Critical Thinking Resources

The Headscratcher model is a working framework for Critical Thinking consisting of 3 components - Clarity, Conclusions and Decisions, surrounded by Discovery, Information and Ideas.


FastCompany article: A Plea for More Critical Thinking in Design, Please BY John Barratt Aug 2009

Long Term Mutual Prosperity

According to Michael Hoseus, Executive Director of the Center for Quality People & Organizations, and co-author of TOYOTA CULTURE, the heart and soul of the Toyota Way, to only be in business to make money is the lowest level of maturity that exists for a company. Long-term mutual prosperity is a goal shared by the company and the employee that brings the two together, and establishes a consensus, trust, and long term commitment to success that becomes the shared purpose of work. While the company targets profit, growth, and sustainability, and the employee seeks job stability, growth, and their development, the two can come together forming a mutual commitment around long-term mutual prosperity.

Happy New Year,
Chuck

Charter for Compassion

3-1/2 minutes of inspiration worth watching. It came to me from TED Ideas worth spreading.

Do we have time for beauty?

When will we make time for something extraordinary?

I heard a great story on All Things Considered tonight during my drive home. Today, the Washington Post's Gene Weingarten won a Pulitzer prize for feature writing for his story about what happened when he recruited Joshua Bell, one of the most accomplished classical musicians in the world, to appear incognito in a Washington DC metro station, playing some of the world's best music on a Stradivarius violin with an estimated value in excess of 3.5 million dollars. This performance was arranged as an experiment -- In an ordinary setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty overcome routine? The anonymous virtuoso performed for 43 minutes as over 1000 commuters passed by, with only a handful pausing for more than a moment. Bell promised not to “cheap out” on the performance: He put feeling into the performance, playing with enthusiasm, he leaned into the music and arched on tiptoes as the music soared. Here’s an excerpt from the article describing what happened. You can hear a recording of the performance and view video clips at the Washington Post website.

Three minutes went by before something happened. Sixty-three people had already passed when, finally, there was a breakthrough of sorts. A middle-age man altered his gait for a split second, turning his head to notice that there seemed to be some guy playing music. Yes, the man kept walking, but it was something.

A half-minute later, Bell got his first donation. A woman threw in a buck and scooted off. It was not until six minutes into the performance that someone actually stood against a wall, and listened.

Things never got much better. In the three-quarters of an hour that Joshua Bell played, seven people stopped what they were doing to hang around and take in the performance, at least for a minute. Twenty-seven gave money, most of them on the run -- for a total of $32 and change. That leaves the 1,070 people who hurried by, oblivious, many only three feet away, few even turning to look.

When interviewed after the performance, Bell said hadn't known what to expect, but for some reason, he was nervous.

"It wasn't exactly stage fright, but there were butterflies," he says. "I was stressing a little."

"When you play for ticket-holders," Bell explains, "you are already validated. I have no sense that I need to be accepted. I'm already accepted. Here, there was this thought: What if they don't like me? What if they resent my presence . . ."

Toward the end of the feature, Weingarten philosophizes about what happened;

In his 2003 book, Timeless Beauty: In the Arts and Everyday Life, British author John Lane writes about the loss of the appreciation for beauty in the modern world. The experiment at L'Enfant Plaza may be symptomatic of that, he said -- not because people didn't have the capacity to understand beauty, but because it was irrelevant to them.

"This is about having the wrong priorities," Lane said.

If we can't take the time out of our lives to stay a moment and listen to one of the best musicians on Earth play some of the best music ever written; if the surge of modern life so overpowers us that we are deaf and blind to something like that -- then what else are we missing?

My mind jumped immediately from the radio story to an article I had read yesterday in the Sunday Parade Magazine about the Last Lecture by Randy Pausch.


In September of 2007, Randy Pausch, a 46-year-old computer-science professor at Carnegie Mellon University, who has terminal Pancreatic cancer and expected to live for just a few more months said goodbye to his students and the Pittsburgh college with one last lecture called "How to Live Your Childhood Dreams," on his life's journey and the lessons he's learned. The Wall Street Journal called it "the lecture of a lifetime" and those who have seen it more than agreed. The video is long, but very worthwhile. I sent this link with the complete lecture video to each of my kids and my siblings. I'm offering prayers for Randy and his family as they face this very difficult challenge. Please remember them in your prayers as well.

