May 2012
4 posts
3 tags
Launching the scholarship bondbreaking advising...
Months ago, I wrote about wanting to set up a simple service to advise anyone considering breaking their scholarship bond. I have thought a lot about it. I thought through many ideas for how to position it. Should I buy a new domain? Should I write a collection of articles first? Should I have testimonials from happy clients?
Basically, I ran into the problem that many of us face with projects:...
3 tags
The way to take responsibility
Don’t demand authority. Eagerly take responsibility. Relentlessly give credit.
- Seth Godin, on The quickest way to get things done and make change
A few months ago, I reached the point in my job as Product Manager when I became the go-to person if anything related to the product broke. All the complaints came to me. I felt constantly under the gun for things beyond my control.
This...
3 tags
The highest craft
Over the weekend, I saw Jiro Dreams of Sushi, a very lovely film especially if you love sushi. It follows the story of an 85-year-old legendary sushi chef who runs a 10-seater restaurant near a Tokyo subway. Meals start at $300 (USD not yen). He has been awarded 3 Michelin stars. He has been making sushi for 75 years.
I was struck by Jiro’s commitment to this single specific craft. He has...
2 tags
Failing successfully
Since starting, I have gone through cycles of feeling like I’m doing well and feeling like I’m failing. From the outside, it probably looks like things are constantly challenging but generally improving. The stages are probably not noticeable at all, or at least nowhere near as pronounced as how I experience them. Internally, it’s helpful to identify where I am in the cycle to...
April 2012
8 posts
3 tags
Finding the guts to work in public
Working in public. I first came across the idea in Tony Chu’s blog. He talks about opening up the learning process, the creation process by writing publicly about the journey as you go through it. Write vulnerably, gather feedback, expose yourself to interesting ideas.
He linked to a post over at Snarkmarket - the art of working in public. The post is about other (famous) people’s...
Habits (or how I got myself to go running)
In most areas of life, I am relatively disciplined. But when it comes to exercising regularly, I have failed time and again.
A few months ago, I made a new friend. She is a triathlete. She was so enthusiastic, so effusive about getting me to exercise, I couldn’t say no. She broke it down into a simple routine. Run 3 times a week, 30 min each time, pick a route you like. She wakes up early...
3 tags
Ducklings vs. rainfall on water
A friend explained to me that at her school, the students were described as “ducklings” - calm above water but paddling hard beneath the surface to keep up. The same can probably be said of people who work in startups in the Bay Area. People appear chill, and they sort of actually are, except when you discover how hard core they are about their work.
I prefer the opposite analogy.
...
2 tags
Ari Wallach's synthesized problem solving
“All Synthesis is, is myself and my partner running the back end. It’s like cloud innovation; we’re really trying to build a next-generation consultancy, drawing on a different kind of expert network…
“We’ll hire a stay-at-home mom who doesn’t want to return to a position at McKinsey, but will give us 15 brilliant hours a week in between everything else...
2 tags
Not urgent but important moments
If you work in a startup, you will understand that it is very, very hard to get out of operating in the urgent bucket and into the not urgent but important bucket. The bigger important things are easier to identify (you should build X). The smaller important things, those are hard to catch and sometimes seem frivolous, but they add up. They matter.
From the not urgent but important bucket this...
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What actually matters in goal setting
The engineers on my product team asked why I didn’t defend their interests in our quarterly goal setting meeting. This is presumably part of my job as Product Manager. (This is funny to me, since it’s the only time they have ever accused me of not defending them. Whether they like it or not, I have far more frequently erred on the other side.)
The senior leadership exec was doing his...
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Stories that are too big too tell
Do you ever have this problem where something means too much to you, and when you try to communicate it to others it always falls short? Usually, it’s not because they don’t get it. Usually, it’s because it is too intensely personal and you are scared of sharing it. You would feel too vulnerable.
There is this story that I have been telling over and over in the past few months...
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The problem with tactics
When I am under greater stress or feel like I’m floundering, I resort to looking at those around me and trying to learn tactics. Why does X get ahead, despite X’s [insert some undesirable trait]. I try to copy. I try to emulate the tactics. The whole problem is that these moves are just that - tactics. They work in the short term, they work in surface relationships, but they...
March 2012
3 posts
2 tags
Do what you are
“He believes in a theory. He believes in a position. And then he tries to manifest it…” - Jerry Colonna on Mixergy, on Seth Godin starting Yoyodyne and Squidoo, two companies that reflect who Seth is
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My negotiations professor at Wharton, Adam Grant, is writing a book called “Give and Take”. The book is about:
- Givers - people who prefer to contribute more than...
1 tag
Giving credit where it's due
The salesguys had gotten free tshirts and jerseys from a client. Really nice brand, nice swag. It’s been a ton of work to get this launch out. The salesguys H and S were giving out shirts to the people who worked on this.
I told the salesguys, make sure you give one to A!
A is the engineer who has been working incredibly hard on one crucial part of this. There were many pep talks...
