GRIZZLY PEAR

written snapshots

Category: Notes

  • OPM.17 (notes on) Team of Teams, General Stanley McChrystal, Tantum Collins, David Silverman, Chris Fussell, 2015

    I hope you enjoyed your Halloween and Nevada Day!

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    (notes on) Team of Teams

    This new world moves too quickly for top-down, optimized entities.

    The twin narratives of this book are the rise of the hyper-efficient organizations (exemplified by the work of Fredrick Winslow Taylor) in the 20th century and the rise of the hyper-connected network (exemplified in the structure of Al Qaida) in the 21st century.

    After Saddam was crushed in Iraq, the occupying forces were constantly harassed by the flexible amorphous cells of the terrorist organization. This underground operation was running laps around the awesome might of the great American military machine. General McCrystal’s task was to reverse this trend.

    He accomplished this by “shared consciousness” and “empowered execution”. He merged the information silos in multiple organizations so that all the data was shared throughout the forces. He also delegated decision-making power as low as possible, allowing the staff who were most familiar with the situation to respond in an agile manner.

    These twin endeavors ultimately turned the tide of the war. While history was being made, I had thought that the “surge” was merely an issue of applying more resources. I did not realize that the eventual defeat of Al Qaida was the result of better management techniques.

    At first glance, it does not seem that the lessons in this book are immediately applicable to the much more methodical work of a government OPM.

    However, timing is always an issue. Sooner is generally better than later, but our processes with multiple peer reviews tend to push the schedule longer. It’s a bit of a conundrum. Budgets for state buildings are tight. This one renovation may be the only project in this building for the next twenty years. With such timescales, losing a couple of months is worth the tradeoff of ensuring the design is dead on.

    But still, the needs are immediate. It would be nice to move more quickly so we can better serve our users. This book makes me wonder if I should experiment further to speed up my projects. It also makes me question if our system of multiple checks is truly effective. Are we getting proper value for the delay? Each extra step incrementally improves the project, but at what hidden cost?

    In all, this book is a good read. It is a compelling story of how a top-down behemoth adapted in response to the networked resilience of its opponent. Restructuring the team was the key to the endeavor, the nature of the organization is its strategy. As such, this book is a great case-study companion to Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s Anti-Fragile.

    The other concept that intrigued me is the regular status update meetings that were instituted by General McChrystal. Along with transforming their main base into a large open office plan, his team started running a 2-hour meeting every day. All relevant parties could attend these meetings, and he touts it as his primary tool to achieve “shared consciousness”.

    There is a prevailing trend in Tech to avoid such meetings. In that vein, I’ve been pondering how to minimize my OAC meetings. Maybe that is the wrong approach. Maybe I should be thinking about how to maximize the effectiveness of those meetings.

    As OPM’s, we tend to think in a top-down fashion, after all, we are the “owners”. However, delegation (empowered execution) is the primary job of our work. Empowered execution is only effective when there is true coordination, so how does one create a shared consciousness between the multiple parties in our team?

    ~

    A Question

    How do you handle regular status meetings?

    Hit reply and let’s chat!

    ~

    A Link

    As an employee of the State of Nevada, I’m contractually obligated to mention that October 31 is Nevada Day when we joined the Union. Unfortunately, we observe it on the last Friday of October, akin to celebrating Independence Day on the first Monday of July.

    … and a photo.

    Baby in Pumpkin, Gippsland Australia, John Flynn 1880-1951

    ~

    Thanks for reading the OPM letter! I’d love to have a conversation if you have any feedback. I hope you found some prompts to stretch your craft and relationships as a curious Owner PM. See you next week!

    Stay humble, be kind, and keep experimenting!
    Justus Pang, RA

  • I Ching Links

    Like many other hobbies, I’ve cooled a bit on the I Ching. For a while, I consulted it once a week, but it’s been a while since I last visited the book. Like my bread baking, I will coast on the knowledge I picked up over my first couple of months of diligent practice. Or maybe like the Ukulele, I won’t visit much at all.

    With the honeymoon phase long past, I won’t be finding many more internet resources for the I Ching, so this seemed the appropriate time to compile some key links.

