Blog

Principles app

Published on March 10, 2019.

Ray Dalio, in Principles, mentions a couple of apps used at Bridgewater:

• Coach: a library of common situations which are linked to the relevant principles to help people handle them;
• Dot Collector: used to allow people to express their thoughts and see others’ thoughts in real time;
• Baseball Cards: data visualisation fo a person’s strengths and weakness;
• Combinator: staff-job assignment based on staff profile;
• Issue Log: recording of mistakes;
• Pain Button: record emotions for later reflection;
• Dispute Resolver: paths for resolving disagreements;
• Daily Update: improve communication;
• Contract Tool: make and monitor commitments;
• Process Flow Diagram: visualisation of processes;

Some of the apps (e.g. Dot Collector and Issue Log) can be implemented on top of other online services (e.g. Google Docs) but others can not. Would be great to have free and open versions of those apps.

Handle a family estrangement

Published on March 3, 2019.

Around last Christmas, Anna Goldfarb’s article “The Best Way to Handle a Family Estrangement” (archive PDF avaiable) found my RSS reader. This was the same time that I was processing the wish of my parents to not spend Christmas with me in the UK.

Anna’s says in her article:

when someone else is setting those boundaries, it’s crucial to the future of your relationship that you respect them. Someone who has been cut off “may continue to send messages, cards and presents, or criticism when they know they are unwanted,” [Becca] Bland [(chief executive of Stand Alone, a UK-based charity that supports adults who are estranged from their families)] says, but “research suggests this is more harmful than helpful if the other person has asked for time and space.”

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First time manager

Published on March 3, 2019.

A while ago, I read Anna Goldfarb’s article “What I Wish I’d Known as a First-Time Manager” (archive PDF available). Anna’s words are worth sharing so I decided to leave a link on this blog.

If you are too busy to read Anna’s article fully, skip to the last section: “Trust your team.”

On the basis of sex

Published on March 2, 2019.

Yesterday I watched “On the Basis of Sex”, a film based on the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The plot of the film is around sex or gender, as you prefer, discrimination. The story is very inspiring and interesting from the history point of view but the film doesn’t bring up any strong emotions.

“On the Basis of Sex” reminded me of Steven Spielberg’s Amistad that is a must watch for everyone.

Liars and Secret Dater

Published on February 28, 2019.

Today I read “I secretly date people who aren’t my boyfriend - but I don’t think it’s cheating” published on BBC (archived copy available as PDF). Half way the article, it says

Sometimes, I’d feel bad for the guys. Some of them were obviously looking for something serious and I was just wasting their time. I remember one in particular who was really cut up about his ex cheating on him - we talked about it a lot. I vaguely told him that I’d had ‘similar experiences’, but I cried all the way home because I felt like I was re-traumatising him in some way.

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