Category: books

I just finished reading “Simple Rules” by Donald Sull. After reading the introduction, I had to continue. The book begins by describing how military surgeons in wartime situations make decisions on who to treat first, and who not to treat. It’s brutal; the decisions have immediate life and death consequences so they can’t second guess decisions. Right from that moment in the first chapter I realized if this technique was good enough for military surgeons and helped them – it was something I needed to learn.
Donald Sull starts his book with a story that gets you hooked, and continues telling stories to drive home points throughout the book. Every concept, idea and technique he puts forward is accompanied by a story or anecdote from his seemingly endless supply. The ideas are woven into his stories, and each one illustrates a point well. While I enjoyed this technique as a reader, one critique I have is that I found it difficult to pull out the core ideas as each concept was woven into a story at a different point. I’m someone who makes lists and takes notes, and it was hard to pull out good notes without breaking up the narrative.

So what are simple rules?

Here’s an example “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” – which distills the nutritional insights of Michael Pollan into a handful of words.

“Simple words consist of a handful of guidelines applied to a specific activity or decision, such as deciding what to eat.” – Donald Sull, pg 25

The concept is simple but takes a while to figure out how to apply to your specific situation. The book gives great examples, and makes it easy to feel like you can fit the technique to your situation. The thing I liked most is the idea of memorability and usability of the rules.

[Tweet “”To be used, rules have to be remembered, and limiting the number to a handful makes this possible.” – Donald Sull, Simple Rules”]

Where I work we spend a lot of time on User Experience for on-screen interfaces, and spend a lot of time thinking about how users add and edit content. Simple Rules as a technique for decisions feels like you’re considering the user experience of decision making and improving the experience through good tools and techniques. I really like being thoughtful about how we make decisions and giving my team clear guidelines about how to make good decisions quickly.

It’s worth a read to identify how you can simplify your decision making process either at work, to empower a team, or personally.

Check out the book on Amazon

there is a lot of entrepreneurial empathy in this book. if you’re trying to run a company or start one – this book provides an incredible roadmap of some of the challenges you might go through.

a few of the things i really enjoyed in the book is a simple concept: as leader of an organization your responsibility is to design communication patterns. other than setting the vision and direction of the company – that may be the single most useful thing you do.

it also has some really useful, insightful and challenging questions on how to hire executive staff. it’s a challenging topic, and while there are good books out there on this topic – this resource is great insight for the technology community. there is a section of interview questions at the back that i will use in my next hire of a manager. one of the core concepts is ‘hire for strength, not lack of weakness.’ read the book for a full explanation.

i also really enjoyed the Karl Marx nod to the struggle. the quote that came shining through is “Life is Struggle” and if you balk or bend when the difficult things smash into you – you’ll fail. if you can take the difficult things, wrap your arms around them and somehow wrestle yourself behind or on top of them – you’ll find a way. finding a way is one of the themes in response to struggle that i enjoyed. anyone can make excuses for why things are not going well, but it takes a visionary leader to identify the path forward when all options seem like they take you from bad to worse. identifying a path forward and convincing your team that it’s the right way to go, and then ensuring you get there is the real hallmark of a great leader of companies.

it’s a difficult thing. in fact, it’s quite hard. but the subject of the book is not about fluffy bunnies and slobber-tongued puppies.

overall a great read and a resource i plan to come back to regularly for small tidbits and larger sections for motivation and discernment.

!/images/130.jpg (growth of the soil)!

i recently read knut hamsun’s “growth of the soil.” i tip my hat to charles bukowski for the recommendation.

this book begins with painfully beautiful plain language. the words are pure and straightforward, like earth from the garden in your hands. it’s hard to imagine the simple life depicted in the first few pages filling the many pages of the book. if the first 2 pages were a short story you would know all you need to of the main character.

i was trying to think up appropriate praise, but h.g wells does it better than i could:
!/images/131.jpg (herbert george wells quote)!

!/images/126.jpg (Leonard Cohen – Book of Longing)!

i have always loved the writings of leonard cohen. he brings the body together with the spirit in a way that is unexpected yet familiar at the same time.

his writing has a feeling of human and heartfelt directness. when i read his books i feel he knows just a little too much about me, and is describing just a little too much of himself at the same time.

his previous works have been full of sex and passionate energy. this book is full of vigour, but the subject matter of the opening poems is more often the conquest of his bowels than his bedroom.

poetry is a graphical language. the presence or absence of words on a page is as important as the words themselves. the *book of longing* has sketches throughout, sitting underneath, beside, ontop, or above poems. the book feels like a notebook, or unfinished work. ‘unwashed words from the street’ to paraphrase neruda. personally the drawing interferes with the poetry more than it compliments.

there is an incredible breadth of time represented in the book of longing. poems appear from as far back as the seventies and eighties, right up to modern writing.

the book feels more like a curated work rather than an authorial voice. theme and style are well represented, but there is no passionate narrative running through the whole work.

i always love loenard cohen’s writing, but this book feels as though it was hurried to press for a paycheque rather than crafted out of love and longing.

h3. the hands.

!/images/127.gif! the drawings are an interesting idea, and while they distract and play with the text they don’t disrupt my reading. when a poem carries on to another page there is a small monty python-esque hand to indicate the continuing text. for most people the lack of a title on the next page would be enough to indicate a poem is continuing. i hate these hands.

i enjoyed the book “and you might too”:http://www.amazon.ca/exec/obidos/ASiN/0771022344/davebellous-20/