    Biroco – S. J. Marshall’s book reviews were a great introduction to the world of the I Ching in English. I also follow his method for interpreting the changing lines. A comprehensive site, though I suspect that some people might take issue with some of his harsher judgments of various translations. However, I picked up the Wilhelm/Baynes and Lynn translations due to his recommendations and have been pleased with both.

    Hermetica – A lot of good resources, both weblinks and book reviews. He also shares his own translation of the book on this site. His page comparing a multitude of hexagram names is quite interesting to peruse.

    Russell Cottrell – Another site with many reviews with a few virtual divination resources. He also explores a lot of other ideas, including a page comparing 44 translations of #3 and #36, and a nice pocket format I Ching based on the Richmond translation.

    Online Clarity – A nice forum and good community around the I Ching. I’ll occasionally pop into Reddit as well, but prefer the homier feel of this site. I also enjoy Hilary’s email newsletter. She was recently interviewed on youtube which covers quite a bit of ground as an introduction.

    Wikipedia Hexagrams – A concise location of hexagrams and English and Chinese names.

    LiSe – I have not explored this site much, however many people have recommended her site. If I was to start exploring the I Ching again, this would be the next spot to dig into.

    Fred Hatt is a New York artist who has made a good video of divination with yarrow sticks.  It takes a while (a feature of this style of divination), but he chats his way through the process. He was also the guest on this great podcast episode which includes an audio demonstration of divination with coins.

    Finally, I must close with this extended quote from Fred Hatt’s autobiographical blog post.  It has nothing to do with the I Ching, but wish I was as comfortable with myself as Fred is with his path in life, “while I ignore this official Art World, it ignores me back.”

    I rarely write about my own life here on Drawing Life. I avoid drama and so I imagine my life would be pretty boring to anyone not close to me. I devote much of my free time to drawing, photography, and other creative pursuits. While I show work and do events and performances fairly regularly, I’ve always maintained my art as an amateur practice. Of course the word “amateur” means lover, one who does something for the pure love of it. Since I work for a living, I don’t have to worry about creating work to please a market or to make it fit what some critics want to write about. I keep the work free, and I follow it wherever it leads me. To be honest, while I love a lot of living artists and their work, the international contemporary art scene as a whole, with its mega-wealthy collectors and ego-driven art stars, its combination of pretentious discourse and cheap gimmickry, bores me, and while I ignore this official Art World, it ignores me back. I’d rather treat my work as my own exploration of perception and practice. I do want to use it to communicate to a larger audience, but I’m actually more driven by the pleasure of sharing one on one, the special connection that develops between me and my models, the people I sketch portraits of and the people whose bodies I paint, the dancers and performers I collaborate with, and the fans of my work that visit my studio, sit with me on the floor and look through piles of drawings or photographs.

    Fred Hatt

  • OPM.15 (notes on) Anti-Fragile, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, 2012

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    (notes on) Anti-Fragile

    Taleb’s core premise is that we can’t predict the future, so we can only prepare in the present.

    Pretty basic advice for an uncertain world. So what can we do?

    His counterintuitive elaboration is to posit the idea of “anti-fragility”. Anti-fragile things are not merely robust – they don’t merely avoid failure under stress. Anti-fragile systems improve when they encounter variability. For example, our bodies get stronger when we practice a wide variety of exercise routines.

    What an inspiring concept!

    Anti-fragility provides a framework for developing improvements. As individuals, there isn’t a ton we can do to fix the big problems, but we aren’t completely powerless. Don’t obsess over massive single-shot wins. Focus on making lots of experiments. A bunch of little mistakes will come up with the occasional win. Transform one of those discoveries into a big victory.

    He recommends that one starts with a life that maintains a baseline stability. With this solid foundation one is freed to take some risks that might become big wins. Avoid debt and live freely. Procrastinate thoughtfully – a default aggressive stance isn’t always best.

    To nitpick, I admit that the book is a bit long and would have benefited from a sharper editor. But what the hell, it’s well worth your time. Taleb is a punk. He points out that the emperor has no clothes, and that our castle is a house of cards. I wish this book had been published while I was in grad school, I suspect my master’s thesis would have revolved around this concept.

    As with all audio books, I started listening to it at 1.5x speed. Unlike most of them, I dropped it down to 1.0x speed almost immediately and listened to all 16 hours at the narrator’s natural pace. Highly recommended.

