Humans In The Loop

Every. Single. One. of the startups that I've worked with have some

co-founder (or early team) dynamic that implicitly shapes their lasting culture.

These practices may be well-known and honored, or they may be hard-coded yet unspoken (like the pie in my story above). Either way, they are a part of the company’s DNA — its nature.

As an Ops Leader,... See more

What I call temporal curiosity is the practice of actively directing our curiosity across time – past, present, future – to gain a deeper understanding of ourselves, others, and the world around us.

Past curiosity. Directing our curiosity towards the past can help us understand our origins and learn from history. By exploring past experiences from... See more

If you shortcut to the destination you won’t undergo real transformation. Imagine you won the lottery tomorrow: you’d achieve your financial goals, but without the life experience to cope with your change in circumstances.

That’s why you see so many musicians and actors struggle after hitting instant fame at a young age. They have all the success,... See more

For now, at least, innovation is a uniquely human ability—one that would be critical to a system that could recursively imagine and create better versions of itself.

What else has been hidden by summary? What thoughts must we resist abridging? Those giant sequoias echo a reminder to ask ourselves, what are the unseen things today that could be growing?

In practice, that meant permission to stop , permission to play ( including to do work that still felt truly fun), and permission to go internal (get back in touch with her internal compass, goals, and sense of self). She was still working, she was just being a whole lot more mindful about where she was directing her energy.