In his book Your Brain at Work, David Rock introduces the SCARF model, a useful paradigm for understanding what motivates all of us, at work and beyond: Status: how important are you to others? Certainty: how well can you predict what’s going to happen to you? Autonomy: how much control do [...]
From the frat initiation in Animal House to the bachelorette party in Crazy Rich Asians, humans love to use rituals to highlight the seasons of life. It’s no accident that “ceremonies” have found their way into the mainstream of software development in the form of daily standup meetings and [...]
In ThinkerToys, Michael Michalko has a category of creative thinking activities he calls “rechoreographing”. The essence of this work is to apply the attributes of the problem you’re trying to solve to a preexisting framework. A SWOT (Strengths/Weaknesses/Opportunities/Threat) analysis is one [...]
“Please see me.” If you’ve ever seen those words written on a term paper, or had them texted to you from your boss, then you know the sensation of dread that goes with them. There are other kinds of dread, too, that come with the words “we need to talk,” or “I’m very disappointed in [...]
You can’t do a lot to change the way your hardwired biases operate. But there are ways to skillfully deploy your biases to minimize their negative impact. Buster Benson, of the Better Humans website, points out that one particular bias can be a handy ally. “Confirmation bias” describes your [...]
“If you want to understand someone, walk a mile in their shoes.” I was in a certification course recently where one of the primary characteristics of the group was the varied and interesting shoes the participants wore. Phyllis wore a different (and fabulous) pair of shoes for every one of our [...]
The war room in Doctor Strangelove, Mission Control in Apollo 13—places where people gather to debate and make decisions can get pretty intense. That’s why it’s especially important to find ways to bring curious and open present-moment awareness to the conversations that happen in physical and[...]
The flexibility that leads to creativity is a habit that you can develop on many levels. There are micro-flexibility practices like getting up on the other side of the bed, writing a note with your non-dominant hand, or driving to the grocery store by a different route. There are structured [...]
Self-awareness is not just a solo activity: you need input from others around you. Of course, your thought-stream is most likely telling you: “You don’t need any information from anybody else! You can totally handle this on your own!” That’s why we love the thought-stream: it’s always very[...]
The cognitive biases we carry with as part of our mental equipment are certainly inconvenient. It calls into question one of the aspects of our experience we are generally most proud of: the quality of our thinking. It’s not surprising that your thought-stream really thinks highly of…your [...]