In yesterday's Parade article, Randy Pausch recalls his childhood experience of the first lunar landing.

I was 8 in the summer of 1969, when men first walked on the moon. I was at camp, and we campers were brought to the main house to watch the moment on TV. But the astronauts were taking a while, and it was late. The counselors sent us to our tents to sleep, and we missed the first walk.I was peeved. I thought: “My species has gotten off our planet and is in a new world for the first time, and you people think bedtime matters?”

I'm making an effort to hear the music, smell the roses, and experience the people who come into my life every day.

Peace,

Innovations in Search

An article in today's MIT's Technology Review discusses ongoing innovations in search.

Dan Crow, product manager at Google, says people are generally happy with the interface as it exists today. "The basic format hasn't changed much because it's been successful ... It works well for most of the users most of the time."

There is no argument that Google works well compared to what was available in the past, and been very successful; but there are huge opportunities for further innovation. The current implementation delivers results that are popular. It's often difficult to filter through a large volume of search results to find information that is meaningful, accurate and relevant.

I found Google's introduction to their public experimental search lacking. I joined the experiment for Right-hand contextual search navigation. Google's offering of alternate views for search results (list, info, timeline, and map views) didn't grab my interest. Although I'm enthusiastic about the value of the timeline view, the others didn't get me excited. I was a little relucant because it wasn't made clear up-front, what signing up for a Google experiment means. Now when I open a new browser window and search on Google, I get some extra GUI elements that provide context prompts based on my search results. I signed up in MS Explorer, and the features don't seem to carry over automatically to FireFox. My first impression of the new tools is positive, but I like to know what I'm getting into before I sign-up for something online. I guess the fact that I went ahead indicates that Google has earned my trust enough for me to take a chance on something new.

Related links:
Clusty Search clustering 2.0

Best,
Chuck

Improv Wisdom - Just Show Up

More interesting reading.

http://www.improvwisdom.com/

Chuck

Interesting Reading on Innovation

Lessons Not Learned About Innovation Q&A with Rosabeth Moss Kanter of Harvard Business School
Understanding the Process of Innovation
The Essentials for Enlightened Experimentation
Why Managing Innovation is Like Theater
Cheap, Fast, and In Control: How Tech Aids Innovation
Boston Consulting Group Measuring Innovation Aug 07
Boston Consulting Group Sr. Management Innovation survey Aug 07

Strategy & Business Magazine Online

from Manyworlds.com blog
Payback: Reaping the Rewards of Innovation, James Andrew and Harold Sirkin lay bare the nature of cash traps and explain how companies can make more profitable innovations by using a four-phase “cash curve” framework. As Andrew and Sirkin see it, the purpose of innovating is “to generate cash.” Their framework structures the process of sorting through innovative ideas and managing them until they yield financial returns.

No time to draw conclusions yet, but I'll come back and revisit this topic as time permits.

Chuck

Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies

Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies: Understanding Patterns of Project Behavior is a new book from Atlantic Systems Guild, scheduled for publication in February 2008. It is a collaboration by Tom DeMarco, Peter Hruschka, Tim Lister, Steve McMenamin, James Robertson and Suzanne Robertson. I met both Tom DeMarco and Tim Lister through the Boston Software Process Improvement Network and am a fan of their previous book Waltzing with Bears about managing risk in software development. Although the Atlantic Systems Guild general focuses on software development issues, this book really focuses on people issues and behaviors that are applicable anywhere.

Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies applies pattern recognition concepts to human interactions in the project environment. The Guild focused on the hidden notions that govern behavior and interactions on projects and teams Just as architect Christopher Alexander and his IT counterparts Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, and John M. Vlissides, deal with the technological aspects of software patterns, this new book focuses on the social and human aspects.

The book identifies 86 project and team behavior patterns, which often go unrecognized, and provides amusing 1-2 page vignettes describing each of them. The patterns are the unwritten rules that frequently drive behavior. People tend not to think about them, or acknowledge them for what they are. The first step to dealing with behavior patterns is recognizing their existence.
The book has been endorsed by:

Howard Look,VP, Software, Pixar Animation Studios

Alistair Cockburn, author of Agile Software Development

Ed Yourdon, author of Death March

Warren McFarland, Professor, Harvard Business School and others

If you are interested and willing to invest a few minutes, you can download an 18 page sample pdf that includes the table of contents,introduction, and a few patterns.

