Friday Filosophy #2016-25

What a week! Starting last Sunday with Father’s Day. That followed our comments on the status quo and disruption. And we were given a gift on Thursday with Brexit. Not a gift in the manner in which you are thinking, but in the manner of following the thoughts on status quo and disruption. I believe that we constantly need to be challenging the status quo which brings me to the topic of Friday Filosophy #2016-25: dreams.

 Some quotes on dreams.

 

Reality is wrong. Dreams are real.

Tupac Shakur

 

Why does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake?

Leonardo Da Vinci

 

You have to have a dream so you can get up in the morning.

Billy Wilder

 

Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchantment for truth.

Jean-Paul Sartre

 

A dream doesn’t become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination and hard work.

Colin Powell

 

Every dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.

Harriet Tubman

 

All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.

Walt Disney

 

My thoughts go out to the citizens of the United Kingdom who have retaken control of their own destiny. Best wishes and lots of luck.

 

The time is now.

Friday Filosophy #2016-24

One of the most special gifts I received in my life has been fatherhood. My daughter is a very special woman. (I am sure she will poo poo this when she reads it but it is true.)  Although with my work and the travel it entailed it was difficult at times, as I missed things. We tried not to travel during school breaks and that was a very special time for me. The only problem I have as a father is that my daughter is almost identical to me. Make no mistake she has her mother’s manner and instincts and pleasing personality but there is no misunderstanding that she is my daughter.

Some quotes on fathers for our Friday Filosophy #2016-24.

 

My father gave me the greatest gift anyone could give another person, he believed in me.

Jim Valvano

 

One father is more than a hundred schoolmasters.

George Herbert

 

A father is a man who expects his daughter to be as a good a woman as she meant to be.

Frank A Clark

 

I am not ashamed to say that no man I ever met was my father’s equal, and I never loved any other man as much.

Hedy Lamarr

 

One of the greatest gifts my father gave me – unintentionally – was witnessing the courage with which he bore adversity. We had a rollercoaster of a life with some really challenging financial periods. He was always unshaken, completely tranquil, the same ebullient, laughing, jovial man.

Ben Okri

 

I know that I will never find my father in any other man who comes into my life, because it is a void in my life that can only be filled by him.

This is the price you pay for having a great father. You get the wonder, the joy, the tender moments – and you get the tears at the end, too.

Harlan Coben

 

The time is now.

Friday Filosophy #2016-23

Last week we talked about the status quo. Now, in Friday Filosophy #2016-23, I want to move to technological disruptions. Conventional wisdom, which is another oxymoron for the status quo, states that disruptive technologies change everything.  Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen see disruptive technologies upsetting apple carts all over the globe.  

Here are some thoughts on disruptive technologies.

 

Disruption is, at its core, a really powerful idea. Everyone hijacks the idea to do whatever they want now.  It’s the same way people hijacked the word “paradigm” to justify lame things they’re trying to sell to mankind.

Clayton Christensen

 

Supply chains cannot tolerate even 24 hours of disruption. So if you lose your place in the supply chain because of wild behavior you could lose a lot. It would be like pouring cement down one of your oil wells.

Thomas Friedman

 

The key is to embrace disruption and change early. Don’t react to it decades later. You can’t fight innovation.

Ryan Kavanaugh

 

Employees speak of being fearful opening emails and feeling increasingly helpless in the face of the deluge. Physiologically, we now know that the state of continuous disruption puts us into a constant state of hormone-induced stress.

Noreen Hertz

 

The First Amendment was designed to allow for disruption of business as usual. It is not a quiet and subdued amendment or right.

Naomi Wolf

 

True disruption means threatening your existing product line and your past investments. Breakthrough products disrupt current lines of business.

Peter Diamondis

 

The time is now.

Friday Filosophy #2016-22

We just had a dismal jobs report posted yet the jobless rate continues going down. This just highlights the visible disconnect between “government” metrics and real life. The job participation rate is 62.6% :nearly at a forty year low. There are 94.7 million people who are outside the labor force. How dismal is that. Perspective is everything and the status quo is a serious threat to our families and the future of the country.

 

On that note, for our Friday Filosophy #2016-22, here are some thoughts on status quo:

 

The status quo sucks.

 George Carlin

 

I don’t accept the status quo. I do accept Visa, Master Card or American Express.

Stephen Colbert

 

The riskiest thing we can do is just maintain the status quo.

Bob Iger

 

People who demand neutrality in any situation are usually not neutral but in favor of the status quo.

Mas Eastman

 

The history of storytelling isn’t one of simply entertaining the masses but of also advising the status quo.

Therese Fowler

 

Entrepreneurs are misfits to the core. They forge ahead, making their own path and always, always, question the status quo.

Maximillian Degenerez

 

I am not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.

Niccolo Machiavelli

 

 

The time is now.