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22 Resources for

wisdom and ben casnocha

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The Sole Survivor - Navy SEAL Story: The Washington Post has an amazing interview / account of a Navy SEAL who was ambushed in Afghanistan by Taliban fighters a couple years ago. He was the only member of his team to survive. It's a moving story and well worth a quiet read.As we go about our daily,...; Tags: Ben Casnocha, Navy Seal; Blog posts 2007-06-12
Quotes of the Day: Three assorted quotes.The first is from Caitlin Flanagan, a wonderfully zesty writer, who takes on MySpace and online predators in the latest Atlantic Monthly subscribers only. Unlike so many failed attempts to capture this phenomenon, Flanagan opines with originality and humor.With the Internet, children are marching out intothe world every...; Tags: Ben Casnocha, real world, Jenna; Blog posts 2007-06-11
The Importance of Weak Ties: A weak tie for me is an email-only or phone-only relationship with someone. The weak ties in your network are important and underrated. Virginia Postrel, in this Forbes article on networks, reminds us that people usually find jobs not through their close friends but through their weak ties. Excerpt:To...; Tags: Recruitment & Selection, Ben Casnocha, Weak Ties, job; Blog posts 2007-04-23
Once Upon a Business...The Role of Storytelling in Leadership, Management, and Entrepreneurship: The Silicon Valley Junto -- an intellectual discussion society that Chris and I run -- met a few weeks ago around the topic Once Upon a Business...The Role of Storytelling in Leadership, Management, and Entrepreneurship.David Cowan kicked it off with an oral telling of a story he recounted on his...; Tags: PRODUCTIVITY, Recruitment & Selection, entrepreneurship, Ben Casnocha, Leadership Management, Storytelling, leadership; Blog posts 2007-04-18
The "Rich Get Richer" Effect: Duncan Watts has a fascinating, brief piece in the NYT Magazine today about the "rich get richer" effect and how cultural mega-hits dont have much to do with many individuals independently liking a given song or book. Rather, the success of a successful book or song and the failure of...; Tags: Ben Casnocha; Blog posts 2007-04-15