    ~

    One Question

    Where can you start experimenting? How are can you create the variability to make you become anti-fragile?

    Hit reply and let’s chat!

    ~

    One Link

    Along with Anti-Fragile, I recommend checking out Simon Sinek’s book the Infinite Game. It hammers in the point that “winning” in life is being invited to “keep playing”, a critical concept that rhymes well with the themes of Anti-Fragile.

    … and a photo.

    “Dreamland” burned, Coney Island, Bain News Service, 27 May 1911

    ~

    Thanks for reading the OPM letter! I’d love to have a conversation if you have any feedback. I hope you found some prompts to stretch your craft and relationships as a curious Owner PM. See you next week!

    Stay humble, be kind, and keep experimenting!
    Justus Pang, RA

  • The Book of Atheist Spirituality, Andre Comte-Sponville, 2008

    Reading this book was an exercise in confirmation bias. Long ago, I had reached similar conclusions Comte-Sponville, after a similarly devout upbringing while also leaving the faith in early adulthood.

    While losing a personal diety may be difficult for some folks, it was quite liberating for me. Not to become a wanton libertine. Rather I was freed from carrying an unnecessary construct in my brain. It allowed me to enjoy life more fully.

    That said, I don’t begrudge those who are religious, and Comte-Sponville’s first essay is a discussion about tolerance in the face of the unknown. You be you.

    However, we’ll still believe in the absence of a god (more certain than a mere agnostic). His second essay plainly addresses why he does not believe in the existence of a deity.

    Finally, he tackles the title of the book in the third essay, exploring how an atheist can explore spirituality.

    I’m an architect, not a philosopher. So even though I had naturally come to similar conclusions as Comte-Sponville, I enjoyed reading a professional exposition on this matter. The book is well structured with the three essays that build upon each other, and then it ends with a rousing epilogue, on Truth and Love.

    Here is where all our different themes converge without conflating.

    Fidelity to truth: rationalism – the rejection of Sophism.

    Fidelity to love: humanism – the rejection of nihilism.

    Fidelity to a separation between the two: atheism.

    …

    Love, not hope, is what helps us live. Truth, not faith, is what sets us free.

    We are already in the kingdom. Eternity is now.

    In all a great read. He hit his mark in writing a book for a popular but serious audience. There are plenty of allusions to other authors whose names I recognize but have never read, but the book is plenty readable, and each essay is properly dense, as appropriate for this weight subject. This is not your usual quick burn self-help fare. It may be “little”, but took a surprising amount of time to work through.

    Even though I don’t feel the urge to purchase my own copy, I’ve already recommended it to several friends and I suspect this will become my standard book recommendation for anyone interested in such matters.

    By the way, if you are into such fare on a lighter subject (though equally universal), I’d recommend The Philosopher’s Cookbook, by Martin Versfeld, 2005.

  • Double Quick III S Hand Air Pump, Intex

    The pandemic landed in America at the same moment that my in-law’s tenants gave up their lease.

    After a couple of coworkers called in sick in mid-Februrary, I went into exile to minimize the chance of exposing the parents and children to this mysterious disease.

    My wife bought an air mattress and hand pump, packed up some groceries, and I was a single man again.

    The air mattress lasted about half a year. Kids ruined it by jumping up and down on it. However, the pump (which cost more than the air mattress) has paid off handsomely.

    It turns out that when you buy a tool, you’ll find other uses for it.

    They used it to blow air on each other’s faces. They played around with the detachable flexible tube that came with the pump, using it like a telescope. I used it to pump up the yoga ball.

    And then we got a packet of balloons for my daughter’s birthday.

    With the germophobia induced by the pandemic, we quickly realized this was the perfect way to inflate balloons.

    Because it was so easy to inflate them, it was also no big deal to deflate them.

    For a couple of weeks, the boy would watch me inflate a balloon and then release it, laughing as it bounced off the ceilings and walls, sputtering around the room.

    This pump is about eighteen inches tall, a perfect height for children. So the boy has been able to operate it as well.

    As implied by the “Double Quick” name, this thing pushes air on both the up and down strokes. It’s endlessly amusing to watch him strain with this thing.