Dead Fish: From Day One, the project has no chance of meeting its goals; most people on the project know this and say nothing.
Film Critics: Film critics are team members or corporate spectators who have determined that the value they add to the project lies in pointing out what has gone wrong or is going wrong, but who take no personal accountability to ensure that things go right.
Hidden Beauty: Some aspect of the project’s work moves beyond adequate,beyond even elegant . . . and reaches for the sublime.

There is an aesthetic element to all design. The question is, Is this aesthetic element your friend or your enemy? If you’re a manager, particularly a younger manager, you might be worried that any aesthetic component of the designer’s work could be a waste, little more than the gold-plating that we’re all taught must be avoided. This aesthetics neutral posture in a manager acts to deprive designers of appreciation for work that is excellent, and to refuse acknowledgment of any valuation beyond “adequate.”The opposite posture requires that you be capable and willing to look in detail at your people’s designs, and be aware enough to see quality when it’s there.

The book is now available for pre-order through Dorset House or Amazon. (The current Amazon price is $35.95 with a 5% pre-order discount)

Best,

Chuck

Roller coaster image available under a Creative Commons License from Kalense Kid's photos

On choosing a college... how to decide

The decision deadline for most colleges is past, and we had quite an experience with Emily, our third child, who is graduating high school this weekend and plans to begin studying pharmacy, (a six year program) in the fall. She was accepted at two well known private schools, including her initial top choice. (Here are a few relevant financial facts for her initial top choice: $43,000/year times six years less $5,000/year scholarship and $3,000 financial aid package = $210,000 before other living expenses) She was also accepted at our state university which has a highly ranked pharmacy program where she received a full tuition merit scholarship where our net cost for 6 years will be about $84,000. That’s still a LOT of money, but less than half of the private school.

I talked to many people asking the question, how to explain to an 18 year old that these are not just numbers written on piece of paper? How can I help my daughter understand this choice will have a huge impact on her long (and our) term finances? In the end, this is how we addressed the issue.

1) We told her she could go wherever she wanted, but if she chose a school that is beyond our means, she would have to take out loans to cover what we are unable to afford, and she would be responsible for paying back the loans.

2) We helped her understand the interest payments on student loans multiply the amount owed. The school’s financial aid offices provided information on typical payment schedules. We also provided her information on the amount of borrowing vs. future expected income from the College Board Workbook for families Meeting College Costs. (The book is discounted if purchased it when completing the CSS Profile).

3) We made it clear that if she took out huge loans, then decided later on to switch majors, say from pharmacy to teaching, resulting in a much lower expected annual income after graduation, she would still be responsible for the loans.

4) We helped her to confirm for herself that there was nothing at the higher cost private schools that she could not do at the less expensive state school.

5) For the field of pharmacy, it doesn’t seem like where you go to school has a huge impact on future career potential. For liberal arts, that may be less true.

6) If she chose the private school, at least part of the money she earned while working summers would have to go to tuition and board expenses, so she would have a lot less spending money while in school, whereas at the more affordable state school, we can cover her tuition and board, and she can use her earnings for her living expenses.

7) Originally, I wasn’t going to include this last point, but in the interest of full disclosure, I thought that I should, because I think that it had some influence on her decision. We have an extra car in the family for our kids to share, and with her two older brothers away for the most of the year at college. Emily had the car pretty much to herself for her senior year at high school. We dropped a few hints that if she chose the state university, she would be able to take the car with her to school, giving her a lot of mobility and freedom. This would have been out of the question at the private school because it’s in the city and none of us would have been able to afford to run it anyway. OK you can call it a bribe if you want. In the end, considering all these factors, we were thrilled when she chose the state school.

I hope that things work out as well for your family.

Best,

Chuck

more on Enterprise 2.0 and WPI 2007 Commencement Speakers

More on Enterprise 2.0

Meet Charlie, Mr. Enterprise 2.0, - Slideshare Intro to Enterprise 2.0 which Tom Mandel posted on his blog. Oops! You can see in the screenshot below, Tom didn't tag his blog post.

- although slide 16 indicates that tagging is key to Enterprise 2.0.

