So, you're a willing and eager participant in capitalism?

fudcap is an unstructured collection of ideas and excerpts which have stuck with the author and they find themselves returning to often.  The content here sits in one of two themes: working on yourself, and working on business.  None of it is self-help content, empirical data, or should by any means be used in isolation as a single source of truth.  Instead consider each a point on a perimeter — a messy perimeter — from which you may be able to triangulate your own methods.

Modus operandi

1. Further to Einstein's misattributed definition of insanity: what got you where you are now won't get you where you want to go next.
2. If you don't change direction you may end up where you are headed.  Excelling at things which no longer matter leads to failure more than poor performance.
3. There is no guaranteed path to success, it comes down to luck and luck is often created for us by others.
4. If you want to succeed increase your Luck Surface Area with the Gaddie Pitch.
5. Build brands for your ideas; make it a thing. It gives them mass, gravity.  Others get drawn in.
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6. Adding more isn't always the best way forward; but it will be harder work to reduce an idea.
7. Pursuing "best imaginable" leads to remarkable.  "Good enough" leads to ordinary.
8. The Cynefin Framework determines how much to care in any context and Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions Theory helps with relevance.
9. The firmer your priorities are the easier it is to say no.
10. You are what you don't automate.
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11. Learn to recognise Pace Layers and how they spin.  Most of what you see around you is not a set system but a series of opportunistic process.
12. Work out where The Cluetrain Manifesto was right and where idealistic.
13. Read Mencken's Notes On Journalism 18 September 1926 or The Basic Laws Of Human Stupidity.
14. You can learn something from everyone and it’s amazing what happens when it doesn’t matter who gets the credit.
15. Liking, agreeing with, or respecting someone are separate things.  If in doubt be respectful.

Alan Cohen, 1993, The Dragon Doesn't Live Here Anymore

No connection to Lao Tzu found.

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Abigail Posner, 22 April 2015, Google Firestarters

“Whatever you work on, give it a name.”

Build brands for your ideas.  Define everything you do as a thing.  More mass, stronger gravity.  Others are drawn in.

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Jason Roberts, 2010, Codus Operandi

"Your Luck Surface Area, is directly proportional to the degree to which you do something you're passionate about combined with the total number of people to whom this is effectively communicated."

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H.L. Mencken, 18 September 1926, The Baltimore Sun

"No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.  Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.  The mistake that is made always runs the other way.  Because the plain people are able to speak and understand, and even, in many cases, to read and write, it is assumed that they have ideas in their heads, and an appetite for more.  This assumption is a folly."

As the passage appeared, syndicated to The Chicago Tribune the following day.

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Stewart Brand, 18 January 2018, Journal of Design and Science

"Fast learns, slow remembers.  Fast proposes, slow disposes.  Fast is discontinuous, slow is continuous.  Fast and small instructs slow and big by accrued innovation and by occasional revolution.  Slow and big controls small and fast by constraint and constancy.  Fast gets all our attention, slow has all the power."

"The job of fashion and art is to be froth—quick, irrelevant, engaging, self-preoccupied, and cruel."

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Clay Parker Jones, 2013, Undercurrent

"This development tool is designed to give strategists clarity into their path forward, help them define and deepen strengths, and give managers a way to guide their directs."

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Laurence J. Peter, 1969, The Peter Principle

Why is incompetence so maddeningly rampant and so vexingly triumphant?

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Dave Snowden, 1999, IBM Global Services

"All too often, managers rely on common leadership approaches that work well in one set of circumstances but fall short in others. Why do these approaches fail even when logic indicates they should prevail? The answer lies in a fundamental assumption of organizational theory and practice: that a certain level of predictability and order exists in the world. This assumption, grounded in the Newtonian science that underlies scientific management, encourages simplifications that are useful in ordered circumstances. Circumstances change, however, and as they become more complex, the simplifications can fail. Good leadership is not a one-size-fits-all proposition."

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Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger; 30 June 1999; The Cluetrain Manifesto

"A powerful global conversation has begun. Through the Internet, people are discovering and inventing new ways to share relevant knowledge with blinding speed. As a direct result, markets are getting smarter—and getting smarter faster than most companies."

Theses 1–6: Markets are Conversations

The open forum of the internet is removing barriers to marketplace entry, democratising information, and massively increasing the number of actors with varying roles and objectives.

Thesis 7: Hyperlinks Subvert Hierarchy

Information is easily remixed and repurposed in contexts not initially intended.  This changes its value.

Theses 8–13: Connection between the new markets and companies

Employees and customers become better informed through connection to each other and between each other; creating a newer, superior source of truth and method of verification.

Theses 14 – 25: Organisations entering the marketplace

Natural human tone is the lingua franca and organisations must find a way to become part of the conversation.

Theses 26–40: Marketing & Organisational Response

A degree of authenticity (read: relevance) is required from organisations to be accepted.

Theses 41–95: New Market Expectations

Provocations on future state.

