Our capacity for surprise has diminished. As director Larry Clark said, "You can't get lost anymore." There are no aimless road trip stories in a world of pocket GPS devices, no wandering into an unknown town. Our always-on world creates an economy of distraction, risking numbness, banality, and boredom. David Foster Wallace said the k...

These days, we hear a lot about optics. News people say, "the optics aren't good," meaning it doesn't look good. I understand what it means, but the trend is worrying. Cultural idioms often come with ethics. Most of us wouldn't want our spouse or boss to tell us that what we're doing "doesn't look good." Adopting more formal language c...

The fabric of society depends on trust. Today, freely available information makes everyone feel like an expert. Not recognizing our limits or expertise in others pulls at the threads and erodes trust – a mass Dunning-Kruger delusion fuels a death of expertise. Institutions from Twitter to the United States survive based on trust. Socie...

“I have been to the movies. I've seen how it ends, and the joke's on them.” Words of an optimist. It’s easier to have a complaint, look for conspiracy, and be in glass-half-full mode, but pessimism never works. Dystopian futures make great stories, but like other horrors, it’s better fiction than reality. Optimism is necessary for stab...

In a wonderful lunchtime session with Institute of Design (ID) students discussing careers in design. Among the things I shared was my "master" plan (not) for "building a personal brand and becoming an influencer in the world of design" (surely not). This request made me think of my much-repeated tenet: "expertise is relative." My sill...

We know from behavioral science that bad experiences have a stronger impact than positive ones. Evolution is a likely source; it may have been smarter to escape death than find dinner, but it plays out in our modern society in ways that hold us back. New products have to be 10x better for people to switch. A tragic flaw takes down good...

The standard approach is to DO something, then SAY something about it, but many leading organizations today don't start with doing things – they start with saying things.

Organizations must adapt to changing conditions, but nobody likes to change. Change is hard; before you even notice, your groove becomes a rut. Agile teams need self-awareness, intellectual honesty, and humility. Evolution is a necessity, but personal growth is a skill.

Even if Moore's Law stopped being valid today, society would take several decades to adjust. Sharing economy companies like Uber, Airbnb, and WeWork did not create much new technology; mostly, they leveraged the supercomputer in our pockets. Innovation is not dependent on cutting-edge technology. Technology merely creates options. Solv...

People get mixed up when talking about vision, mission, and strategy. Returning on shareholder investment is not a strategy; it’s survival. Leaders define the destination and the path to get there. The future state should be seen and understood.

Today's technology enables so many personalized, tailored experiences that it's harder to have shared ones.

Starting with why is okay, but it's only half the battle. Brand building is not all about self-actualization. Brands are inherently two-way communications: half sender, half receiver. You must know as much about your customer as possible to be effective. Otherwise, you're not building a brand; you're delivering a monologue.

Numbers bias us. Things that can be counted seem safer, more predictable, and more organized. But quantitative customer data always looks back, measuring what happened before. The past can suggest the future if conditions don’t change, but there is much change today. Qualitative data is harder to nail down, but if we aim to understand ...

“Creative” people often are good at abstraction and reframing problems intuitively, but they’re not always as good at controlling this muscle - so they’re seen as geniuses or jerks. Others must learn to back up to see the larger picture. Knowing how to throttle abstraction is a key skill for solving problems today.

Free services sometimes come with products (warranties), and free products sometimes come with services (mobile phones). Innovative product companies are starting to behave like service companies (SaaS). Innovative service companies are starting to behave like product companies (packages/subscriptions). Both are trying to close the cus...

Most people prefer simple experiences – ones that feel easy. Making experiences simple is hard because the complexity doesn’t go away. Organizations that create simple experiences must internalize the complexity, which costs more, takes longer, and fights optimization. Future-focused organizations will optimize the customer experience ...

We think in extremes because it’s easier. Black-and-white is easier to understand than grey – the more graphic, the simpler, and the easier to define edges and describe differences. But our lives and choices are more nuanced. The map is not the territory, and bridging the gap requires new thinking skills.

Thinking about thinking.