Personal Development

  • Humans Need Not Apply

    While we all know that pop culture representations of AI aren't accurate – I'm still surprised how often I see people who are against Artificial Intelligence. It seems that many people are focus on science fiction's dystopian depictions of sentience and omniscience, while the reality is exciting (and much less scary). 

    In my office, we use a lot of what seems like "futuristic" artificial intelligence approaches to understanding financial markets and enhancing decision-making. Most of my team are technical or data-science specialists that develop and drive the systems that create our systems. Despite the exponential growth of AI and its supporting technologies, I still believe the heart of AI is human.

     The Heartbeat of AI is Still Human_GapingVoid

     

    Of course, I'm not sure how long that will be true.  But I'd bet it remains true for the next 25 years.

    The video below was shot in 2014 and gives a great perspective on how quickly automation, robots, and eventually autonomous robots, are becoming pervasive. 

     

    via CGPGrey

    Automation used to mean big, bulky machines doing manual and repetitive work. Today, however, automation can land an aircraft, diagnose cancer, and trade. I'm fascinated by what is becoming possible … and how, even when the A.I. is little more than an elegant use of brute force, incredible results are becoming commonplace.

    In many cases, the results coming from machines coding other machines are matching or exceeding the work done by humans. 

    And it's only getting better. 

    In the past, innovation created new industries or allowed increased scale … nonetheless, people are worried that the number of jobs the internet and Artificial Intelligence create isn't matching the number of jobs they're making obsolete. 

    According to this study, approximately 50% of jobs will be automated by 2034.

    Personally, I believe that freeing us to elevate our perspective and do more has always been a boon to society. Electricity put a lot of people out of work as well. Nonetheless, look what it made possible.

    To date, human progress has been based on the division of labor. As our society progressed, our jobs have become increasingly specialized. Now, machines will be able to break down complex jobs into simple parts and complete them faster than we can. 

    So, yes, the same technology that's currently creating opportunities could eventually put you out of a job … but it also creates an opportunity for something new.

    There's a lot of change coming, and that can be scary, but there's reason to be excited as well.

    We live in a golden era of innovation, and we have longer life expectancies than ever before. Humans are immensely adaptable, and I'm sure we'll continue to grow to meet the challenges and opportunities we face. 

    The reality is, we've been working symbiotically with "machines" since the very beginning.  Our definition of a "machine" simply continues to improve. It's fractal, and each time the technology we're adopting gets bigger, so does the eventual positive effect on day-to-day life. 

    AI adoption is a big step, but the positive effect it can have on our lives is astronomical. 

    Onwards!

  • Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading – June 27th, 2021

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    Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

    Lighter Links:

     

    Trading Links:

  • A New Experience For Me

    We had Nick Nanton and his crew in our office, recently, to film for a documentary on 'Getting to Next' – How AI is transforming the world and humanizing technology. 

     

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    Nick has been involved with many cool projects from a documentary on Peter Diamandis to Operation Underground Railroad (and more). He's also won more than 20 Emmys. 

    Nick is also working on a documentary with Chris Voss – who wrote Never Split the Difference. I spent time in D.C. watching Nick shoot with Chris and his son Brandon Voss, who is the president of Black Swan Group. 

    While I've done podcasts and interviews before, this was a surprisingly fun and cool experience for me.

    It was also interesting to watch some of our more introverted data scientists in front of the camera. 

    The documentary just started shooting – but I look forward to showing you the finished product when it's ready. 

  • I’m Going to Be a Grandpa

    Happy Father's Day!

    Both of my children are adults now. It's strange to consider them fully-functioning autonomous adults – because I remember their childhood like it was yesterday (like worrying whether the soft spot on their heads would ever fill in and harden up, or if they'd ever stop sleeping with a nightlight). 

    Today, they're men doing great things … and I get to watch and be proud of them.  I also get to be proud of my role in their growth and proud of passing down the wisdom of my dad, and his father, and the rest who came before me.