I hope that's not an example of big hat, no cattle... (just teasing Tom.) From Tom's other posts, you can see this is an isolated oversight.

I also found Corante blogs, which examine critical themes and memes in technology, business, law, science, and culture. ( I admit, I had to look up memes in the dictionary ) -

An idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture

I came across Corante because they produce the FastForward blog on Enterprise 2.0 for Fast Enterprise Search. I'm convinced that Enterprise 2.0 is here to stay despite what the editors of Wikipedia may do.

I enjoyed the Speakers Saturday at WPI's 139th Commencement, where my oldest son, Mike, took his BS in Computer Science, He will be starting a full time job after a short vacation. Dad and mom are very proud!

Neil deGrasse Tyson, Astrophysicist and Frederick P. Rose Director Hayden Planetarium and a Research Associate at American Museum of Natural History and host for NOVA, Science Now. Neil deGrasse Tyson received an honorary Ph.d. from WPI and gave a brief, and amusing, but unscheduled address that was one of the highlights of the ceremony. He couldn't resist the opportunity to address such a large audience of technologists and assured the graduates he remains a card carrying Nerd with Pi to 11,000 decimal places, the text of Newton' s Principia, and the screenplay to the original Matrix on his PDA (the original, not the other two). He did include a serious message for graduates telling them that technological innovation is the greatest driver of Economic development. He also put a new twist on the verse from the Beatitudes, Mathew 5, 5, "The meek shall inherit the earth", suggesting instead that the Geeks shall inherit the Earth!

The primary speaker was Barbara Dunsire, president and CEO of Millennium Pharmaceuticals in Cambridge, MA, who emphasized three messages, in a world of change, let integrity be your compass, expand your horizons to find growth opportunities, and be true to yourself. More on that in a another post. She has clearly had to make some difficult decisions. I have most of the commencement on video and will work on getting it posted as time permits.

I'm here to serve,
Chuck

"Enterprise 2.0" equals "Next Generation IT" but does not equal "Web 2.0" (or does it?)

Enterprise 2.0 = Next Generation IT by ZDNet's Dan Farber -- After Wikipedia deleted the "Enterprise 2.0" entry, the Enterprise Irregulars swarmed, responding to the critique of the term by a Wikipedian editor as a "neologism of dubious utility" and taking a crack at defining it.

Accprdomg to Dan, battle lines are being drawn over the term Enterprise 2.0 after the term was deleted by editors of Wikipedia (I found Enterprise 2.0 in Wikipedia redirected under Enterprise Social Software).

In his recent presentation at IDC Directions in Boston, Don Tapscott talked about a similar experience when the term Wikinomics was added, then deleted and subsequently re-added to Wikipedia. Wikinomics is currently #13 on the Business Week best-seller list based on February 2007 sales.

At a recent Boston-SPIN meeting Ed Yourdon gave an hour-long overview of Web 2.0 and keeps updating his Web 2.0 mindmap which has grown to about 25 Mb describing Web 2.0 themes, history, technology, vendors, business & cultural issues, references and conclusions.

There are some common themes with Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0.

Accessibility/Openness
Collaborative user generated content
Two way data flow in and out of the enterprise
-- prosumer = producer/consumer
Self Service
Low Barriers to entry
User Driven

Is Enterprise 2.0 a subset of Web 2.0 for business? Interesting topic.

I'm here to serve,
Chuck

Joe Thomas & the NFL draft - Keeping Priorities Straight

I'm not much of a football fan, and had never heard of Joe Thomas until Saturday morning, but I have a new admiration for Thomas who became the third overall pick in the 2007 NFL draft. He was chosen by the Cleveland Browns . I heard about Thomas on my way to an early morning haircut, while listening to "Only a Game" on NPR. Bill Littlefield did a story about Thomas who, declined an invitation by NFL football commissioner Roger Goodell to the nationally broadcast draft ceremonies from New York City, electing instead to stick with his previous plans to spend the day fishing with his dad on Lake Michigan. (The story about Joe is about 7 minutes into the podcast.) It's a great example of keeping life in perspective. Keeping priority on family and not letting success go to your head. Thanks Joe for a breath of fresh air in a world where we need more roles models like you!

If people concentrated on the really important things of life, there'd be a shortage of fishing poles.

