thinks killing each other around the Thanksgiving table is actually a tradition>.

Anyway. I cook a turducken every thanksgiving. It is this fabulous creation of layered turkey, duck and chicken with a spicy stuffing mix. It is an, admittedly, exorbitant excessive culinary delight.

And as I gaze at it I thought of all the years in the past as I lived a nomad life away from any family, my own or anyone’s, and I think of the solo trips to islands and far off countries and … well … luxuries many people have never had the opportunity to enjoy.

At that time I never thought anything about the ‘luxury’ or any sense of extravagance.

At that time, in my mind, I deserved the break.

I say this gazing at my turducken when I know people in other countries … shit … in cities in my own country … will never know this luxury adorning my dining room table.

Am I altruistic?

Shit no.

I tend to believe I am simply gaining some perspective on what I used to consider, well, I deserved. And it makes me reflect upon people and how they think about ‘what I deserve.’ And as I begin discussing ‘what I deserve’ I will hearken back to the original Thanksgivings and the fact the original pilgrims were not called pilgrims.

—

“Those who were members of the Separatist Church Movement referred to themselves as ‘Saints.’ About 60 others who came over in the Mayflower with them were called ‘Strangers.’ But they all knew how to have fun and enjoy life. They made and drank a lot of beer, hard cider and something like today’s brandy.
Occasionally there was drunkenness and fighting.”

So. The original thanksgiving was a celebration for the harvest. in other words, for work. It was kind of the first Labor Day.

It was not indulgence, it was not extravagance, it was a celebration of real output <not income>.

I would suggest it was an understanding of balance. And an understanding of the Life value proposition – work & what I deserve.

Look.

That is a hard thing to understand.

It seems like it should be easy, but it is not.

—

“The hardest choice in life is usually between what you want, and what you deserve.”

Rashida Rowe

—

Society makes it tough. Particularly today’s society. “Society”, as it was back then, were the Pilgrims as a small tight knit group of people with similar attitudes honed by similar hardships. They had a common interest in success and outcome from hard work. All those things make it easier to not only understand the balance, but share the balance.

Today?

Today it is difficult.

Society makes it difficult.

Society has a nasty tendency to complicate our understanding the ‘deserve’ balance.

Everywhere you turn there is the message screaming at us that we need to give ourselves a break and have a treat:

==

Girlfriend, put your feet up and enjoy a mani-pedi.

You deserve it!

<note: …. always with an exclamation point>

–

Hey mom! Following an afternoon with your crazy kids, you deserve a stop at the mall to treat yourself to new shoes or that designer handbag or, well, whatever you want!

<note: …. always with an exclamation point>

–

Life got you down? Retail therapy! You deserve it.

<note: …. always with an exclamation point>

==

While I focused on women <because there is an inherent underlying capitalism theme that women are being too hard on themselves — juggling the duties of being mothers, wives, professionals — all at once and should spend money to solve that> the fact is that all of us are encouraged, because we demand too much of ourselves, to ‘stop punishing ourselves’ and go out and indulge ourselves in some way as therapy.

Ok.

First.

I am all for breaks.

But in the good ole days Thanksgiving was but one indulgent break from 365 day toil. That is a well deserved break.

In comparison. Today?

Weekly pampering?

Monthly reward for work well done?

Daily indulgence of something to break the day up?

Where is the number?

What is the number?

How much do we truly need and doesn’t more of it actually:

<a> make us expect more (answer: yes), and

<b> create the impression we are sacrificing more in our everyday toil (answer: yes).

Secondly.

Uhm.

Instead of “punishing ourselves” by plowing through life we reward ourselves with making purchases that sit on a credit card <called ‘debt’> or spend money on some intangible indulgence which depletes four wallet size <and savings size> which could be used to actually accumulate something that could actually bring us closer to whatever our vision is.

Look.

Before everyone gets defensive about how many indulgences are required to get you through the week, consider the source of your belief that you need some indulgent break every week.

Were you really raised to believe some continuous indulgence <under the guise of ‘reward’> is a basic part of human life?

