Anxiety doesn’t generally come from making decisions, but rather from the time spent deliberating on whether to make a decision. 

At a certain point there’s enough information gathered, and a choice should be made. That choice isn’t always Option A vs Option B, but could include Option C all the way to Option Z. 

If you’re struggling with a decision, use the best data you have now and decide (even if that means intentionally deciding not to act, just be direct about it). You’ll be wrong sometimes, but the anxiety of it will hopefully lessen.

You can tell someone what you’re thinking, and convey that in a way that you believe is correct. But that’s only a very small part of what it means to communicate something. 

Communication happens through the words you choose to say, the words you leave unsaid, the way your words are shared, and the language your body is presenting (if you’re in person). You also communicate through the way you approach a project, how you talk to your team members, what you choose to share publicly and what is only said behind closed doors. 

You also communicate through built up trust over an extended period of time. If a close friend tells you something that’s hard to hear, but says it in just the right way, it might have an impact. If a coworker with a bone to pick says something in a spiteful manner (even if they’re right), well you’re unlikely to take much notice. 

All of this, and more, is important to keep in mind when trying to share your thoughts. It’s the responsibility of the sharer to convey what they mean to share. 

Writing down an idea is a way to gather your thoughts and think through a problem. It’s also a way to decompress after a long day. 

I’ve found over the years that I need to get out what I’m thinking in some form. Sometimes that comes down to sharing with a close friend how my day or week went and breaking down the pieces that occurred. Other times it means writing a daily update and sharing with my team. 

Then, sometimes, writing means taking the idea or concept I’ve been struggling with and retooling it in a way that I can share more publically. Sure, this could benefit someone else reading this, but more importantly it’s an outlet for me to add some structure to my thoughts. 

If you have found this helpful, or have any specific feedback, feel free to reach out! 

You run into an interesting situation the moment you introduce more than one person into a project. Whereas at the start a project may have been from the mind of just one, now you have a few folks weighing in. At this point multiple opinions enter into a discussion, and you have to make decisions and tradeoffs based on that. 

This is a good thing. When everyone is pulling together in a healthy tension great things can happen. The challenge is it can be hard for a team to figure out the right balance between that healthy tension and a toxic environment that shoots down the value of everyone’s feedback. 

A lot of teams struggle with getting this balance right, and it’s tempting during any point in the project to think that everyone else is the problem. That’s not the case though. Any company you work at, any project you take on (unless you’re truly the only person) will involve figuring out how to work together with others. 

Recognizing this and just calling out the tension for what it is helps to solve part of the problem. Also, having grace for what someone says, and what they mean, makes a big difference. For example, when someone is trying to explain a concept they are likely to not use the right words for what they’re trying to say. Or, they might say something that’s incorrect, or that you disagree with. Having grace and patience means you’ll accept their intent, or question what they said, and find a way to work together.

If you start counting remarks as points against a teammate, and holding onto those as fighting points, then collaboration and mutual support will start to break down. 

Getting this right is hard. But it’s something we must figure out if we want to succeed in our work. 

There are times when you’re presented with two opposing views. Surely two sides of something can’t both be correct at the same time, right? 

Life usually isn’t black and white on everything. If you’re trying to figure out the best way forward on something, and are looking at multiple options that seem to have no clear crossover, then that’s where the hard work of making decisions has to come in. 

It’s important when presented with all the information to make a decision. Then be willing to change that decision if it was wrong. 

Five projects are due next week. You’re a blocker for two teams across four of those projects. You need to hire three new team members to handle all the work going on, but you have no time to find that hire. 

What do you do?

You could work 12-15 hour days. You could find a new place to work. Or you could ignore most of what’s going on, focus on one or two things at a time, and deal with the fallout. Sometimes that last option is a decent one.

