“If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it”
– Peter Drucker
April 2021, Articles & Podcast
Noteworthy articles and podcast that I’ve read/listened to this month:
- HBS Case Study: How Venture Capitalists Evaluate Potential Investment Opportunities
- The Day They Chose Hate: Arkansas and The Choice On Who Gets Protected
- Moving Your People to Action
- How I Stumbled Into An Equity Lens
- Newcomer: Bessemer’s Big Exit, Clubhouse, and ‘The Curse of Bigness’
- McKinsey Papers: Speed and resilience: Five priorities for the next five months
- McKinsey Papers: Boards and decision making
- The Daily: A Vast Web of Vengeance
- The Daily: Europe’s Vaccination Problem
- More Equity: Morgan DeBaun of Blavity
- The Prof G Show: Episode 58
- The Indicator: What McDonald’s Tells Us about Minimum Wage
- The Indicator: Too Many Real Estate Agents
- Divergent Unicorn: Increasing Cap Table Diversity with Megan Holston-Alexander
- The Journal: Why China is Jumping into Digital Currency
“Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.”
-Eleanor Roosevelt, 1901
Why you should save like a pessimist, but invest like an optimist
Interesting article I ran across this weekend.
Three types of kindness
There is the kindness of ‘please’ and ‘thank you.’ And the kindness of “I was wrong, I’m sorry.” The small kindnesses that smooth our interactions and help other people feel as though you’re aware of them. These don’t cost us much, in fact, in most settings, engaging with kindness is an essential part of connection, engagement and forward motion.
And then there is the kindness of dignity. Of giving someone the benefit of the doubt. The kindness of seeing someone for the person that they are and can become, and the realization that everyone, including me and you, has a noise in our heads, a story to be told, fear to be danced with and dreams to be realized.
And there’s another: The kindness of not seeking to maximize short-term personal gain. The kindness of building something for the community, of doing work that matters, of finding a resilient, anti-selfish path forward.
Kindness isn’t always easy or obvious, because the urgent race to the bottom, to easily measured metrics and to scarcity, can distract us. But bending the arc toward justice, toward dignity and toward connection is our best way forward.
Kindness multiplies and it enables possiblity. When we’re of service to people, we have the chance to make things better.
Source: Seth Godin
The trap of busy
Everyone who wants to be busy is busy.
But not everyone is productive.
Busy is simply a series of choices about how to spend the next minute.
Productive requires skill, persistence and good judgment. Productive means that you have created something of value.
Perhaps your self-created busy-ness is causing you to be less productive.
Source: Seth Godin
Born to run (things)
The first half of Bruce Springsteen’s autobiography makes some things abundantly clear:
He had no natural ability to play the guitar. In fact, after his first lessons, he quit, unable to play a note.
He had no singing talent. Every group he was part of needed a lead singer, and it wasn’t him.
And just about everyone dismissed him. Audiences walked out, his first agent simply stopped returning his calls and bandmates gave up and moved on.
He didn’t even know how to drive a car. Not only wasn’t he dating in high school, he wasn’t even cruising around town, being a charismatic rock star.
Talent is overrated. Skill is acquirable.
Showing up is something almost every creative leader has in common. In business, in the arts, in society. Consistently shipping the work, despite the world’s reaction, despite the nascent nature of our skill, despite the doubts.
And community is essential. The people you surround yourself with can reinforce your story, raise the bar and egg you on.
After the fact, the community becomes an integral part of your story of success. But first, you have to commit to the journey.
Source: Seth Godin
The Great Grift
NYU Stern School of Business Professor Galloway just published a great piece on the wealth transfer during the pandemic. It’s worth the read.
Excerpt: “The wealthy use this influence to expand their wealth and power. Consider the tax code: Income gained from selling stock in a firm is taxed at a lower rate than income gained from actually working at that firm. A second transfer from poor to rich: A homeowner may deduct mortgage interest on a first and second home, while the less wealthy pay non-deductible rent. If it makes no sense that we’ve functionally decided money (and the money it makes) is more noble than sweat … trust your instincts.”
The next normal arrives: Trends that will define 2021—and beyond
McKinsey and Company just published a great piece on business trends that’ll lead us in 2021 and beyond. It’s worth the read.
The next normal arrives: Trends that will define 2021—and beyond