Salesperson as therapist
Over the last few weeks, I’ve been teaching a workshop about sales. We get together on Zoom for an hour every week to discuss – and practice – a more authentic approach to selling. I made my first sales at five years old at Robin’s Pumpkin Patch. Selling is a part of my work today. […]
How Pixar Thinks About Stories (Hint: It’s Four Frames)
I had a call recently with Bobby Podesta, a 20-year veteran animator at Pixar. The call was supposed to be about Responsive Conference, my annual conference about work. Instead, we spent the entire time talking about storytelling. I’ve been telling stories since I was quite young, but I’ve really only studied storytelling since starting Zander […]
The utility of taste
I was on a call with a client recently and found myself saying that the human desire to listen to Homer recite The Odyssey is timeless. Even when AI voices become as good as today’s best voice actors, listening to the best in the world tell stories is always going to be worthwhile. Or as Pixar animator […]
The AI Apocalypse
My AI avatar logs into Zoom to chat with your AI avatar. Sounds great – fewer meetings! But then what? What happens when AI takes over both our mundane and creative tasks? This question has been haunting me lately. If you’ve been following along with the Snafu newsletter, you know that I had an AI inflection […]
Getting back to basics
Over the last few months, I’ve fallen out of my routines. Since my former roommate had a mental health crisis in January, I’ve been living in a short-term rental. During my recent real estate sprint (which you can read about here, here, and here), I set aside all but my most important to-dos. Last week […]
Sales is service
Last week, I taught the first workshop in a series about selling – because knowing how to influence and persuade are essential skills for navigating chaotic times. I brought together a handful of friends and taught one of the most overlooked elements of selling: being of service. When we think “sales”, we think of a […]
Join us in September!
Ten years ago, the Responsive.org Manifesto laid out that “The rate of change continues to accelerate” and “The future is increasingly hard to predict.” Today, those principles are more relevant than ever. Our lives are rife with uncertainty – from the acceleration of AI to generalized anxiety about the state of the world. This rapid […]
How to train for chaos
Michael Phelp’s coach, Bob Bowman, understood that the greatest athletes don’t just train for performance – they train for chaos. Once he recognized that Phelps had the potential to be an elite level swimmer, Bowman started building unpredictability into Phelps’ training. When traveling for competitions, Bowman would misplace Phelps’ luggage or swimsuit. During practice, Bowman […]
How to climb a mountain
I spent a lot of my childhood scrambling up and down mountains. When I discovered this metaphor at 13 years old it resonated for me – and still does today. The idea is that you need to get to the top of a mountain, and there are two different ways to do so. Two different […]
Tilting at windmills
In Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote believed the windmills were monstrous enemies threatening the land. He charged the windmills and was, of course, knocked off his horse by a windmill’s sail. This is where the phrase “tilting at windmills“ comes from. It means going to battle despite the certain reality that you […]
Surviving in an AI age
My girlfriend and I are in the process of buying a house just north of San Francisco. Over the last six weeks, I’ve spent 500 hours immersing myself in real estate. I’ve scoured the property, met with County officials, received bids from seven different contractors and conducted inspections with engineers, architects, roofers, plumbers, electricians, and […]
The gift of fear
For many years now, I’ve repeated a phrase to myself: “Fear is my north star.” Fear is often misunderstood as a negative emotion – as something to be avoided. Instead, it is a useful guide for action. Some of the most significant moments in my life came as a result of moving towards fear. I’m […]
AI inflection point
Last week, I hit an inflection point – a shift in perspective that altered how I see AI, and will shape everything I do going forward. My history with tech waves I came of age amidst the rise of the internet and social media. In middle school I was on AIM chat rooms. (Don’t tell […]
Rabbit holes, and why they matter
Three weeks ago, my girlfriend and I were looking at rentals just south of San Francisco. Over the course of a long afternoon, we looked at seven different properties. The next evening, she messaged me a new Zillow listing – this time for a property for sale. I walked over and wrote her a note: […]
What to do with overwhelm
Over the last four months, I’ve dealt with a death in the family, a friend’s mental health crisis, moving, an angry client, a new relationship, the news, and still trying to run my business. To state the obvious, it’s been a lot. That depth of personal (and existential) overwhelm has me thinking about the tools […]
The identities we hold
