In the last issue of MindPrep I mentioned our plans to create a course focused on Pragmatic Business Thinking and I drafted a course description. Mary, my friend and advisor, reminded me that I just might want to define the term before I described the course. Of course, I was assuming that all of you…
First, a quick quiz. What do they have in common? Well, obviously, they are no longer needed. But ponder this – these businesses were managed by experienced, educated, well paid, and (supposedly) smart people. What went wrong? Why did they disappear? I suggest that poor quality thinking is at the heart of the decisions they…
There is this cool, but complicated, thinking machine that sits between your two ears. You might think it looks like a grey blob, but I imagine it as a rather interesting machine that produces a custom version of “my truth.” Maybe it looks like this: Rin Duong You’ll note that the inputs to the machine…
Here are some components of thinking and some notes I made about myself and the world at large. Components 1. Perception: The process of taking in sensory information and making sense of it. I sense the weather every day but am not sure about climate change. To misquote Sherlock Holmes, we see but we do not…
The future is going to be increasingly complex, contentious, and “wicked.” (Note: Wicked environments exist where the rules of the game are often unclear, feedback is spotty at best, and patterns are lacking or not obvious. It’s a condition of a system, not a commentary on morals.) We need great thinkers to deal with the…
One of my favorite books is How Doctors Think, Jerome Groopman, M.D., 2007. Dr. Groopman is a good writer and an engaging storyteller. More than that, he pulls advice from the stories so that we can become thoughtful patients and apply his observations to our world. The story One of the chapters is the story of…
This continues the questions and comments that came from MindPrep 196 – You Tell Me. Ken wanted more re: “thinking blocks” and four versions of the future. Here are the thinking blocks. I’ll send the “four futures” in a few days. Thinking Blocks: we all have them! Marcel Straub on Unsplash “This book is concerned…
When the pandemic started “in earnest” in 2020 I responded to a blogpost from my friend Erica Nelson and wrote a month-long series of posts about books on my shelf and ideas I gained from them. You see, I like “real” books and I often write notes in the margin. I was keeping busy (all…
Inflation is out of control! Who should we blame? When something goes wrong, we want to find someone to blame. It seems to be human nature and it’s turned into an art form for our Congress. It’s easier than figuring out why something went wrong. And sometimes the answer is so complicated that we find…
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