Herbert Lui

Blog on creativity, marketing, and the human condition.

  • About
  • Creative Doing
  • Newsletter
  • Strong defense sets up strong offense

    A few days ago, I observed how my work either felt like playing defense or offense in a sport. I wrote, “Saving money, living gently and slowly, and minimizing risk feels like playing defense… Getting in motion, creativity, and shipping work feels like playing offense.” I am in the thick of a season where I…

    Herbert Lui

    November 26, 2025
    Expectations, Turning Stories
  • If you’re exploring your career, keep more options open

    There will be seasons where you need to keep options open, and others when you need to commit. My friend Jason wrote a provocative article about the latter.  When we recently caught up, I mentioned his article and I told him how I felt like I’d been juggling a lot of projects. I wondered out…

    Herbert Lui

    November 25, 2025
    Creator Confidential, Expectations, Turning Stories
  • Share your reminders to yourself

    If a lesson was important enough for you to remind yourself about, there’s a good chance it will be useful for other people too.  A lesson is particularly helpful when you share the story that led you to learn the lesson. People remember stories. What’s obvious to you isn’t obvious to everyone else. Publish your…

    Herbert Lui

    November 24, 2025
    Creativity, Creator Confidential, Turning Stories
  • Maybe it’s not you

    A good friend of mine has worked tenures at several great tech companies. Their professional success was never surprising to me; I’d known them for years, and I knew any team would be lucky to have them. Still, when tech companies started laying people off—by the tens of thousands—they got caught in two of them,…

    Herbert Lui

    November 23, 2025
    Expectations, Turning Stories
  • If you’re unsure what to do, take any action

    Here’s a useful reminder from Brian Armstrong, who leads Coinbase: One of my favorite lessons I’ve learnt from working with smart people: Action produces information. If you’re unsure of what to do, just do anything, even if it’s the wrong thing. This will give you information about what you should actually be doing. Sounds simple…

    Herbert Lui

    November 22, 2025
    Creativity, Creator Confidential, Expectations
  • The first step to get out of a hole is to stop digging

    In the physical world, it’s very clear when you’re digging yourself into a hole. Kids do that when they’re playing.  In the financial or emotional world, it’s less clear, and you can live in denial for a long time. There are signs, though. You will notice you’re borrowing from tomorrow to pay for today and…

    Herbert Lui

    November 21, 2025
    Expectations, Life, Turning Stories
  • Defense to offense

    When I was a child, my parents enrolled me in a rec floor hockey league. I played defense for a couple of years, until a snow day happened and the team needed me to play offense. I shifted my focus away from clearing the ball away from my own net, and instead on putting pressure…

    Herbert Lui

    November 20, 2025
    Creator Confidential, Expectations
  • Are you being rude to yourself?

    For some of us, the people who taught us when we were young might have been tough. They believed that by being rude to us, they were also helping us build character and succeed. Whether their approach was effective or not, their voice stays with us. We learn to be rude to ourselves in the…

    Herbert Lui

    November 19, 2025
    Creativity, Expectations
  • How to compete with geniuses

    You don’t compete with geniuses by trying to outsmart them. That won’t work. You compete with them by coming together with your team (which could be official teammates like co-workers, or unofficial teammates like friends and acquaintances).  You share ideas and synthesize new ones together. You learn to rely on one another. You apologize when…

    Herbert Lui

    November 18, 2025
    Around the World, Creativity, Turning Stories
  • Five tactics to scan for career opportunities

    If you ever find yourself exploring the job market, you can treat these five posts as a mini-guide to help scan for opportunities. I wrote these with my tech marketing career experiences in mind. I think the insights are widely applicable: How to reach out to your network for opportunities: These approaches are useful particularly…

    Herbert Lui

    November 17, 2025
    Creator Confidential
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