1 tag
An afternoon in Brooklyn
The Brooklyn Bridge
The Manhattan Bridge
One Girl Cookies
One Girl Cookies (I love their lighting)
Dumbo Arts Center
February 2012
4 posts
2 tags
Things that cannot be taught
…that I wish could be:
1. How to make yourself happy
People I know who are best at making themselves happy were also acutely miserable at some point.
People I know who are bad at this have only known a numb unhappiness and a lot of inertia.
Being able to make yourself happy is different from being lucky.
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2. Professional judgment
In roles that require managing people and...
2 tags
For giving to feel like receiving #generosityday
I didn’t always get generosity. Sasha Dichter once ran a Generosity Experiment. For 30 days, he said yes to every request for help, for money, for anything from friends, people on the street, anyone. I loved the idea. I also thought it mildly crazy. I wanted to feel what he felt, but couldn’t get comfortable with it. Giving is supposed to feel good theoretically. But in reality,...
3 tags
Connecting online to offline
For these two weeks back home, I’ve scheduled lots of meals (when one is in Singapore, one eats) to catch up with friends. These are typically with Singaporean friends I’ve known since my school days. This is the first time that most of these meals are with people whom I’ve gotten to know in the past year. A couple of you I’ve only met once in person. One of you I have...
2 tags
Of business trips and a three-year-old
Another day, another business trip. This place is growing on me.
It’s funny but there are things mentioned in the meeting that refer back to things that happened months ago. I remember what happened and I also remember how I felt back then, how lost, how mildly terrified that I was going to screw up a big deal. Except that of course, I had no idea how big a deal. And I had no idea that...
January 2012
3 posts
3 tags
Growth requires friction
In the first couple months of my job, the two most common phrases I used to describe my experience were “thrown in the deep end” and “drinking from the fire hose”. I felt slightly overwhelmed on most days, totally overwhelmed on a few days, and it was great.
Fast forward half a year later, I work less hours (somewhat). I generally no longer feel lost. I am less stressed....
3 tags
The way to love your job
Step 1. Follow that feeling Last March, I almost chose a different path. I actually gave up this job, almost signed with another one. But then I just couldn’t fight the feeling. It ate at me. I couldn’t sleep. I was terrified that I was changing my mind so dramatically - overnight it seemed! I’m not one to make fickle decisions. When I make decisions, major ones, even smaller...
1 tag
Taste-making
I’ve been thinking about taste and my funny affinity for people who exhibit good taste. It’s not necessarily expressed in a visual way. It’s not just about picking out good art, or being able to distinguish good sashimi from bad, or being able to put together a stylish outfit. Taste can be exhibited in abstract ways. Like people who get when an idea is beautiful. Or people who...
December 2011
4 posts
2 tags
What it's like to advise scholarship bondbreakers...
[This post is on scholarship bondbreaking. If you are not from Singapore, there are some articles out there for context. However, even without context, this entry really is about gift gifting.]
This year, I’ve gotten an almost steady stream of requests for career advising chats. They are either about wanting to join a startup, about getting a job in social venture capital, or about...
2 tags
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Why we trust some people and not others
I’ve been thinking about trust. Trust as a kind of foundation that makes social and professional transactions much easier.
A colleague once made the remark that there is no way we can explain all the details of our product to our clients. And we should not have to. It should not be their job to worry about all the details. What we need is to get them to trust us and trust the product. The...
2 tags
Committing to the work
Remember the post about tasks. vs. outcomes? I’ve been think about another factor - process. Process, or I think the more accurate word is journey, refers to what you do to get from tasks to outcomes. If your outcome is say, getting a book published, then the tasks could be rewriting draft after draft, and the journey is everything in between - the planning, the emotions, the frustration,...
November 2011
3 posts
1 tag
An incomplete list of great pleasures
The Thanksgiving edition.
- Drives on 280 even when it’s faster on the 101
- The sublime experience that is opera
- With people whose love and dedication to classical music far exceeds mine
- Radiolab episodes that are so good I come away filled with wonder
- And colleagues who also gush about Radiolab
- Watching a professional at work
- Getting to know someone at depth over...
2 tags
Cultivating Creative Depth
I was asked today what it takes to perform well in the Product and Engagement Manager role, what skills we expect from candidates, what skills I bring to this role. I said something about being analytical and being technically comfortable even without a CS background and being a good problem solver, because you’re doing a lot of things that just haven’t been done before. And then I...
1 tag
Stephen Fry on kindness
I suppose the thing that I would have like to have known or be reassured about is that in the world, what counts more than talent, what counts more than energy or concentration or commitment or anything else, is kindness. And the more in the world you encounter kindness - or cheerfulness which is its kind of amiable uncle or aunt - the more… just the better the world always is. And all the...
October 2011
7 posts
2 tags
Is it crazy to want to change the world
I received an email from a reader who is on scholarship in response to my post about scholarship bondbreaking. He writes, “my dream is to create/invent something that will change the world and add enormous value… Am I being delusional, or are my views shared by other scholars?”
It is somewhat heartbreaking to me that when young Singaporeans express this sentiment, this wish to...
2 tags
Fire drill
We have fire drill situations every now and then - it is a startup after all - but today was the first time I really had to escalate. It was truly bizarre to feel so responsible for getting a project across the finish line and to realize that you can do so very little of it yourself. You need everyone else’s help. They have the skills, and all you have is a long list of things that need to...
