I hope it has been a good year for you.
The first issue of the newsletter went out in February 2019. So this is the end of year five.
I’m not a fan of New Year resolutions, but I do try to cultivate some habits. This is one of them:
The most popular entries of 2023 were the following:
Laëtitia Vitaud identifies 5 toxic forces that prevent you from quitting when you should.
Survey of the most frequently-used business buzzwords. Guess which one is #1 (Preply)
from Chip Huyen: “The resume evaluation process is pretty much a black box for most candidates. And it is so because few hiring managers have publicly discussed this. I thought I should start the conversation.”
Five graphs that changed the world (from a 6-minute video of the Royal Society):
Dot maps
the Coxcomb
W.E.B. Du Bois
the Kallikak family tree
Warming stripes (see above)
Jens-Fabian Goetzmann says you should send a weekly email summary to your manager and your team. Very easy to do if you, as I suggest we all do, keep a journal.
When Yale neuroscientist Joy Hirsch used sophisticated imaging tools to track in real time the brain activity of two people engaged in conversation, she discovered an intricate choreography of neural activity in areas of the brain that govern social interactions. When she performed similar experiments with two people talking on Zoom, she observed a much different neurological landscape.
A review of the research on why Jerks might win the battle, but nice guys win the war.
Benedict Evans answers two fundamental questions: “ChatGPT and generative AI will change how we work, but how different is this to all the other waves of automation of the last 200 years? What does it mean for employment?”
Ed Batista reminds us that we don’t get what we deserve. It’s about locus of control.
Thanks for reading! And thank you for your comments and suggestions as well as the conversations that have ensued.
As long as the newsletter serves its original purpose and leads to enlightening conversations, I will continue to publish it… in 2024 and beyond. I’ll see you in January 2024.
My best wishes for a happy and healthy new year!
Richard