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John Grant, 2002, After Image

"Business strategy has shifted, from developing new products and services, to developing whole new business models and markets.  This is a natural consequence of the Information Age, which affects the whole economy from the capital markets to individual workers."

Richard Serra, 1973, Television Delivers People

"Commercial television delivers 20 million people a minute./  In commercial broadcasting the viewer pays for the privilege of having himself sold./  It is the consumer who is consumed./  You are the product of t.v. You are delivered to the advertiser who is the customer./ He consumes you./ The viewer is not responsible for programming./  You are the end product."

"If you're not paying for it, you're not the customer; you're the product being sold."

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Russel Davies, 20 March 2009, The Planning Lab

"The real art of planning isn't about brands, it's about organisations. What a good planner really learns is how to get organisations to do stuff. Early on it's the account group organisation; account person, creatives - you learn how to get them to do something. Then it's a few clients, or the whole agency, then the marketing department. Eventually, you learn how to get huge global organisations to do stuff. Not necessarily the right thing, not necessarily what you think they should do, but something. That's really, really hard. That's a good skill. That's what you should pay attention to and study. What does it take to get Organisation A to do something? … What happens when Organisation A has to work with Organisation B? How do you help that happen?"

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Geert Hofstede, 1980, IBM

"Six basic issues that society needs to come to term with in order to organize itself. These are called dimensions of culture. Each of them has been expressed on a scale that runs roughly from 0 to 100. Each dimension has been derived by comparing many, but not all, countries in the world. The findings can be summarized into six world maps of the distribution of that dimension. Of course, in reality there can be quite a bit of within-country variation; these maps should be seen as rough 'climate maps' of culture."

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2019, Marketing Quotient

"Commercial priorities change.  But the need to identify, engage, and keep the right audience is constant ... Respond to a world where modern life fractures thought, digital culture shards identity, and branded messaging reaches saturation by aligning initiatives to shareholder, stakeholder, and audience requirements."

“Your audience want shortcuts.  They're experimenting with quicker, simpler ways to do things in their personal life and business.  So the biggest challenge to growth isn’t external, it’s internal.  Getting any organisation to keep up with the new shortcuts your audience takes is hard.  Fortunately many of these shortcuts are found on digital platforms and in connected communities.  This means they are visible, measurable, and can be monetised.”

"The four components of the marketing mix — product design, pricing, distribution, and communication tactics — become specialised and siloed as operations grow.  As does the link between Marketing and Sales"

"How can marketers support the need to increase brand awareness, accelerate the sales process, and retain install base against this internal complexity; while outside the business trends move faster, buyer expectations shift, and the tenure of decision makers is shorter?"

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2020, Wiredfire

"Forgetting is as much a part of the human condition as remembering.  It’s in our nature to let things slip, especially in a world where distractions multiply by the second.  Even this headline — moments after you’ve read it — is on its way to being replaced by something newer, something louder."

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Roger Martin, 2014, Harvard Business Review

"The problem with smart people is that they are used to seeking and finding the right answer; unfortunately, in strategy there is no single right answer to find. Strategy requires making choices about an uncertain future. It is not possible, no matter how much of the ocean you boil, to discover the one right answer. There isn’t one."

And lessons from the real world:

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Hideo Yoshida, 1951, Dentsu

1. Create work for yourself; don't wait for work to be assigned to you.
2. Take an active role in all your endeavors, not a passive one.
3. Seek out large and complex jobs. Trivial tasks debase you.
4. Welcome difficult assignments. Choose them. Progress lies in accomplishing difficult work.
5. Once you begin a task, complete it. Never give up.
6. Lead your fellow workers. Be an example for them to follow.
7. Set goals for yourself to ensure a constant sense of purpose. This will give you perseverance and hope for the future.
8. Move with confidence. Confidence gives your work force, focus, and substance.
9. Find new solutions. This is the way we ensure satisfactory service.
10. When conflict is necessary don't shy away from it or be afraid. Conflict is the mother of progress and the source of aggressive enterprise. If you fear conflict, you will become timid and servile.

Ken Murray, 30 November 2011, Arizona State University

"Years ago, Charlie, a highly respected orthopedist and a mentor of mine, found a lump in his stomach. He had a surgeon explore the area, and the diagnosis was pancreatic cancer. This surgeon was one of the best in the country. He had even invented a new procedure for this exact cancer that could triple a patient’s five-year-survival odds–from 5 percent to 15 percent–albeit with a poor quality of life. Charlie was uninterested. He went home the next day, closed his practice, and never set foot in a hospital again. He focused on spending time with family and feeling as good as possible. Several months later, he died at home. He got no chemotherapy, radiation, or surgical treatment. Medicare didn’t spend much on him."

Scott Alexander, 17 July 2013, Slate Star Codex

"Am I calling hospitals hellish? Sure am. It has nothing to do with the decor, which has actually gotten much nicer in your newer hospitals until it’s hard to tell them apart from a stylish office building. It’s nothing to do with the staff, either – most doctors and some nurses seem pretty happy and trade banter around the water coolers like everyone else. It’s mostly the screams."

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