Or was the idea planted by some marketing genius promoting therapeutic benefits of whatever indulgent behavior they want to sell you?

Let me caveat this a bit by acknowledging life can be a grind and that the way work is conducted, for the most part, certainly makes us seek something better or some off-ramps on occasion and certainly encourages us to think we desrve better <or something more than what we are getting>.

That said.

We all should use every opportunity to better ourselves. And this includes thinking about what we truly deserve.

But what we deserve is, and should always be, balanced by our understanding of ‘effort.’ And effort should be all about making every minute count.

Let me be clear.

I love the American ambitious ‘you can do anything’ culture <although it has been warped a bit by the “hustle culture”>.

And I dislike it at exactly the same time.

Why?

Because it is a constant struggle.

All of us get tugged by ambition <work hard> and at exactly the same time get tugged by fairness <value for my work as part of everyone else’s work>

No.

I am not suggesting you cannot have and do both.

Yes.

I am suggesting it gets tough to balance.

One is driven by individualism <what I deserve and I want a good happy Life>.

One is driven by collectivism or some version of pluralism <I would like everyone around me to live a good happy Life>.

It is natural to focus and put a heavier emphasis on the “I” portion, especially at first because you typically have nothing <or little> and you believe you need ‘something’ before you start worrying about fairness or general Life happiness of others.

So. The true struggle occurs once you … well … have.

You have invested the effort, you have worked and focused and did and all of a sudden you have entered into the “I deserve” mentality <zone>.

That is actually a byproduct of ambition. Ambition, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. Unfortunately it brings some baggage along with it. It’s almost like you go on this ambition trip without any bags and when you get off the train you have a bag you carry off. The bag is a metaphor for tangible shit you have accumulated <which reflects your effort in your eyes as well as the eyes of those who look>, but it also contains mental shit. Self value, self-actualization and self-esteem. And it is the mental aspect which builds up the ‘deserve equation.’

We almost consider it as an aspect of winning … as in ‘winning in Life.’

I played the game.

I put in the effort.

I deserve the trophy.

And maybe that is where we get it wrong <sometimes>.

Playing the game versus winning.

Life, in general, is not measured by how many wins you have <or awards you get> it is about how you play the game. It really shouldn’t be about “winning in Life” it really should be “Life played well.”

Unfortunately, that is not part of the USA DNA.

We are an ambitious group of people who like to have, and measure, progress.

We are a group of people where ambition is not a negative word, it is indicative of a positive spirit. It is indicative of an underlying competitiveness which resides in the souls of 99% of Americans. I am not suggesting it is the only characteristic within us .just that it is always there and always suggesting ‘keep going.’

—

“The problem in France is that ambition is not a compliment.

It’s almost a bad word. ‘Ha, look, he’s ambitious.’

So that’s a very difficult situation for an athlete: As soon as you try to be ambitious you have people mocking you.

For instance, we would never have made the war in Iraq. On the other hand, we may never win anything.”

Bouin

—

This is not about slamming USA.

Shit. This is not about slamming your own ambition.

This is not an indictment of a ‘can do’ spirit or an indictment of ambition.

This is simply a reflective moment on how we think about what we deserve on Thanksgiving.

We deserve more than a ‘bucket of balls’ on Thanksgiving.

We deserve a sense of success for effort. Not anything truly tangible, but a sense.

We deserve a good sense and a good feeling for playing the game well, and with effort.

If we figure that out, I tend to believe all the rest will simply fall in place. Ponder. And Happy Thanksgiving.

=====

“Cease, Man, to mourn, to weep, to wail; enjoy thy shining hour of sun; We dance along Death’s icy brink, but is the dance less full of fun?”

Richard Francis Burton

============

Well. This is about attitude and business and the occasions in your work life when you have the opportunity to dance on the icy brink of Death.

Oh. And I will make the point that dancing is … well … dancing <brink or not>.

Now. Unfortunately many people don’t look at dancing on any icy brink of death that way. They look at where their feet are instead of what their feet are doing. They get freaked because they are being asked to dance along Death’s icy brink.