This quote is attributed online to Herbert Hoover, Doug Larson & others. I'm not sure who really said it, but I know it's true. I wouldn't be surprised to hear about Joe signing a celebrity endorsement deal for a major fishing tackle company at some point in the future, and good luck to him.

I'm here to serve,
Chuck

Earthday 2007

Here is a photo of South-Eastern New England taken from the Space Shuttle. This is my corner of the Earth. Cape Cod Bay is visible along the right hand (east) side of the photo. The sand spits about halfway down the right hand side of the photo form the harbor at Plymouth, MA which is where the pilgrims formed their colony when they arrived from England in 1620, and near where I grew up. Martha's Vineyard, the Elizabeth Islands, Buzzards Bay, and the Cape Cod Canal are in the bottom right (south-east) corner of the photo.

Narragansett bay occupies the center of the image. The city of Newport, RI is where Atlantic Ocean meets the bay. I live in Barrington, RI about 14 miles up Narragansett bay, along it's eastern shore. Block Island, RI and Montauk Point, NY are in the bottom left (southwest) corner of the image. The space image reminds me that I'm a steward of a beautiful corner of the Earth, and I should do more to protect it and reduce my impact on our environment.

Today is a gorgeous spring day- sunny with the temperature in the mid- 60's. I added the lilac bud photo Sunday morning 4/22. The temperature hit 80 degrees F Saturday afternoon, and all many buds on the lilacs and forsythias popped during the day.

Although I'm avid about re-use and recycling, and am conscious of energy consumption, I haven't done anywhere near as much as I could. I'll try to do better. I'm looking for suggestions about what I should do about the gas hog vehicle I've been driving since 2000.

It has 100,000+ miles on it, but with two kids in college, I'm not really in the market for another car just yet. When it needs to be replaced, I will definitely get a smaller vehicle with better mileage. One of the reasons I keep it is because I have a boat trailer to pull around. With my current commute of 11 miles to work, I'm using a lot less fuel than I used to, when I commuted 30 miles each way. Should I consider getting a scooter to reduce my fuel consumption in nice weather? My only issue with a scooter is safety since I commute through very busy traffic in Providence every day.

Happy Earth Day!
Chuck

Space Photo ISS006-E-45447 courtesy of the Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, NASA Johnson Space Center. For more images, visit Image Science and Analysis Laboratory, NASA-Johnson Space Center. "The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth."

Bill Nye the Science Guy says "You can change the world."

I saw Bill Nye last week when he spoke on April 10th at Bridgewater State College's distinguished speaker series. The mission of this lecture series is to present a variety of leaders and luminaries to challenge the minds and thinking of students and the community. Their mission was accomplished in this lecture. Bill is a former mechanical engineer (like me) with a degree from Cornell, who worked for many years a Boeing, where he desingned a hydralic resonance suppressor that still flies on 747 airliners. Bill gave up his engineering career, becoming a stand-up comic and eventually becoming a passionate public educator.

Bill described his contribution of the concept and design for a sun dial installed on each of the the Mars Rovers which evolved from the need to generate a shadow on mars for the purpose of calibrating on-board cameras. The sun dial idea was inspired by Bill's dad, Ned, who became interested in sun dials to pass time while he was a POW in China where Ned spent 44 months after being captured on Wake Island in the Pacific during WWII. Ned evenutally started a business selling sundials and at one time proposed converting the Washington Monument into a sundial.

Bill observed that the cost of the Mars mission was a bargain when you consider the value of the resulting discoveries. He remarked, there are two Rovers that cost of $435 million each just sitting there on Mars, and they aren't even locked!

Bill both praised and derided Pluto's recent de-classification from planet status. The understanding and insight that lead to the re-classification of Pluto opens the door to a whole relm of intricacies and nuances in the characteristices of celestial bodies that were not even possible to consider 30 to 50 years ago. According to the International Astronomical Union, "Pluto is not a planet, it's a dwarf planet. " But Bill chided, if you say Pluto is not a planet, you shouldn't use the word "panet", even with a "dwarf" modifier to define what it is.