The Role of Feelings and Emotion in Decision Making: People love to characterize emotion and feelings as toxic to rational, objective decision making. "Be cool and dispassionate," they say. While theres some truth to that, there is also evidence to suggest that emotions are crucial in rational decision making (Antonio Damasio, author of Descartes Error, is an influential proponent...; Tags: Tools & Techniques, Ben Casnocha, decision-making; Blog posts 2007-04-06
A Central Tension in Any Entrepreneurial Venture: Marrying Your Business But Also Keeping a Safe Distance: Continuing my riff on the role of passion in decision making, heres a central tension in any entrepreneurial venture you dont hear talked about much:It demands complete emotional committment to be successful, but youre also told not to have your self-esteem / self-worth too invested in the success or failure...; Tags: Entrepreneurship, Ben Casnocha, entrepreneurial; Blog posts 2007-04-06
Design Puzzles - Why Do Outdoor Coffee Tables Have Four Legs?: Prof. Steven Postrel has a good post over at Organization and Markets about why some entrepreneurial opportunities go unsatisfied. His example is why outdoor coffee tables have four legs instead of three, when its "obvious" that three legs would make the table rock less. He concludes with the following design...; Tags: Ben Casnocha, Steven Postrel; Blog posts 2007-04-04
The Biggest Secret Knowledge in Business: Is the stuff that ought to work, but doesnt.So says GMU economist Arnold Kling in this interesting TCS Daily article. Kling hits on something I think a lot about which is how common and repetitive the "best practices" of business are. Its hard to find original insights, even if the...; Tags: Ben Casnocha, knowledge; Blog posts 2007-04-04
The Myth of One Giant Eureka Moment: I was talking to a journalist today about entrepreneurship. I told him my theory that the myth of creativity is that it all happens in one, giant "Eureka!" moment.You know the image: The idea comes to mind and you freeze. Its brilliance strikes you. Its going to change the world!...; Tags: Entrepreneurship, Ben Casnocha; Blog posts 2007-03-16
The Role of Evangelist For Web 2.0 Companies: How do web 2.0 / consumer web app-ish type companies generate buzz for their free product or service online? Online promotions? Email blasts? Pray to be TechCrunched?Ive seen an increasing number of companies do all this and one thing more: hire low-cost "evangelists" to sit at a computer all day...; Tags: Blogging, Ben Casnocha, evangelist, Web 2.0, Web; Blog posts 2007-03-15
Hiring Philosophies: No False Positives vs. Hire Fast, Fire Fast: Dick "da wizard" Costolo, CEO of FeedBurner, has a great post up contrasting two schools of thought around hiring:Briefly, the "No False Positives" school of hiring says that bad hires are worse than no hire because bad employees infect the company with all sorts of issues. Better to march on...; Tags: Recruitment & Selection, Ben Casnocha, hiring, False Positives, Dick; Blog posts 2007-03-15
Changing Your Mind in the Executive Suite: Ive posted before about why its a shame our obsession with "consistency" prevents people from changing their mind. The John Kerry flip-flop saga illuminated this obsession. Daniel Gross has a piece on Slate about U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney and how his corporate success taught him that changing your views...; Tags: Ben Casnocha, job requirement, Daniel Gross; Blog posts 2007-03-09
Herzberg: True Motivators vs. Hygiene Factors: A friend mentioned Herzbergs theory of motivation to me today. Herzberg says there are two kinds of motivational concerns: true motivators and hygiene factors:Herzberg (1959) constructed a two-dimensional paradigm of factors affecting peoples attitudes about work. He concluded that such factors as company policy, supervision, interpersonal relations, working conditions,...; Tags: Recruitment & Selection, Ben Casnocha, motivator, investment, theory, Herzberg; Blog posts 2007-03-08
Business Rules of Thumb Wiki: Ive launched a new project: Business Rules of Thumb -- its a public wiki to track useful rules of thumb from negotiation to marketing to presentations to PR. Please contribute rules of thumb to the wiki! The password is: "thumb".Some of the content is taken with permission from Seth Godins...; Tags: Ben Casnocha, Seth, Wiki; Blog posts 2007-03-08
Book Review: One Person / Multiple Careers: Marci Alboher has written a great new book that came out yesterday called One Person / Multiple Careers. She sent me an early copy and after reading it I spoke with her on the phone.The premise is this: From lawyer/chefs to police officer/personal trainers to mom/CEOs, more and more people...; Tags: Professional development, Entrepreneurship, Ben Casnocha, career, Marci Alboher; Blog posts 2007-03-05
Can Companies Accelerate the Adoption Curve?: Great market timing -- that is, releasing a product when the market is ready for mass adoption -- can make up for poor execution. Great execution cannot make up for poor market timing.In general, I believe technology companies overrate their ability to accelerate an adoption curve and underrate the natural...; Tags: Sales force management, Ben Casnocha, adoption curve, technology company; Blog posts 2007-03-05
Conceptual Breakthroughs The Domain of the Young: Jason Mendelson recalls this quote: "I love backing first time CEOs because they don’t know what they cant do and never limit themselves."Reminds me of a conversation I had with Auren Hoffman a couple weeks ago. We theorized the best time to start a company was around age 27. On...; Tags: Leadership, Strategy, Ben Casnocha, Galenson, Jason Mendelson; Blog posts 2007-03-01
Embracing Randomness in Your Product -- Or Your Life: Kathy Sierra recently hit on one of the themes of this blog which is "randomness". She notes that adding randomness to your product or service can be a wonderful idea. Products should be neither fully predictable nor chaotic: just look at the iPod shuffle.When the iPod Shuffle first came out,...; Tags: Ben Casnocha, randomness, Randomness, Apple iPod, music; Blog posts 2007-02-03
Book Short: Anonymous Lawyer: Anonymous Lawyer by Jeremy Blachman is simply hilarious. Its a satirical novel written in the form of blog entries and internal emails by a hiring partner at a big LA law firm. A must-read for anyone in a law firm or considering that career path. Heres the fake law firms...; Tags: Litigation, Ben Casnocha, stapler, law firm; Blog posts 2007-01-27