Ideas are free, execution is priceless.

Here’s the text of an actual email that showed up in my inbox once. Scott, our chamber of commerce recently ordered new name tags with the new logo for all the directors and staff. Some of the directors are very pleased with their nametags, while others are not so impressed. We have written an article for our newsletter on the benefits of wearing of nametags, as per the article…

People are not machines. Trying to measure humanity fragments our understanding of it. We need to start accepting ourselves as an inherent part of nature, just like the trees and the animals themselves. Bateson, the illustrious anthropologist and social scientist, made the observation that the difference between the way human beings think and the way nature works is, nature doesn’t measure. Nature deals only with the pattern which connects,…

Culture is everyone’s job. It’s made up of everyone and every interaction in the company. If it’s happening at the organization, it’s a part of our culture. Whether we like it or not. There is no such thing as nonexistent culture. It’s either intentional or not. Years ago, one of my junior coworkers was bemoaning the fact that our company culture had become unfriendly and overly professional. Pretty standard…

We can’t become mediocre friends with too many people. Because as we grow older, our days go faster than we think, and the fewer opportunities we have to be with those people. The upside is, the knots grow tighter on the ropes that bind us. When we’re apart, we think to ourselves, wow, isn’t it wonderful that we actually want to be friends with our friends? What blessing. The…

Desire doesn’t have to be specific or passionate to be real. It’s okay to want something from a place or simplicity and generality. Just because we don’t check the boxes of white hot longing and obsession doesn’t mean our feelings aren’t legitimate and shouldn’t be honored. The challenge is, we buy into these culturally sanctioned stories about what our desires should look like. Unwritten rules about what’s okay to…