    I also get to be excited because my oldest is about to have a child. Meaning the chain of education continues, and the wisdom of each generation builds upon and becomes greater than the last. 

    6a00e5502e47b288330263e951d107200b-600wiThree Generations of Getsons

    As I come to grips with becoming a grandpa, I think about my children's grandpa – my father.

    It has been over 20 years since my father died … Crazy how time flies! He was my best friend and an amazing mentor. His vision for what I could become helped shape and inform my goals, my accomplishments, and yes, me.

    For example, after winning the State Championship in the shot put, my dad came down from the stands onto the field.  He hugged me and told me that he knew I could do it. Then, he looked deeply into my eyes and asked whether I was a little disappointed?  "Disappointed?" I asked. "But, Dad, I won."  He looked at me and said, "Winning is great … but you didn't throw a personal best."   He was proud, and he loved me.   He recognized that winning was important … but he wanted to remind me that the other throwers weren't my real competition.  

    In life, to be and do your best, the competition is really with yourself; and we both knew I could do better.

    My Dad believed in setting high standards.  He taught me that most people's lives are defined by their minimum standards.  Why?  Because once those standards get met, it is easy to get distracted or complacent.

    One of his favorite sayings was, "The difference between good and great is infinitesimal."  This applies to many things. For example, people who are good take advantage of opportunities; people who are great create them. 

    As time goes on, I recognize how much of my Dad is in me. And, likewise, how much his father was a part of him … and how parts of all of us have somehow become a part of my children. 

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    Many of the lessons he taught me became the lessons I taught my children – and my company. It's easy to focus on the big stories and the big lessons – but as I look back and consider what had the biggest impact, it was what happened in between … It was his incredibly consistent and unconditional love and his focus on what was possible.

    The standards I hold people to are high, and it can be tough for them to meet those standards.  Hopefully, they understand that it's because I love them (as my dad loved me) and that I see the greatness in them and available to them.

    I like to think each generation becomes better (as people and parents) due to the cumulative experience of the generations that came before them. 

    We stand on the shoulders of giants. 

    I look forward to seeing how my grandchildren turn out, and how little pieces of me and their great-grandfather show up. 

    Hope you had a great Father's Day weekend.

  • The Right People To Raise Your Thinking

    There's a popular quote by Jim Rohn that states that you are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.

    I think there's a lot of truth to that statement, but I also think it's true of larger groups. 

    The people and groups you spend time with influence who you are in the moment and over time. We all act differently within different groups of people, and that's part of why surrounding yourself with the right people is so important.

    You can see this when you visit your childhood home after many years, or spend time with your parents, or visit your old college. It is easy to revert to who you were when you were most influenced by that person or environment. 

    A few weeks ago, I spent a couple of hours speaking to Dan Sullivan and Steven Krein to record two podcasts.  The first was about building your own future and the second discusses surrounding yourself with the right people.  Here is a link to listen to the second podcast, "The Right People to Raise Your Thinking."

     

     

    For decades I have believed that you can predict a lot about your future based on who you choose to spend your present with.

    That is why I think participation in quality peer groups is critical. Peer groups help us set higher standards for our behavior, aim higher in our aspirations, and they help us stay better focused and committed to big-picture goals.

    I belong to several executive and business leader peer groups — groups that double as advisory boards, counselor’s offices, and idea factories. They allow me to see, hear, and discuss things I don't normally think about, talk about, or even notice.  Peer groups bring blind spots to my attention and keep me fully connected to trends that are transforming the world on a global scale.

    I love going to Strategic Coach because it has a unique approach to challenging people about how they think.  After years in the program, the frameworks have unconsciously become a part of how I work and live day-to-day. 

    If I could challenge you to do one thing based on the lessons in this podcast, I'd encourage you to lay out the framework for where you will be in 25 years. Who do you want to be? How do you want to live? What are you committed to building?  Who are you going to be spending more or less time with?