Let’s be clear about this moment. You may be on the icy brink of Death <in some business situation>.

And yet.

The sun is out.

The spotlight is on.

My point? The icy brink moments are not the dark days. They are absolutely not the plodding grind it out days. Nor are they the days burdened by mistakes or failure. These are the days where, as you dance on the brink,  everything is clear and uncluttered and bright and warm and, well, let’s identify them as the moments where you sense — “this is it.” Yeah. This is “it” … one of those moments where you go big or go home.

These are the moments which business people dream of <or you should>.

You know what I mean … THOSE moments.

Everything clears, and is clear, and you have the opportunity to dance. To do your thing. To, well, suffice it to say many of us in business dream of these moments. It is here I will point out these moments are actually often few and far between.

Yet. So often, far too often, people hesitate to take the opportunity to dance.

Instead.

People mourn.

People weep.

People wail.

People gnash their teeth in despair.

People “wilt.”

They don’t see the opportunity to dance. They only see that their feet stand on the icy brink of Death. They only see uncertainty and <possible> death if they slip.

Now. Let me be clear. No really good business person actually aims to dance on the icy brink of Death. But that’s not really the point. Much of business is simply managing the moments that arise. You see the moments and some shit you can control as well as know most you cannot control. And the majority of the time these moments to dance, your moment, is not created by any plan you have developed but rather in spite of your plan. No plan goes as planned. And therein lies the dances that occur on the icy brink of Death.

And I say that because a shitload of people don’t dance because they are too busy regrouping around the ‘plan’ to see what went wrong. They gather around to discuss why the hell we have this <unfortunate> ‘opportunity’ to dance ON THE ICY BRINK OF DEATH <they moan>. Then sit around the table and gnash their teeth … and wring their hands … and seek to blame someone.

In other words, do anything but dance.

And you <as in the people who do not shrink in these moments>  want to frickin’ dance.

Well. Those who want to dance in those moments? Those are the people you are looking for in business. They do not focus on the uncertainty of dancing on an icy brink, they are only certain they know the dance.They are the ones  who see dancing as dancing — where they dance is almost irrelevant to them. They aren’t clueless as to the location of the dance <therefore they are careful where they put their feet> but other than that they don’t care where the dance is — just let them dance.

They enjoy the sun, the clarity, they ignore the moaning and wailing, and they frickin’ dance.

My point?

Pretty simple. In business all that matters is being able to dance and enjoy it. Because if you enjoy it, you will be successful. If you focus on where you are dancing, well, I imagine in some way you are claiming dancing is best, or better, in some places rather than others. These people, I would argue, seek the wrong things & actually can be a little dangerous to your business.

But. The people who just like to dance anywhere? Whew. I believe those who don’t care where they dance are the best of the best. The business people you kill for. The ones you pay a little extra for to keep around.

But that’s me. That’s how I think about this.

I know I have seen some great dancers, mostly younger, who never get an opportunity to dance on the icy brink of Death not because opportunities don’t exist, but because senior management does:

<a> anything but dance when on the icy brink,

<b> anything to get away from the icy brink or

<c> anything to explain why the opportunity to dance was actually occurring on the icy brink <or all of these or any combination of these> rather than there is an opportunity to dance.

Once again. Good business people don’t seek dancing on the icy brink of Death. But neither do they not dance there if the opportunity arises.

Anyway.

Just think about it. Because in the end dancing in business is not only exhilarating in that it’s usually the stuff that gets the heart pumping and when good stuff happens but, well, that’s kind of why you are working for gods sake … those moments.

I mean, if you think about it, all the rest of your working life is nothing but … well … no dancing.

So why miss any opportunity to dance, no matter where it is?

——————-

“Inside this room, all of my dreams become realities, and some of my realities become dreams.”

Willy Wonka

====

So. I begin with a Willy Wonka thought to discuss Life is a connection between dreaming and reality, aspirations and the daily grind, thinking and doing, all occurring “inside this one room” called “self”.