    As middle-class parents in a wealthy nation, we purchase many toys that get land with a thud. These wasted expenditures purchases are lottery tickets for amusing our children.

    Then life intervenes and a worldwide pandemic forces you to buy the perfect toy that you didn’t even know was a toy.

    We pulled out the pump after storing it for a few months. His face brightened up immediately, and he went right back to inflating and deflating balloons. Some toys are just real, and we’re lucky when we find them.

  • OPM.13 (notes on) How to Remember Everything You Learn, Will Schroder, 2018


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    (notes on) How to Remember Everything You Learn

    This is the best video I’ve watched this year.

    The three steps of this practice are Recall, Simple Explanations, and Spaced Repetition.

    “Recall” is as basic as it sounds. Pause and think about what you just read. Information shouldn’t be treated like a page-turner. Pause between chapters and ponder what was just read.

    I stumbled into this practice two years ago, after refocusing this blog as “notes on my consumption”. I try to write a blurb about every bit of extended content that I consumed. At the time, I was trying to force myself to be a more consistent content producer, but it unwittingly made me a better consumer as well!

    “Simple explanations” are called the “Feynman Technique” in the video. Master the subject so you can explain it to a 5-year-old.

    I have used this technique throughout my career.  I’ve always forced my engineers to explain problems so that I can retell the story to the clients. Decision-makers are rarely the subject matter experts, so the consultant’s job includes distilling issues to their core essence for informed action.

    “Spaced Repetition” is the practice to regularly review content. As we internalize the info, we gradually increase the intervals between reviews to lock the information into our long-term memory.

    Again, this blog has come to the rescue because posts involve multiple rounds of edits. For example, this post was initially drafted on June 8th. I edited it in August and I’m now publishing it in October.

    This post regurgitates the actionable advice from the second half, but the first half is worth watching because it provides the neurological context for its recommendations and includes a potent warning that feeling like we know something is not a sign of real understanding.

    Give it a watch, take some notes, explain it to a kid, and watch it again!

    Also, consider starting a blog. This site has hosted a variety of odd experiments. This digital archive of the decade has become a personal infrastructure for further explorations. Maybe it will even unwittingly create a process to help you improve at remembering things.

    ~

    One Question

    Do you have any processes that help you practice spaced repetition? How do you avoid forgetting information as quickly as you learned it?

    Hit reply and let’s chat!

    ~

    One Link

    While this video may be the best single shot I’ve come across this year, I have been really enjoying the Technology Connections Channel by Alec Watson. He explains common technology (such as the dishwasher) in simple clear language with a wickedly dry humor.

    ~

    Thanks for reading the OPM letter! I’d love to have a conversation if you have any feedback. I hope you found some prompts to stretch your craft and relationships as a curious Owner PM. See you next week!

    Stay humble, be kind, and keep experimenting!
    Justus Pang, RA

  • Mulan, Niki Caro, 2020

    Last year we watched the new Mulan after watching the original animated Mulan a year before that. Accented Cinema did an excellent comparison on these movies. Everyone else also properly panned the new show as well.

    The live-action film movie has stunning locations marred by ridiculously outlandish characters. I understand why the actors would take the gig, but I don’t see why any self-respecting Asian would pay money to watch this new movie.

    It’s a mish-mash of exotic Asian-ness, as respectful of the culture as the cheesy dub on a bad kung fu flick.

    Then again, as an Asian American, I’ve always had a tortured relationship with Asia on the big screen. I’ve avoided movies like Lost in Translation or Last Samurai because I am particularly uninterested in a film centered on a white protagonist in an Asian setting. But as an American, a truly Asian film is too foreign to be relatable.

    When I studied abroad in Paris, I met an Algerian who dropped the perfect line about immigrant life, “living with your ass on two seats.”

    To be honest, life as an Asian American is pretty good. Things are a bit crazy at the moment and I’m well aware that things could turn much worse. But generally, the worst I have to deal with is being constantly aware of my otherness. Then again, I presume white kids have plenty of hang-ups from their adolescence that they have to deal with.

    Even so, it does suck to never see yourself well portrayed on the big screen. However, I’m not a big fan of movies, so maybe it’s my lack of interest to blame? Maybe it’s a chicken and egg problem?

