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Commitment is the most underrated execution strategy on the planet.  All of that corporate bullshit about managing expectations and setting priorities and taking action and getting the job done and delivering results and making the final leap to achieve your goals, none of that applies to the people who truly commit.  They operate on a different plane. They live in a world where they can’t avoid doing the work…

Lefsetz reminds us that the modern career trajectory is inverted: Once upon a time, artists would labor in obscurity, gain traction slowly, and with a lot of work and a little bit of luck, maybe their work would be universally applauded. But now it’s the reverse. People who barely have their shit together emerge with tons of publicity, the media proclaims their greatness, the public says they’re undeserving of the attention, and after…

Nike’s slogan was first coined in the late eighties at an advertising agency meeting.  Over the next ten years, that historic campaign allowed the shoe company to increase sales from eight hundred million to nine billion.  Not bad for an empty, three word sentence.  But of course, the joke’s on us. Because while the company was printing money urging its customers to just do it, our global conception of…

The struggle of entrepreneurship isn’t the financial uncertainty, but the emotional volatility. The whipping between disappointment and exhilaration.  In the beginning of any given month, for example, I might experience several days or weeks of confidence and inspiration, producing piles of great work in record time, booking new clients like it’s going out of style.  But by day twenty, I might find myself completely unmotivated with nothing to say…

Here’s one of the mantras I use to understand the propagandas of life.  It’s just true enough not to be a lie.  This new sports drink contains nutrients, antioxidants, all natural ingredients, electrolytes, vitamins and minerals, and will help you flush out free radicals, toxins and impurities from your system.  Not really. If you examine the label closely, the drink contains mostly water, sugar, sodium, artificial flavorings and a…

Ideas are free, execution is priceless. That’s been my mantra since day one of starting my business. It’s also the title of a book I wrote a few years back. You can download it for free here. But here’s the problem. I’m an idea junkie. Everything I look at in the world breaks down into a collection of ideas. I have about fifty new ones every day, and sadly, I…

Some people are addicted to being rescued.  Their drug of choice is the euphoric experience of being dragged out of the tempest, thrown into the lifeboat and saved from certain danger.  The irony, of course, is that they never make it to shore. They always end up back in the water. Because deep down, they don’t really want to be saved.  That would mean they’d actually have to change….

Part of being a compassionate, empathetic person is learning to step out of the mindset that everything begins and ends with yourself.  Always assuming that most people are fighting a battle you know nothing about. And remembering that there are a multitude of internal and external forces at work at any given moment, most of which have exactly nothing to do with you.  Selling is the perfect venue for…

Fletcher was the most highly regarded and prolific graphic designer of his generation.  In his bestselling book on visual intelligence, he famously wrote that the first move in any creative process was to introduce constraints.  And most artists would agree. A little structure won’t kill your free spirit. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Without some kind of constraint, there’s nothing to lean against. No boundaries against which to…

I’m nostalgic for a time when my ideas were considered interesting enough to make headlines.  Back when I first started my career, my story went viral before viral was viral. And I barely even had to do anything. On multiple occasions, my book would steal the spotlight and capture the media cycle for a few days at a time, simply by telling the press about some guy who wore…