I was at dinner with my parents and my girlfriend last weekend. For some reason, Robin’s Cafe came up in conversation. Anyway, I got on my soap box and said: “I opened Robin’s Cafe on 3 weeks notice and…” Before I could finish the sentence, my father said “And you sold it on Craigslist. We […]
How to design for change
In 2015, the authors of Responsive Org wrote that “the future is becoming increasingly difficult to predict.” Today, with global instability, political partisanship, and an ever more rapid rate of change, those words seem prescient. The tension between organizations optimized for predictability and the unpredictable world we inhabit has reached a breaking point. Only organizations […]
The lie of mise-en-place
I love the phrase “mise-en-place,” which is common to professional kitchens and translates to “everything in its place”. The phrase appeals to my inner neat freak. In restaurants, chefs arrive hours prior to service starting to prepare for the evening ahead. These are the unseen and unsung aspects that make a restaurant successful. We had […]
How I’m surviving the next four years
SNAFU is an acronym for Situation Normal: All Fucked Up. The phrase was born out of the chaos of World War II, but it is just as relevant today. Snafu has become my shorthand for a world that’s always been broken, but is now undeniably so. Things that once seemed stable – governments, economies, industries […]
How to train a puppy
A friend of mine just got an 8-week puppy! I’ve raised two dogs from puppyhood, and helped a dozen other people do the same. Here’s what I’ve learned… Expect interrupted sleep Interrupted sleep comes with the territory. I often suggest raising a puppy to people who are considering having a child. It’s good practice. As […]
How to buy a (used) car
I have two friends looking to buy used cars right now, and over the last fifteen years I purchased six used cars and re-sold five of them. While I’m a novice compared to real car salesmen, I have more experience than the average layman, and thought it would be useful to write down what I’ve […]
The opposite of distress
I love when the English language has a word for something that I’m trying to describe that isn’t in the popular vernacular. Today’s word is “eustress,” which means beneficial stress. This kind of experience that is difficult but ultimately does you good. Eustress is the opposite of distress, which is harmful. It motivates and enhances […]
The day Devin died in my arms
When I was in college, my friend Devin died in my arms. He didn’t actually die. But it certainly felt that way. We were taking a nine day, 100 hour Wilderness Emergency Responder course in Portland, Oregon, and each of us took turns attempting rescues. Devin was the victim. He was lodged in between two trees on […]
A lifelong obsession with movement
In 2003, I broke my neck on a trampoline. That sounds extreme, but it is actually fairly common. Walk into any gymnastics gym in the world and someone will have had a similar injury. But that injury, and my journey since, have shaped my lifelong obsession with movement. Shortly after the injury, I graduated from […]
The portals of learning
I recently sat down with an entrepreneur who is nine months into building his business. He described the trials and tribulations of figuring out his business structure, landing his first few clients, and collecting invoices. I don’t denigrate those challenges. Starting a business is hard! But having built four successful businesses over the last fifteen […]
Nobody is coming to save you
There’s a social media account I like called Nature is Metal. Their content is not for the faint of heart. Regularly, I’ll open Instagram to see a beautiful bald eagle tearing out the guts of a snake, or a baby hippopotamus getting torn apart by a lion. Nature is Metal documents the stunning absurdity and fragility […]
Why Snafu?
I stumbled into the phrase SNAFU by accident. Last winter, my father and a close friend both asked me, quite out of the blue, if I knew what SNFU means. I’d thought “snafu” was an English word that means a small mistake. SNAFU is an acronym that originated during World War II, coined by soldiers […]
Is this safe to try?
I’m frequently doing ridiculous self-experiments like eating just three ingredients for six months, sitting in freezing cold water, or selling a cafe on Craigslist. When I first read the Respnsive.org manifesto and started talking about the “future of work,” someone offered me the question: “Is this experiment safe to try?” That phrase has become a guiding principle for my […]
How much evidence do you need to know that something is true?
When I first walked into a gymnastics gym, I had zero experience with gymnastics or acrobatics of any kind. Nor did anyone else I knew! I’d never seen gymnastics in the Olympics or otherwise. But the moment I walked into that gymnastics warehouse and saw someone doing giants on the high bar, my life changed. I’ve spent […]
How to run a self-experiment
I first heard the term “self-experimentation” as an undergraduate in behavioral psychology My professor gave a few examples of his own. He went a month with no sugar, which made carrots taste unbearably sweet. He tried sleeping with his head lower than his feet, which felt miserable and his wife refused to continue. And more. […]