The first part of the Willie Wonka story is a good satire on how adults sometimes make trivial things so important and how the media gets carried way with stupid trivial issues that adults have heightened in importance. Well. That certainly sounds relevant in today’s world, huh?

The second half of the story is intriguing because Willy Wonka – a no nonsense candy maker who doesn’t put up with the brats – teaches us about “decision making” and consequences, or, how choices have varying degrees of risk as someone navigates their dreams and reality.

The reality is, well, the gauntlet between dreams and reality is all about assessing risk. Yeah. You have to risk something to achieve a dream and, yet, even with taking that risk often your reality reverts back to simply being a dream. What I mean by that is reality has a gravity to it. It is always doing its best to keep you tied as closely as possible to your current circumstances. Reality likes you just where you are in your lot in Life. Yes. This means dreams, or dreaming, is about a different version of reality. Existing reality finds that, well, dangerous to its existence.

Therein lies the crux of the quote – what looks divine to you (your dreams) looks dangerous to reality. Reality’s response? Reality will make it as difficult, even dangerous on occasion, as possible for everyone to attain your dreams.

Therein lies the crux of danger – risk. Even if you are resilient, persistent and “in for a penny, in for a pound’ with regard to working toward your dreams, there is always a large risk reality wins.

Look. Life isn’t easy. Dreaming isn’t easy. Reality isn’t easy.

We all know this <although aligning them like this can make one slightly pessimistic>.

Life is tough because running the gauntlet between dreams and reality means you have to accept that things may not get better by tomorrow, maybe not even next week, but at some point <in the future>. And while I don’t really embrace the whole ‘live in the now’ psychology, I do suggest that really the only thing dreams demand is improving yourself and doing the best you can every single day – kind of like “the now improvement plan”. Kind of like keeping an eye on the divine while navigating the danger.

Now. This is a parallel Life truth – one rail for adults and one for children.

Childhood is strewn with booby traps and the allure of the forbidden where danger often looks divine. In fact. Willy Wonka is a warning to choosing the seemingly divine and, yet, facing the horrors and delights, the dangers betwixt dreams and reality, the repercussions and traps often found on the other side of each “now” choice.

Adulthood carries a higher freedom of choice which is intertwined with a higher danger associated <note: the Wonka story places extra adult reflection of consequences by associating this with children>.

And. The movie is a reflection of an eternal truth – for every action, there is a consequence.

Eat too much? You’ll get fat.

Drink too much? Alcoholism looms.

Over indulge your children, they will torment you.

Over indulge your children, they will torture the rest of the world for the rest of their lives.

Certainly, within Willy Wonka’s world of delight and humor and unimaginable joy there is also a grim note and admonition to the choices we make every day. He puts adults on pedestals to remind them of responsibility for all to see. He portrays adults as clowns and boorish and sometimes poor examples of how to live life (pretty much showing us at our worst with regard to choice-making).

Certainly, the movie reflects how our choices as adults can beget a generation being raised as a race of over indulged brats who often deserve to be banished into some dark fate after their own “poor choices” (in the movie they simply disappear, of course, after disappearing Wonka says they’ll all be returned back to their “normal rotten selves.”)

Shit. Even Charlie, the hero child, is left standing at the conclusion of the quest not without sin.

For adults watching there is a tinge of disappointment as we watch poor examples of a generation <youth> in which we place our hopes. With thoughtfulness we see the repercussions, and consequences, adults have on the young.

And, yet, the end of the movie dangles hope that not all is lost with the younger generation.

Look. Life is tricky.

Danger can often look divine and some choices that look easy are complicated.

Shit.

The divine is always dangerous and all choices are complicated if not complex.

That said.

Dreams can become realities and reality can be positively affected by your dreams. There are dangers and risk tangled in every thread of life and choices we make and, yes, danger can be cloaked in the divine.