2 tags
Making major decisions and such
A friend was faced with the situation of having to choose between publishers and asked what I thought. He knows that I know nothing about publishing, so he wasn’t asking for which choice he should make, but he wanted to know what questions he should be asking.
It made me think about my Major Decision Making heuristics and I wrote something to this effect:
I like to throw out the classic...
3 tags
Career coaching
I get career advising requests a lot. They mostly come through as referrals. Friends of friends. 2nd and 3rd degree friends. Half of them are scholarship bondbreaking related, and the rest are about how to land a job at a startup as a non-engineer. I get them enough that I could have done 4 last weekend if I didn’t push out the meetings. This is not a service I advertise (but maybe I...
2 tags
One-slide decks
I was asked a difficult question by a customer that sent me on a long data analysis chase. I wanted to be thoughtful and thorough about it, so I:
- Asked my colleagues how they would think about it. - We filled a whole white board with ideas, charts, arrows, lists. - Downloaded a lot of data. This took more hours than I care to admit. - Worked some excel magic on the data. Tried to make sense...
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In which I discover the beauty of an Eames
To buy a chair, you need to go sit. And that is what I’ve been up to. I wanted to get a soft plushy armchair, until @kathliu pointed out that a well designed hard chair might be more comfortable and much better for the body. So there I was, Goldilocks in Design Within Reach.
If you’ve never sat in an Eames chair, you should.
The chair that brought me into the store was the Eames...
September 2011
8 posts
1 tag
The genius that is Radiolab
I want to talk about Radiolab. Every now and then you discover something just outside of what you’d normally consume, something totally amazing, and it makes you sit up and pay attention. It shifts your world view just a little.
First, there was the appreciation that Ira Glass wrote. He made me want to go listen.
I marvel at Radiolab when I hear it. I feel jealous. Its co-creators Jad...
2 tags
Thank You Project Update #4: What People Say in...
(Cross-posted from the Thank You Project)
Dear backers,
It’s been awhile. :) I hope this update finds you well. I thought I’d share a few observations from all the cards I have written so far.
- I have sent cards to people all over the globe - India, Germany, Canada, Singapore (my hometown!), and an APO in Japan.
- I had to write one card in a language I don’t speak -...
1 tag
The long, long line from the B to the E
“Because for me to join the B to the E, I have to stop thinking about every single note along the way and start thinking about the long, long line from B to E.”
The energetic Benjamin Zander is talking about music and how one plays beautifully through “one button playing”. But he might as well be talking about how you get from tasks to outcomes.
When I think of the...
3 tags
Tasks vs. outcomes
I figure out what to do each day based on a running to-do list. This is the first job where I’ve really needed it, because there are too many discrete, non-standardized tasks to keep it straight in my head. A task on my list takes anywhere from 15 min (email customer about something) to a few hours (do a deck for a particular analysis that I’ve never done before).
The problem with...
3 tags
That $20 malaria book: how generosity trumped...
I finally bought the book. I had been resisting it. All week, I had been seeing tweets and blog posts about End Malaria Day and the fundraising book that was being sold for $20. It’s a collection of motivational pieces, many of which were written by blogging personalities I follow. But I resisted it because the campaign just felt like just another ask for money. “Just click and for $20...
2 tags
In search of a desk that delights
I am in the market for a desk. Not just any desk. What I want is essentially a simple table, no drawers or shelves, but I want nice wood and nice design. I currently have a small desk that’s part of a Container Store shelving unit. I’ve had it for years. It was perfect for compact NY apartments. The issue now is that I work with 2 laptops at home - one for work, one personal. My...
1 tag
August 2011
3 posts
2 tags
Why scholars break their bonds
A year ago, I decided to give a talk about bondbreaking. I wrote an email and asked friends to forward it to anyone who might be interested. A handful of brave souls showed up. The really interesting outcome was that the email got far wider circulation than I had expected. In fact, I was recently introduced to someone who knew of me because a friend of his had read that email. Yeah. Small world.
...
2 tags
Doing what is difficult
An interesting piece of advice today:
Do what is difficult but essential. Do what is too painful, tedious, challenging for other people to do. That’s where you add value. That’s where you become indispensable.
It runs counter to a lot of the values that b school espouses. In b school and I suspect a lot of corporate environments, there is this unhealthy obsession with going after the...
July 2011
8 posts
2 tags
Loving the insanity
I was asked what I miss about New York. I said, I don’t really miss New York. If I did miss anything, it’d be the food, the opera, Central Park… I’ve been a bit too enamored of the stunning weather and lovely hikes and many bubble tea options here to miss New York.
Then I read this post by Sasha Dichter about two people asking for your money on the subway with a creative...
4 tags
Matching your job to your leisure reading
“Every time I switch jobs, I learn to read a different section of the papers.” -@chewinglum
That’s a one way to do it. I’ve done the exact opposite. I’ve matched my job to my leisure reading.
Two years ago, I found myself reading a whole bunch of social impact books. Three Cups of Tea. The Blue Sweater. Half the Sky. Etc. Couldn’t get enough of it. I figured,...