Reader, Think about a big project that is going to get you from “here” to “there.” Let’s assume you have the money and the talent to make it happen. Now think about your most precious and non-renewable resource -- time. A Metaphor: The River of Time We often think and write about “the” past, or “the” future as a thing. But time is not static; it flows minute-by-minute, day-by-day, and week-by-week. Time is a river. Today is yesterday’s tomorrow and the past is always influencing today. The...
6 days ago • 4 min read
Reader Wicked problems are not simply very difficult problems. They are situations in which stakeholders disagree about what is wrong, causes and effects are entangled, actions change the situation, and no final or universally accepted solution exists. Wicked! We cannot fix healthcare, but we can improve it. We cannot eliminate homelessness, but we can help homeless people. We cannot eliminate hatred, but we can get some people to talk with one another. Our task is therefore not to solve the...
13 days ago • 1 min read
Reader, I’ve been in the “the world of work” for long time and I recently spent a few minutes pondering the metaphorical road I’ve traveled. Let’s take a tour and you can tell me what I’ve forgotten. I once worked for a printing company. I remember when typesetting, film preparation, past-up, and traditional print production were good paying middle class jobs. I remember when Business Process Engineering was going to help us redesign our operations. Unfortunately, the “reengineering” work...
20 days ago • 1 min read
Reader, I’ve been writing about wicked worlds and wicked problems for a couple of years (although the concepts are much older than my writing). I’ve also been facilitating strategic thinking workshops for over 20 years and one of the topics I include is a discussion of unintended consequences. And, in case you haven’t noticed, Iran and Strait of Hormuz have been the news lately. So I went to my hard-working intern, Chat GPT, and asked it to comment on the wickedness of the situation. Here is...
27 days ago • 2 min read
Reader, QUESTION: What do these two pictures have in common? ANSWER: Contagion Both the Spanish Flu of 1918 and social media of 2026 are examples of contagion. Let me explain. 1918 Influenza The Spanish flu spread through physical proximity. Gatherings accelerated transmission of the virus that moved invisibly before symptoms were obvious. 2026 Social Media Platforms like Facebook, Instagram and TikTok create algorithmic amplification loops. And, therefore, anxiety, comparisons, and self-harm...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
Reader, Adrian Slywotzky wrote Value Migration over 30 years ago. It was one of my favorite books then and I was recently wondering if his idea was time-bound or timeless. Quick Summary Value migration is a strategic concept developed to explain a recurring but often misunderstood reality of competitive markets: profits do not remain fixed within a company, product, or even an industry. Over time, value migrates away from business models that no longer align with customer priorities and...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
Reader, I’ve been writing about wicked worlds and wicked problems for a year or so, but I don’t want you to think that these are new. Here’s a story that’s over 30 years old. IBM was in deep trouble in 1993. Its mainframe-centered business model was weakening. Personal computing was reshaping the industry. The company was losing billions of dollars. Its major divisions operated with competing priorities, and many experts believed IBM should be broken into smaller businesses. At first glance,...
about 2 months ago • 2 min read
Reader, Here are a few reflections about some past business failures. What happens when ....... Weak signals are dismissed? You get Nokia. Smartphone interfaces, software ecosystems, developer platforms and changing customer expectations were visible before Nokia’s handset collapse. An old mental model is retained? You get Kodak. They understood digital photography but continued to interpret the market through the economics of film, processing, and printing. Problems are defined too narrowly?...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
Reader, I’m in the midst of reading The Future of Truth: How AI Reshapes Reality by Steven Rosenbaum. It’s interesting, well written, and a bit scary. I’ll send my notes in a future MindPrep Reflection. Anyway, it got me thinking about thinking and some observations I’ve made over the years. Here are ten thoughts. The list is incomplete and I’m sure you have more. Send them along and I may include them in a future article. You’re a sucker if you need to always be right. You will ignore or...
2 months ago • 1 min read
Reader My first “career move” was time in the Marine Corps. And so, sixty years later, I’m still interested in military history. One of my favorite books is Miliary Misfortunes: The Anatomy of Failure in War (Cohen and Gooch, 1990). The book was centered on failure modes and how they can interact. The point of the book is that there are three failure modes and when they interact they can result in catastrophe. They are: Failure to learn Failure to anticipate Failure to adapt The authors...
2 months ago • 2 min read