Design is the first of the six Concept Age senses that we’re going to explore. Dan Pink quotes John Heskett when describing design as “a combination of utility and significance”. Utility is something that is prevalent in the market today. Unless you’re on the bleeding edge, most products do what they say they’re supposed to… Read More
Here’s what Adam had to say about working with me today (HE wrote this!): Hi, I am Adam. I am in 6th grade, and go to Springfield Middle School. Today was take your child to work day, so I stayed home with my mom since she works at home. I had a fun experience at… Read More
My son came up to me last night and said “Mom, tomorrow is take your child to work day”. Before he could finish I started laughing “so you want to stay home. Nice try!” Then I thought about it. Why was my first assumption that he wanted to watch TV and play video games all… Read More
In my last entry I said that we’d be talking about the skills needed to be successful in the Concept Age. Actually, in A Whole New Mind, Dan Pink refers to senses. This is an important distinction. Normally, we can all see, hear, smell, touch, and taste. Some of us have more heightened sensitivities… Read More
Dan Pink’s new book, A Whole New Mind, introduces so many important ideas that I’ll be doing a series of blog entries on it. Consider the next several posts your cliff notes! Dan’s premise (and the subtitle of the book) is that we are moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age. The Information… Read More
I’ve been struck recently by how easily you can join just about any conversation. In the last several months I’ve been connecting with people I barely know, commenting on blogs, and writing this one. I am interacting with people all over the country and I’m more in tune with colleagues now than when I went… Read More
Purple Cow has really gotten me thinking about compromise in product development. As Seth Godin writes, “Compromise is about sanding down the rough edges to gain buy-in from other constituencies. Vanilla is a compromise ice cream flavor…But vanilla is boring. You can’t build a fast-growing company around vanilla.” Well, the problem is that you can’t… Read More
In my last post I advocated forgetting irrelevant rules and making your own decisions. That might sound a little ridiculous to some, but consider this: Only you are responsible for your actions. Sure, doing what you’re told might give you a great excuse, but does it absolve you from your responsibility to use your brain? … Read More