After discussing space exploration, Bill switched to the topic of carbon emmissions and global warming. He showed a graph of planetary tempuratures spanning back 1,000 years based on seven independent studies, which each show the same trend of significantly rising temperature over the last 100 years. I approach this data with healthy skepticism, because we have to acknowledge that global climate change is well known to go back to the ice age, about 20,000 years ago, long before humans had any significant influence carbon emmissions. Although I'm not convinced that reducing carbon emmisions will reverse the global warming trend - if there is a statistically significant warming trend, it's hard to argue that we shouldn't do as much as possible conserve energy and focus on renewable resources. My impetus to conserve energy is not to reduce carbon dioxide emmisions, but becasue its the only way we can eliminate our dependence on imported energy and hope to control the fate of our economy.

Bill wrapped up saying he wanted his audience to change the world and enjoy success of ¥€$ [yes] Yaun, Euro, Dollars. If you can design a better battery you can get rich in all three currencies. He encourages all to cut carbon emmisions 80% by 2050 by using high efficiency light bulbs and driving cars with high milage and riding our bicycles the HKEV, Highest Known Efficiency Vehicle. Bill drives a Toyota Prius Hybrid which gets about 46 MPG,
The lecture was enjoyable, entertaining, educational, and inspiring.
I'm here to serve,
Chuck

Four Themes of Wikinomics - Don Tapscott at IDC Directions07

I'm really fired up after attending IDC Directions07 in Boston yesterday. Key themes of the conference were: innovation, hyper-disruption, and opportunity.

Don Tapscott, Chief Executive of New Paradigm and author of "The Naked Corporation" and more recently co-author of "Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything" gave the closing keynote address, which summarized the four themes of Wikinomics.

1. Peering

2. Being Open

3. Sharing

4. Act Globally

1. Peering - Economist Ronald Coase was awarded the 1991 Nobel Prize in Economics for his earlier work on Transaction Cost Theory to explain why corporations exist. As Henry Ford built his automobile company, he integrated steel, rubber and glass processing operations. The vertical company included stamping, forging, and machining and assembly operations. Ford also encompassed a trucking operation to move material and components and numerous other disciplines that are frequently outsourced in today's environment. The reason vertical integration made sense at the time was because it was less expensive to do those operations within the confines of the corporation than it was to purchase each item or service separately. Today the web enables collaboration reducing transaction costs to the point where open entities and individuals are collaborating to produce on scale that was previously the sole domain of corporations. Examples include Open Source Software, Boeing's development of the 7E7 Dreamliner and decentralized motorcycle manufacturing in China. This doesn't mean that collaborating individuals will replace corporations anytime soon, but it means that innovative upstart competitors are able to disrupt markets in ways never before possible.

2. Being Open - There is a huge potential to harness global expertise by sharing data and encouraging non-traditional collaboration. GoldCorp, an under performing mining company in Ontario turned itself around through the GoldCorp Challenge, an online contest where geologic data that was previously considered highly proprietary was published on the web for analysis by global scientists with over half a million dollars in prizes made available to entries that were able to identify where the gold was.

Synopsis of a May 2002 "FastCompany" article about the
GoldCorp Challenge:

Rob McEwen, chairman and CEO of Goldcorp Inc., based in Toronto, triggered a gold rush by issuing an extraordinary challenge to the world's geologists: He showed the world all of the geological data on GoldCorp's Red Lake mine online offering outsiders a prize to outsiders tell GoldCorp where they were likely to find 6 million ounces of gold.

The mining community was flabbergasted. Nick Archibald, managing director of Fractal Graphics, the winning organization from West Perth, Australia said, "The mining community was flabbergasted. "We've seen very large data sets from government surveys online, but for a company to post that information and say, 'Here I am, warts and all,' is quite unusual indeed."

For McEwen, the contest was a gold mine. "We have drilled four of the winners' top five targets and have hit on all four," he says. "But what's really important is that from a remote site, the winners were able to analyze a database and generate targets without ever visiting the property. It's clear that this is part of the future." McEwen knew that the contest was risky. But the risks of continuing to do things the old way were even greater.

3. Sharing - Give up on conventional wisdom about intellectual property. The new philosophy is "Give and ye shall receive." Companies need a portfolio of intellectual property, some of which they own and protect, and some of which they give away to build communities around their IP. IBM's investment in Linux is a prime example. In 2000, IBM announced a one-billion dollar investment in Linux. By January 2002, IBM had nearly re-couped the investment. By 2003, IBM was doing two-billion dollars per year in Linux related services (see The Wealth of Networks by Yochai Benkler chapt. 2, p. 47.) A key concept of sharing is turning consumers into producers.