In the end I’d like to remind everyone that Willy Wonka, above all, reminds us of our responsibility to the young. They represent the hope to right our wrongs (intentional or unintentional wrongs). They represent the hope to fulfill the dreams we had that didn’t become reality. If we screw them up, we screw up our future. I imagine I could suggest they are the divine … and the danger.

Ponder.

Ponder it all.

For danger can look divine and the divine can always be found in danger.

====

“It is good to get in the habit of considering if the measured improvements are truly an indication of an improved system or merely the result of distorting the system or the data.”

(Deming, I think)

====

You know what sucks? You have data, it appears like evidence of something, and it really isn’t, but people, desperate for proof, use it to make a decision. It sucks because (a) data and evidence feels like it should be easier to assess and (b) there will always be someone rushing to find proof to support what they believe rather than evidence of something we should know. As Tony Fish suggests: “Data can tell us from where we came, our models based on said data can suggest where we will go, but as yet, we cannot determine if we should.”

All that said. This business/data gauntlet runs face first into something called ‘asymmetrical updating’ which is the tendency to favor evidence that confirms our beliefs and to ignore or misread new evidence that does not. I will come back to the end of that thought later.

Oh. It also sucks because the reality, the harsh truth as it were, is there is never enough time to wait for more data once an opportunity, or even a problem, arises. Problems gain velocity on their own and opportunities diminish on their own. The longer you wait the more likely something dies while you decide.

Yeah. It sucks.

Here is what I know.

If you look at how metrics develop over time, several things might happen:
Some will stay the same.
Some will go up and down <sometimes in extremes>.
Some go steadily up or down.

It’s the last category where our desire for evidence leads us astray. We lend a higher meaning when two things move in tandem, even more so when three do, but all this really does is reflect correlation, not causation. The unfortunate truth with our use of evidence is that we tend to associate causation with correlation when in reality it is simply coincidental.
That said. I always get a nagging feeling when any hypothesis conveniently fits the data. It feels unreliable despite looking quite reliable. I sometimes refer to this as “the even face of evidence.” It’s like a seamless flat surface with nothing to get a grip on. Evidence shouldn’t be neat and tidy, it should be, well, “the uneven face.” Why? Information, even data, is usually unequally distributed (there is an asymmetry of information). They create what Brian Christian in The Most Human Human calls “holds’.

** note: “as akin to an indoor rock-climbing gym’s “holds” – those bright jewel-tone rubber blobs that speckle the fake rock walls. Each is both an aid to the climber and an invitation onto a certain path or route along the ascent.” (The Most Human Human, p. 181)

Therefore, patterns become what is important because it is patterns that identify the variations that matter as well as the non-variations that matter – to climb or choose a path. In addition, pattern recognition offers the evidence to better “results” by improving the system <not a specific tactic>. What I mean by that is our biggest misuse of evidence is to use it to achieve a better result, i.e., improve what is measured <a causal attempt>. This is doubly damaging in that (a) in systems improving one part does not improve the whole and (b) doing this over time will begin to narrow-cast data in order to improve specific data limiting the true scope of what ‘better’ can be.

What we do more often than not is distort data and evidence to meet the needs of the measurement rather than use the data and evidence to improve the system as a whole <which may beget different things to measure>. Evidence demands that we understand the limitations of the specifics measures we use and the data we select. We should be constantly trying to improve the system but, well, that’s not the way business works. 99% of the time measurements are set up to assess performance and outcomes and people get paid to perform and generate outcomes. The measurements are tied to incentives. Evidence is then viewed through a bias of what I am incentivized by.

Anyway.

