-
Advice for considering advice
Advice is a genre that should probably be treated more like fiction than non-fiction. Because so much content that’s packaged as advice is more like entertainment or remixed clichés—with little lived experiences, or introspective reflections, to support it—it’s best to read most advice with the seriousness you would a fictional story or a horoscope. Take…
-
Good editing is cutting
If your personality is inclined to optimism, one of the most difficult aspects of the editorial skillset is learning to say no. There’s certainly an opportunity to liken this to the classic business strategy phrase, “The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do. Without trade-offs, there would be no need for choice and…
-
Uphill thinking
My team recently posted this piece by John Maeda to Shortcut. When Carly sent the team an initial draft she and John had worked on, I was mind blown—it was the best thing I’d read all week. Here’s an excerpt: Humans are innately driven to take the adventurous, longer route. Our distinct traits of creativity,…
-
Creativity, just because
People went from running as transportation to running for all sorts of other reasons. There’s physical and mental health, personal development, and community, amongst so many other reasons. In other words, we don’t need to run to get someplace; we found new ways to need running. It’s worth considering this when you think about artificial…
-
A trustworthy expert’s tone
It’s in an expert’s interest to make the case that they can add value to you and your work. That usually means that you need to believe you’re not doing something right. The next time you experience doubt after hearing an expert’s claims, just remember that they’re incentivized to make you feel that way. It…
-
Points for pointedness
Matt Galligan said to me, nearly a decade ago, “When you ask pointed questions, you can get real answers. It is so much easier for me to knock out an email with a thoughtful response when a question is asked.” Make the question direct, to the point, and easy for the other person to respond…
-
The negative press brand litmus test
A couple of days ago, I wrote about how imagining a brand’s hotel lobby could make for a good litmus test. It reminded me of another heuristic a marketing executive once told me about; they measured the health of a brand by how much negative press it gets. When Jay-Z bragged about owning the Nets…
-
Expectations vs. support
Expectation: The prospect of the future; grounds upon which something excellent is expected to happen; prospect of anything good to come, esp. of property or rank. (Webster’s 1913) Support: That which upholds, sustains, or keeps from falling, as a prop, a pillar, or a foundation of any kind. (Webster’s 1913) While these two concepts don’t…
-
The hotel lobby brand litmus test
If there’s anything that makes branding more tangible and easier to understand, I’m all ears. I came across this passage recently that fascinated me, from The elegance of nothing by Seth Godin (via Ben Gilbert and Liberty’s Highlights): If Nike announced that they were opening a hotel, you’d have a pretty good guess about what…
-
Saving money, getting rich
This is not a finance blog, though money is as embedded into the human condition now as a means of survival and comfort. What’s truly absurd is the amount of marketing and entertainment designed to encourage each of us to spend more. It’s important to amplify the signal of how some of these artists actually…