4. Act Globally In the US, Europe & Japan, corporations behave as multinationals. Multinationals think globally, but act locally. In China, India and other emerging economies, rising companies are adopting truly global business models. They think globally and act globally.

Don punctuated the talk with a few humorous quips such as: God may have created the world in 6 days, but he didn't have an installed base." He wrapped up with a bit of philosophy. We must welcome the future, remembering that soon it will become the past, and we must respect the past, remembering that once it was all that was humanly possible. I thought Don attributed this quote to French aviator Antoine de St.-Exupery, author of the Little Prince, but my research indicates that this quote should be attributed to George Santayana.

I enjoyed Don's presentation so much, I stopped at Barnes and Nobel on the way home to buy the book. I couldn't wait to start reading it.

I'm here to serve,
Chuck

Ten easy changes to increase personal satisfaction

I strongly recommend this hour long exploration of satisfaction and happiness from The Infinite Mind radio show. On this episode, titled "Satisfaction," Fred Goodwin asks three authorities in the field of psychology for a few pointers to increase personal satisfaction. The list is simple, makes sense, and all of them are free. Remember, money can’t buy happiness!

[Click here to listen now Real Audio format.]

Barry Schwartz: professor of social theory and social action at Swarthmore College and author of “The Paradox of Choice, Why More is Less”
10. Develop realistic expectations about how good the results of your decisions will be.
9. Choose when to choose. Be willing to give up choice in certain areas of life. You don’t always need to assert your choice, give others the option to exercise their preference. You don’t always need to present yourself options then go to the effort of evaluating each possibility.
8. Make non-reversible decisions rather than always wanting to keep your options open. When you make reversible decisions you tend to second guess yourself, which leads to dissatisfaction.
7. Regret decisions less.

David Meyers: professor of psychology at Hope College in Michigan
6. Aerobic exercise is a powerful antidote to mild depression and anxiety.
7. Place greater priority on close relationships, investing time and energy in relationships that matter. Nurture relationships just as we nurture our career and bank accounts.
8. Recognize that our disposition is to an extent controlled by our genetic constitution.

Michael McCullough: associate professor of psychology and religion at University of Miami
9. Gratitude provides an important coping strategy in dealing with life’s challenges.
10. Grateful people are generally happier with life and more prone to spiritual satisfaction.Helping others cultivates feelings of happiness and satisfaction.

I'm here to serve,
Chuck

What is Success? by Bessie A. Stanley

Success by Bessie Anderson Stanley

He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often, and loved much; who has enjoyed the trust of pure women, the respect of intelligent men, and the love of small children; who has filled his niche, and accomplished his task; who has left the world better than he found it, whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem, or a rescued soul; who has never lacked appreciation of earth's beauty , or failed to express it; who has always looked for the best in others, and given them the best he had; whose life was an inspiration; whose memory a benediction.
- - - Bessie Anderson Stanley

This was the prize-winning definition of success which won a contest sponsored by Brown book Magazine, Boston, circa 1904. I recently learned that this quote is commonly mis-attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson. The primary reason is that Anne Landers and Abigail Van Buren mis-attributed it in their popular syndicated advice columns. This is according to Ralph Keys who my local reference librarian tells me is a reliable source. Keys is the author of the Quote Verifier, Who said what where and when, published by St. Martin's Griffin, NY in 2006 Ralph Keys confirmed the real author is Bessie Anderson Stanley of Lincoln, Nebraska. She won a $250 prize and publication of her poem in 1905. Keys wrote that the poem has also been mis-attributed to aphorist Elber Hubbard, clergy man Harry Emerson Fosdick and author Robert Lewis Stevenson.

The following entry appeared in Dear Abbey February 1, 1992, Reference :The Record. Bergen County, N.J, p 2.

DEAR ABBY: I am finally writing to ask you to correct your Nov. 17, 1990, column that contained the definition of "Success" attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson. It was very similar to one written in 1904 by my grandmother, Bessie Anderson Stanley.