Using data effectively requires understanding how measures capture the actual state of the system and requires understanding the limitations of the specific measures we are using in their refection of the system as a whole. But that also means understanding the data itself. Let’s be clear. No business lacks data. If anything, they have more than they know what to do with. So, what any sane business does is compress their data into usable forms. In technology there are two types of compressions “lossless” and “lossy.” Lossless means nothing is lost or compromised in its compression – meaning it can be reconstructed in its entirety without missing anything or detail. Lossy is you may lose some data or some level of detail as a cost of compression. Data evidence, particularly in a typical business environment, is exactly the same. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out any compression relies on some bias that computers, as do people, seek patterns they expect or at least are representative of something similar to what they have seen. So, compression will arc away from the unexpected. Compression doesn’t encourage what I call “evidence drift.” I made up that term mostly because business hates drift particularly if they feel time constrained. Under the guise of “highest probability given the information we have at hand”, drift doesn’t meet the constraints of the context nor the desire of the decision makers. That said. Evidence drift is actually where the answers tend to reside. I say that because data compression zeroes in on “what to do in the present” while evidence drift gives signals to help with “what do we need to do for the future.” I am certainly torturing good data science practice and distorting how things get done, yet, I am summarizing what most businesses dependent upon a lot of data to make decisions do. Time compression plus data compression is a bad equation for decision-making.

But data compression has some structural repercussions.

It uses the compressed evidence to make the system more efficient – over and over again. Evidence drift, which could actually permit the business to drift into a more effective space, gets ignored over and over again. The problem is when the evidence looks right, evidence is acting responsibly, and irresponsibly, at exactly the same time.

Which leads me to information.

Information is a stabilizing buffer. In the good old days, most buffers were physical and unwieldy, in the here and now, information is a leverage buffer. It protects against crisis and permits advancing to meet emergent opportunities. It actually buffers against uncertainty as well as unhealthy asymmetry (when disruption affects the system). I am not sure it needs to be said, but evidence is information. But to be effective that evidence information must shed delays in entering into feedback/decision-making loops (both positive and negative). I say this because no one person can ever hold all information and, currently, most knowledge/information banks are a bit unwieldy for true business agility. I would be remiss here if I didn’t point out that our unhealthy love of agility only encourages us to misuse evidence <put too high a confidence in on the wrong things too quickly>.

Evidence needs to be a readily accessible inventory from which people can select possible patterns of information to test out new patterns. I should note the source of power, in this system, is actually not the evidence, but within human imagination and creative thinking. Anyway. The objective of any business should be to deliver evidence where it did not exist before (in the system and the system of people) causing people to act, and act differently, therefore the system itself acts differently. Missing information, missing evidence, or the misusage of, is most likely the greatest cause of system failure (or complications within a normal complex business) than anything else.

Which leads me to the fallacy of the do the best thing.

This is actually about complexity, consequences and repercussions. The need to consider the consequences of your actions also means you need to consider future mistakes. This can sound mind-numbing. Almost like a bad game of “what ifs.” It’s not. The truth is a decision today is actually more dependent upon what you do next, more than it is what you do now. All the initial decision does it start the game <and the game, if it plays itself, will never take into consideration the consequences and repercussions you desire>. Circling back to ‘doing the best thing.’ The best thing may be available, but not available now. But good enough is available now. The best thing to do may actually not be by using the best thing. Ponder that. The reality is all decisions are flawed, nothing is guaranteed, and only truly shitty decisions are unfixable. And here is where ‘evidence that looks right’ rears its ugly head. Not all evidence is created equal, but we are more likely to use evidence as proof of best thing to do now and for later rather than evidence of ‘getting the game started.’ I admit. I don’t know if I am arguing most business people do not understand complexity or they simply do not know how to use evidence. My guess is it’s a little of both.

In the end.

Evidence breeds complacency. That may sound odd given how much data we have, how much time we invest on looking at data and how much we seem to value data to craft evidence, but the reality is we are becoming complacent to its compression.

We become complacent with too much “good evidence.”

We become complacent with tidy answers.

All that complacency makes us less sharp and less in tune to “lossiness.”

All I can truly say is, evidence is your friend, until it’s not.

=========================

“Besides, it doesn’t matter if it’s real.  It never does with dreams.

They aren’t anything anyway but lifesavers to cling to so you don’t drown.  Life is an ocean, and most everyone’s hanging on to some kind of dream to keep afloat.”

Tim Tharp

======================

Well. Today is for the dreamers.