    The next part is easy. With those things in mind, start taking steps in the right direction today. 

    Onwards!

  • Getting To Next: How Thoughts Become Things

    Two weeks ago, I introduced Innovation Activity Centers which are the building blocks for my technology adoption model.InnovationActivityCenters2

    Today, I have a video and a worksheet for you that goes into the overarching Technology Adoption Model Framework. It explains how thoughts become things and how ideas scale with respect to capability, audience, and monetization.

    The four base stages of this framework are: Capability –> Prototype –> Product –> Platform. 

    It's a great use of 20 minutes. Check it out.

     

     

    While the Technology Adoption Model Framework stages are important, the ultimate takeaway is that you don't have to predict what's coming, only how human nature works in response to the capabilities in front of them.

    It's a bit cliche, but to paraphrase Wayne Gretzky, you just have to skate to where you think the puck is going to be. 

    Desire fuels commerce.  As money fuels progress, desire grows … and so does the money funding that path. As such, the path forward is relatively easy to imagine.

    This isn't about predicting specific technologies, but rather about the capabilities people will want.  I think of it as anticipating the natural path.  It is easier to ride the wave than it is to fight nature.

    Each stage is really about the opportunity to scale desire and adoption.

    It isn't really about building the technology, rather it is about supporting the desire.

    If you understand what is coming, you don't have to build it, but you can figure out where you want to build something that will benefit from it.

    This model is fractal.  It works on many levels of magnification or iteration.

    What first looks like a product is later seen as a prototype for something bigger.

    For example, as a Product transforms into a Platform, it becomes almost like an industry of its own.  Consequently, it becomes the seed for a new set of Capabilities, Prototypes, and Products.

    SpaceX's goal to get to Mars feels like their North Star right now … but once it's achieved, it becomes the foundation for new goals.

    This Framework helps you validate capabilities before sinking resources into them. 

    In the video, I walk you through several examples of companies, their innovations, and how they fit into each stage. I even used Capitalogix as an example. 

    I'm also attaching a fillable PDF of the form we used so that you can run through this with your business as well. 

    Tech Adoption Model for Entrepreneurs (1)

    As I continue to refine and work with this framework, I look forward to improving it and sharing it with you all. 

    As the world continues to change faster and more dramatically, this framework will help you anticipate changes, and it will also help you take advantage of them. 

    If you have any questions or comments about the idea, or how to implement it, feel free to reach out. 

    Onwards! 

  • Make News Beautiful Again

    My mother watches the news religiously. To her credit, she watches a variety of sources and creates her own takeaways based on them. Regardless, there's a common theme in all the sources she watched – they focus on fear or shock-inducing stories with a negative bias. As you might guess, I hear it when I talk with her.

    While I value being informed, I also value things that nourish or make you stronger (as opposed to things that make you weak or less hopeful).

    Negativity Sells. 

    Sure, news sources throw in the occasional feel-good story as a pattern interrupt … but their focus skews negative.  History shows that stories about improvement or the things that work simply don't grab eyeballs, attention, or ratings consistently.

    The reality is that negativity sells. If everything were great all the time, people wouldn't need to buy as many products, they wouldn't need to watch the news, and this cycle wouldn't continue.

    It's worth acknowledging and understanding the perils our society is facing, but it's also worth focusing on the ways humanity is expanding and improving.

    As a brief respite from the unending doom and gloom of mainstream media, Information Is Beautiful has a section of their site focused on "Beautiful News".

    It's a collection of simple data visualizations for positive trends, it's updated daily, and can be sorted by topic.

     

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    Beautiful News via Information Is Beautiful

    If you're looking for more "good news", here's a list of 10 sources focusing on good news. 

  • The Law and Flaw of Averages

    The law of averages is a principle that supposes most future events are likely to balance any past deviation from a presumed average.

    Take, for example, flipping a coin. Should you get 5 "Heads" in a row, you'll assume the next one must be "Tails" despite the fact that each flip has a 50/50 chance of landing on either. 