DEAR MR. [Arthur Stanley Harvey]: My apologies to your family. According to "Distilled Wisdom: An Encyclopedia of Wisdom in Condensed Form" by Alfred Armand Montapert, published by Prentice-Hall Inc., Bessie Anderson Stanley wrote the famous definition of success that was published in 1904 in Brown Book Magazine.

Another reference librarian told me of a a reference to the poem in an edition of Granger's Index to Poetry and Recitations from the early 1930's. It is listed under the title of "What is Success?" by Bessie A. Stanley, as printed in a volume called Heart Throbs v.2 that was published by Chapple Publishing Co. [Update 2-24-2007 See images of Heart Throbs Volume 2]

Here, according to Dirk Kelder of the Emerson Socicety who researched this quote in depth, is a different view of success. The author is unknown.

At age 4, success is...not peeing in your pants.
At age 12, success is...having friends.
At age 16, success is...having a driver's license.
At age 20, success is...having sex.
At age 35, success is...having money.
At age 40, success is...finding meaning & purpose to life.
At age 45, success is...finding meaning & purpose to life.
At age 50, success is...having money.
At age 60, success is...having sex.
At age 70, success is...having a driver's license.
At age 75, success is...having friends.
At age 80, success is...not peeing in your pants.

Regards,
Chuck

Words of Wisdom on Independence and Empowerment from Susan T. Buffett

Listen to a June 30, 2006 NPR interview with Nicole Buffett, an artist in San Francisco and granddaughter of Warren Buffett, one of the world's richest men. Warren Buffett encouraged his family to be independent. He felt that flooding his heirs with wealth would be "neither right nor rational." Nicole was "pleasantly surprised" when her grandfather announced that he would donate 85 percent of his fortune or about 37 billion dollars to the Bill and Melinda Gates charitable foundation. Nicole said this really would have pleased her grandmother Susan T. Buffett. Nicole thought he was fulfilling her grandmother's wishes. Nicole described her experience as "a middle class upbringing with an upper class education." Her grandparents paid for her education, but she always needed a part time job while in school to supplement the aid she was given. She worked as a Nanny to earn extra money. She enjoyed working with children which was a really nice way to supplement her income while doing something that she feel good about. She described a universal frustration of wanting more money, but focusing on earning the money rather than asking for it which was not considered an option in her family. She learned to focus on personal responsibility to create a living specifically to support herself. Finally Nicole recounted five sayings, words of wisdom handed down by her grandmother.

1. Show up.
2. Tell the truth.
3. Pay attention.
4. Do your best.
5. Don't be attached to the outcome

These were her late grandmother's way of supporting the path and teaching of being independent and really empowering ourselves.

Regards,
Chuck

What can we learn about compromise and win-win negotiation from Senator Henry Clay?

Senator Henry Clay, "the Great Compromiser," brought about the Missouri Compromise of 1820.

Listen to a January 26, 2007 NPR interview with Roert Remini the historian for the US House of Representatives and biographer of Sen. Henry Clay, known as "the Great Compromiser." Clay used win-win negotiation tactics to establish the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which bridged the gap between the North and South over slavery, delaying the civil war for decades.

Clay's achievement resulted from his ability to make each side — in this case, the South and North — feel that it had won something in the bargain. A successful compromise is not simply a brokered quid pro quo – If you’ll do this, then I’ll do something else. Enduring compromise requires the parties to ask "What is your position?"

"If I have the majority and I jam it down your throat, that isn’t going to solve the problem. You’ll only come back when you are the majority and jam it down our throat. The answer he said is that each side must feel that they have gotten something that it wanted, but in order to do that you must give up something that the other side wants, so that there are no winners and no losers.

There were any number of Southerners who, when the Civil War ended, they said if Henry Clay had been alive in 1860 or 61, there would not have been a Civil War. "

When Remini wrote the biography of Henry Clay, he wanted to use the title, "Henry Clay, the Great Compromiser." Arthur Schlesinger advised against using the word compromiser, because of the implication today that compromisers have no principles. "You are ready to do whatever is necessary for pragmatic reasons. Compromise in the 19th Century meant something quite different. That you are willing to listen to the other side and try to work out your differences. " Compromising doesn’t mean that you no longer stand for anything. In order to achieve results, we have got to get together. The only way you can do that is through compromise.

Robert Remini, the historian for the US House of Representatives and author of the book, "Henry Clay, Statesman for the Union."

Regards,
Chuck