Let me begin by saying it’s kind of a tough world out there today for dreamers and dreaming living in a world where pragmatism, outcomes and measurement are put on the pedestal of Life.

In fact.

I could argue that today’s world not only discourages thinking about dreams, but it screws up how we do think about dreams when we actually think about them. Dreams used to be … well … dreams. Ok. Bear with me because sometimes it is difficult for me to find the right words on this.

Dreams, in the past, seemed to be more about wishes and desires and imagining what could be in some intangible sense. I don’t mean unicorns or rainbows type stuff and it also wasn’t always pot of gold at the end of some rainbow, but it had a sense of something better.

Today?

In today’s world dreams are more often about something tangible.

I dream of winning something.

I dream about having gobs of money.

I dream about some outcome or something received.

I dream of an award.

I dream of achieving something (specific).

It is no longer dreaming something intangible.

Like.

I dream of being an Olympian <not winning something>.

I dream of being on the front cover of Time magazine <not gobs of money>.

I dream about being the best I can be <no reward or award attached>.

Look. I actually believe I am on to something <for once>. I believe this is a “thing”. That said I started thinking about dreams and dreaming and went out and I researched exactly what a dream is:

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Dreams (imaginings, desires) are the potentials that are too intense to be imperceptible. Having intensified to the objective reduction threshold, a desire collapses into an action.

The nobler an individual, the higher the objective reduction threshold and the more organizedly complex the imagination.

Wikiquotes

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Step one:

‘potentials too intense to be imperceptible.’

Step two:

‘a desire collapses into an action.”

I point that out because in our outcome driven world inevitably a dream is pushed into a corner being bludgeoned with “what are you going to do to attain that dream !!??!!”

Look. I am all for taking steps to attain your dream, but the definition suggests that the intense dreams <think the ones that are truly worth paying attention to> inevitably collapse into an action.

In other words.

I don’t make a plan, the dream begets a plan.

In other words.

Reality is shaped by a dream <we don’t shape reality to ‘force’ a dream into being>.

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“That’s the problem with dreams” he said, “Reality just can’t compete.”

e.m.b

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Life, and reality, pushes and pulls us in many directions.

And, more often than not, Life, and reality, places more stop signs in front of us then ‘this way to your dream’ signs. That means to have a dream that is big enough to reshape reality is … well … uhm … means that the potentials that are too intense to be imperceptible.

It isn’t about money.

It isn’t about some sating some ego driven idea.

It is about having intensified to the objective reduction threshold, a desire collapses into an action.

And that is where dreamers know something that non dreamers do <part 1> … nowhere in this definition or Life equation is ‘fear.’

Far too many times dreams get attached to thoughts like ‘not pursued due to fear …”

And that is where dreamers know something that non dreamers do <part 2> … nowhere in this definition or Life equation is ‘courage.’

Far too many times dreams get attached to “people who had the courage to pursue …”

Dreams have nothing to do with fear or courage. In fact dreams, the real meaningful ones, are out of our conscious control. They are a force in and of themselves. They beget the action by sheer force of intensity. Big, small or in between dreams, the meaningful ones, may have more power than anything else in the world. And while much of the world looks at dreamers as wistfully delusional … it is more likely than not purposeful willfully delusional.

We dreamers dream with purpose. Not for outcome, but of what can be. And when we get a dream right, or maybe better said, when the dream is right for us … well … there is no obstacle too big, no fear too great and no courage is needed, because the dream itself is the energy forward.

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“Well, maybe it started that way. As a dream, but doesn’t everything. Those buildings. These lights. This whole city.

Somebody had to dream about it first. And maybe that is what I did. I dreamed about coming here, but then I did it.”

James and the Giant Peach

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This is really hard to explain to non-dreamers. But. It doesn’t really matter <it never really does with dreams>.

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The dreamer dies, but never dies the dream,

Though Death shall call the whirlwind to his aid,

Enlist men’s passions, trick their hearts with hate,

Still shall the Vision live! Say never more

That dreams are fragile things. What else endures

Of all this broken world save only dreams!

Dana Burnet

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