I love the idea of a meritocracy! It's a glorious myth that makes a wonderful story. But if you look at how resources, wealth, prestige, etc. get distributed, it's very hard to make a case for meritocracy. It's no surprise we believe in meritocracy. We spend our...
decision making
Here are articles on decision making
Your little voice may give you better advice than you know.
Have you ever wondered how certain corrupt businesspeople can keep spouting great, moral words while doing the exact opposite in their behavior? You wonder how they can wax eloquent about the need to give customers high-quality products while they happily substitute...
Who’s surprised by compact car sales? Spotting trends. In advance.
The New York Times reported that sales of smaller compacts and subcompacts are on the rise, now that we're in a gas crunch. Industry analysts (who are young enough that they don't remember the 70s) are calling this "a first." I tried to tell a friend that we've had...
Is there any place for using data and observation in the book?
I'd value your thoughts. I just wrote a fairly rambling post about my frustration at how we ignore data in favor of superstition, and that could lead to stuff like, oh, the collapse of modern society. I think on a personal level, there's room for us to use data in our...
Science has worked so well that superstition now reigns supreme
I grew up in the era of the Apollo moon launches. One of my earliest memories is traveling to Cape Canaveral and watching from the beach as one of the missions was launched towards the moon. It was pretty incredible. Despite frequent moves and attending six schools...
Do you improve your decision quality over time?
In my business blog today, I got a little, er, hot about tax season. In my footnote, I flamed on about the 2004 elections, noting: One thing I’m sure of: none of you stopped to analyze the quality of your 2004 decision-making and explicitly change the criteria you...
Thinking ahead. How far? And how certain?
At a recent physical exam, my weight was a tad above what I want it to be (probably all muscle, but you can never be too sure). So I went web surfing a bit about weight gain trends and found an article proclaiming that obesity is becoming a world-wide problem. It...
How far ahead do you plan?
As I write this, oil prices topped $78. In January of 2005, gas was selling for around $1.75/gallon. Now, it's over $3. For any business that depends on transportation or petroleum, we just doubled that line item. Are you assuming this is a temporary spike, and...
Make Your own Luck – a great guide for decision-making under uncertainty
I just finished Make Your Own Luck by Eileen Shapiro and Howard Stevenson. What a great book! My background is in engineering and science, then business. As an engineer, I really liked that there's a "right answer." Or at least, there are clear wrong answers (the...