    I’ve heard of some recent offerings that I should most likely watch at some point, but I keep going back to that exchange at the end of Chan is Missing. It perfectly captures the tension of being Asian American – life as an immigrant and a native and always an other in both worlds.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhgSui0V_qY&feature=youtu.be&t=3435

    Mulan has only diminished further in my mind’s eye as time passes. I’ve heard good things about the new Shang Chi movie, though Accented Cinema did a pointed critique, “Shang Chi and the Perpetual Foreigners” that has cooled my interest in film as well, not that I’m going to a movie theater any time soon.

  • Divination

    Growing up conservative Christian, divination carried an illicit edge.

    But a Tarot deck is just a normal deck of cards with a fifth all-trump suit. Still spooky?

    A while back, my daughter and I messed around with a tarot deck to create a variant on War that improves upon the original (the big change was that we evened out the players’ decks after each round; whoever won more cards banked the extras).

    With the Tarot deck in hand, I also played around with a card reading after the kids went to sleep.

    The booklet that came with this deck was very specific. The cups = love, coins = money, etc. Each card had specific effects in its orientation and place within the tableaux.

    Now, this is where the religious folks have it right. This is not good entertainment. Such a practice with specific prompts will put things in the head that don’t need to be there.

    However, that’s not an issue with divination in general.

    I also played with the Decktet, a modern deck designed in 2008. The creator has published suggestions for using his cards for readings with an open interpretive system. Instead of relying upon concrete predictive functions for each card, a Decktet reading creates a network of relationships between the cards. This method is much more suggestive and might be a great way to unearth the unconscious.

    A few months later, I started messing around with the I Ching. Maybe I’ll revisit the Tarot one day, but it’s hard to beat several thousand years of Chinese divination.

  • Parent’s Tao Te Ching, William Martin, 1999

    Do not ask your children to strive for extraordinary lives. Such striving may seem admirable, but it is the way of foolishness. Help them instead to find the wonder and the marvel of an ordinary life. Show them the joy of tasting tomatoes, apples and pears. Show them how to cry when pets and people die. Show them the infinite pleasure in the touch of a hand. And make the ordinary come alive for them. The extraordinary will take care of itself.

    I came across this quote during the pandemic. I immediately put it at the top of my personal core values document.

    Naturally, I was eager to read the entire book, but the library does not have a copy. Fortunately, I found a free loaner at archive.org.

    The book is great.

    Admittedly, its appeal is limited to the already persuaded. But if you are sympathetic to woo eastern philosophy and a permissive parental style, this book is for you.

    Parenting is stressful at times, worrying at others. Especially during a pandemic when all choices are lackluster (at best). One is haunted by a nagging sense of opportunity cost as the kids lose years of their childhood, trapped at home.

    This book is a salve for such concerns. The basic message is to take your foot off the gas. Let the kids grow up and grow up with them.

    It is also an insightful approach towards the Tao De Ching. In the past, I’ve had difficulty reading through the original. It’s heavy dense stuff that is purposely impenetrable to the uninitiated.

    This parenting version focuses only upon this facet of humanity, making it much easier to read. I’ve read the original enough to feel comfortable claiming that this version reflects the spirit of Laozi. Indeed, it can be a lens to help you navigate the original work.

    Of course, this book is watered down compared to the original. But if it resonates, what more do you want?

    While writing my first draft, I had every intention to purchase my own copy. Since then my ardor has cooled. This is no fault of this book; I’m buried in too many great books and classics! As I read more, the backlog increases.

    One day I’ll figure out how to control my reading appetite. Maybe I’ll pick up this book then.

    Even so, this book is highly recommended. Plus you should check out William Martin’s blog; he posts regularly.

  • Play-Doh

    Squeeze. Roll into a long string. Make a big donut. Cut into little pieces.

    repeat.

    repeat.

    repeat.

    Put it away.

    Exciting stuff.
    Do it again, with a different color.
    Ad nauseam.

    The girl has grown out of this phase.
    He will too.
    Kids are fickle.
    Maybe tomorrow,
    no warning.

    So many things I thought we’d play again.
    The day was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
    Squeezing play dough all afternoon.

    When he was exactly 1,109 days old.

    Leaving a warm memory and a blog poem.