When you do hard work, you'd like for people to notice it. Some people believe in the philosophy espoused in one biblical passage (the beginning of Matthew, chapter 6), which suggests that if you do good deeds without loudly drawing attention to them, you'll eventually be rewarded. It can be frustrating, however, to keep doing… Continue reading Appreciation
Category: Marketer
Launches
You've been working on it for weeks, maybe months. Planning, coordinating, communicating, cajoling, cat-herding... whatever it takes. And finally, the day comes when you are ready to launch. Maybe it's a big project that's consumed multiple months for you and your coworkers. Or an event, like a music festival or birthday party or tradeshow booth,… Continue reading Launches
Discovering competence
Most of us have been in situations where we arrive on a scene, especially when joining a new group, and learn that something is going terribly wrong. The Boy Scout group planning an activity is disorganized. The band uniforms to distribute are all in a giant unsorted pile. The last guy wasn’t enforcing the rules… Continue reading Discovering competence
Puzzles
When your brain is fully engaged in a challenging puzzle, the rest of the world can fade away. It could be a pencil and paper puzzle, like a cryptic crossword clue or “who owns the zebra” logic puzzle. It could be the situational puzzles that come up in complex board games, like how am I… Continue reading Puzzles
New room
The first grader looked up at his father. “Good luck in your New Room today, Daddy,” he said. The child knew what it was like to go into a New Room, having done so both for kindergarten and for first grade. It meant new friends to make. New authority figures to respect. New toys to… Continue reading New room