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- January 2015 — Yahoo's Pfizer Problem
- December 2014 — It's Not a Sprint, It's a Hike Up a Mountain!
- November 2014 — The Cardinal and the Sparrow
- October 2014 — Make It So
- September 2014 — Is Congress Running Your Business?
- August 2014 — The Illusion of Control
- July 2014 — Want High Performance? Hire the Village Idiot!
- June 2014 — Bring Me the Head of Shinseki the General
- May 2014 — Fatal Deadlines
- April 2014 — To Succeed, Plan to Fail
- March 2014 — Unity of Crisis
- Suggestions
If you have a particular topic you would like to see addressed in a future newsletter, please email your suggestions to steve@7stepsahead.com.
April 2015 — Controlling the Little Things
One of the more painful experiences I had in jujitsu was when my instructor taught finger holds. We assume that because our legs are generally quite strong, it would be difficult for someone to force us to go somewhere we don't want to go. That assumption lasted as long as it took my instructor to apply a finger hold. All he had to do was take control of the smallest joint of one finger and suddenly my legs would go exactly where he wanted them to go. By manipulating one little thing, he could convince people much larger and stronger than he was to become extremely cooperative. Controlling one small joint gave him control over their entire body, however controlling the body did not produce the same control over the arms and legs: the hands and feet still moved freely, and would regularly engage in what may be politely referred to as "nose seeking behavior."
March 2015 — Princess Bride Problem Solving
Once upon a time there was an organization. It was a fairly good sized business, not too big and not too small. It was a business, in fact, much like your business. And it came up with a way to apply the battle of wits from the Princess Bride to dealing with some long-lasting and thorny problems. For those who may not recall this scene or, hard though it may be to imagine, have never seen the movie, it occurs relatively early in the film. Vizinni the dwarf has kidnapped Princess Buttercup and is fleeing with her to Guilder. In pursuit is the mysterious Man in Black. The Man in Black defeats the master swordsman in a duel, and Fezzik the Giant in a wrestling match. He then confronts Vizinni in a battle of wits: two goblets, one supposedly containing deadly Iocane powder, sit before the two men. Vizinni must deduce which goblet contains the poison and then both men will drink.
What follows is a dizzying, and often hilarious, chain of logic as Vizinni attemps to solve the puzzle.
February 2015 — Slush in the Schedule!
It's snowing as I write this. Of course, these days that means I could be writing this article almost anytime. In the last three weeks, we've had some 7 feet of snow, or maybe 8, in the Boston area. That makes for a lot of snowmen! It also makes for a lot of slush in people's schedules. It's no wonder that the police in one New Hampshire town issued an arrest warrant for Punxsutawney Phil.
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