    Even from this example, you can tell it's a flawed law. While there are reasonable mathematical uses of this law, in everyday life, this "law" mostly represents wishful thinking. 

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    It's also one of the most common fallacies seen in gamblers and traders. 

    Perhaps you heard the story about how the U.S. Air Force discovered the 'flaw' of averages by creating cockpits based on very complex mathematics surrounding the average height, width, arm length, etc. of over 4,000 pilots. Despite engineering the cockpit to precise specifications, pilots crashed their planes on a too regular basis. 

    The reason?  With the benefit of hindsight, they learned that very few of those 4,000 pilots were actually "average". Ultimately, the Air Force re-engineered the cockpit and fixed the problem. 

    It's a good reminder that 'facts' can lie, and assumptions and interpretations are dangerous. It's why I prefer taking decisive action on something known, rather than taking tentative actions about something guessed. 

     

    via ReasonTV

     

  • My Recent Podcasts with Dan Sullivan & Brett Kaufman

    I recently did two interviews I want to share with you. The first was done with Dan Sullivan and Steven Krein for Strategic Coach's Free Zone Frontier podcast… and the second was with Brett Kaufman on his Gravity podcast. 

    Please listen to them.  They were quite different, but both were well done and interesting. 

    Free Zone Frontier with Dan Sullivan and Steve Krein

    Free Zone Frontier is a Strategic Coach group (and podcast) about creating "Free Zones." It refers to the green space where entrepreneurs can collaborate and create without competition.

    It's a transformative idea for entrepreneurial growth. 

    In my episode, we focused on topics like building your own future, how decision-making frameworks and technology can extend your edge, and what it takes to get to the next level.   I realize there is a lot of Strategic Coach jargon in this episode, but it is still easy to understand, and there was great energy and an elevated conversation about worthy topics.

    As an aside, Steve Krein happens to be my cousin, and we joined Strategic Coach entirely separately before realizing we had joined the same group. 

    The podcast is 47 Minutes. I hope you enjoy it.

     

    Or click here to listen on: Spotify, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts 

    Gravity Podcast with Brett Kaufman

    Normally, I talk about business, mental models, and the future of AI and technology, but Brett Kaufman brought something different out of me. 

    Brett's Gravity Project is about living with intention, community, consciousness, and connection. He focuses on getting people to share their life experiences … with the intent that others can see themselves in your story. 

    In my talk with Brett, we do talk about the entrepreneurial journey … but we also probe some deep insights by discussing the death of my younger brother, how my life changed almost immediately upon meeting my wife, and why love is the most powerful and base energy in the universe. 

    This was not a typical conversation for me (a different ratio of head-to-heart), but it was a good one (and I've had a lot of people reach out because of this podcast). 

    The episode is 65 minutes. I hope you enjoy it. 

     

    Click here to listen on: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Listen Notes

    Let me know what you think.

  • Assessments and You

    Over the years, I've used a number of different assessment tests on myself and our team. It's a great way to help people better understand each other and the different forms of communication and problem-solving styles we use.

    Here are several of the tests that have proven themselves time and again:

    1. Kolbe: measures a person's instinctive method of problem-solving, and identifies the ways they will be most productive.
    2. Predictive Index (PI) – helps you understand the way their traits manifest in relation to their true nature and their perceived role.
    3. StrengthsFinder: helps people uncover their talents, so they can do more of those things each day.

    On top of my normal tests, as a team of data scientists, it's always fun to see what's available. 

    For example, Ray Dalio recently created a personality assessment called PrinciplesYou that you can take for free. I've seen a number of articles claiming that the assessment is not only accurate, but that it also has impressive insights.

    Less meaningful, but still fun, I also found a website that lets you test your performance on various reaction and memory tests. Unsure how scientific it is, but it was an interesting use of 10 minutes nonetheless. 

    Image-2via Human Benchmark

     

    Progress starts by telling the truth … most often to yourself.