Here’s the thing. There’s not really a great answer. We all find ourselves in situations where there’s too much to do. In no particular order, here’s how I’ve found ways to deal with the insanity:

• Take a break – Every seven days, on Saturday, I completely disconnect from work. That means I won’t check my work email, Slack, Github issues, design updates, attend business calls, business conferences, etc. It’s a solid rule I’ve made for my whole career, and it’s one of the reasons I’ve kept from getting fully burned out. At times I’ve gotten close, but there was always knowing Saturday would come and I could disconnect for 24 hours. 
• Get help from your team –  It’s tempting to think we’re the only person in the world who can solve a problem. That’s not the case, not at all. If you work with others, or even if you’re completely on your own, chances are there’s someone out there who can help you. 
• Force constraints – Find a way to shrink the amount of work. There’s usually somewhere that fat can be cut without compromising the integrity of what you’re building. 
• Don’t overwork for too long – We’ve all done it where we worked a ton of hours for an extended period of time. The reality though is the quality of work absolutely suffers the more time we put in without rest. Sometimes it means deciding you’re done for the day and getting a full night’s sleep to tackle the problem with a fresh set of eyes.
• Be nice to yourself – You’re amazing. You’re doing wonderful work, you believe in what you’re building, give yourself a bit of a break. It’s going to be ok. 
• It will be ok – Yes, this is worth repeating. You’ll get through this. Keep up the great work!

On Friday I stepped away from work. Lots going on, but I had done what I could to get things in place for Monday. And with that, for the most part I was off until Monday morning. 

On Saturday our family spent some time in the afternoon hiking with friends out in nature. Part of that hike involved walking out onto a walkway into a marsh. It was beautiful.

The smoke (it’s getting better) in Washington lent a hazy yellow to the atmosphere, dulling the colors and adding a feeling of warmth to everything.

Looking back I have some wonderful photos of the kids, and a feeling of just getting away and taking a break. 

That’s important. We need times like this. 

If you’ve ever try to build something, at some point you’ll need to figure out what it should look like. As a result you’ll probably turn to creating a wireframe or prototype.

That’s a good thing. Try to get it into a visual medium (a sketch, a cardboard prop, a whiteboard diagram).

However, as you do that, always shoot for low fidelity. Meaning, keep it as rough and simple and quick for as long as possible. 1 minute invested into a napkin sketch means only 1 minute lost if you have to change plans. 10-20 minutes invested into a wireframe can just as easily be thrown away for a new idea. Once you spend the time to really get into the details and create a fully flushed out visual prototype you’ll quickly find you’ve become attached to it. At that point scrapping the whole thing is hard, almost impossible.

Try to stay simple and quick for as long as possible. 

There are times where we may feel that we have a bit too much going on. That might mean having a bunch of unactioned emails, unmarked todo list items, unread Slack messages (marked that way after taking a peak), or handful of text docs floating around.

At these times it’s easy for paralysis to set in. It’s impossible to take care of everything, so maybe we should just do… something else, instead of that. 

At times like these there are ways to prioritize, triage, and focus. The big thing to keep in mind is a correlation between how big a task looms in our mind based on how long we’ve held off on doing it. When that happens sometimes it helps to promise yourself that you’ll only spend 5 minutes on it, just to get started. 

Sometimes there are days where you’ve done it. You accomplished a herculean task. You got all the way through and by applying every last bit of energy you pulled off the impossible.

Days like that are magical, and unfortunately, can be rare. If you’ve reached that point in a day where it’s all come together – you’ve hit that deadline, delivered that project, solved that challenge – then give yourself a bit of a break. 

Take that time to count your victories, and celebrate. 

Just read a great idea to create sticky notes documenting your wins. 

Over the past few weeks I’ve been working with our team on several design related projects. Since we’re all remote, and only get a few opportunities a year to spend time in the same room, we need to find a way to work in collaboration. 

While it’s not quite a perfect system, remote paired designing is pretty amazing! Here’s how it works:

• Screen share – Using Zoom create a video conference room and share screens with the team member you’re going to design with. 
• Have a stylus – Connect your iPad (or other stylus device) and share it’s screen as a secondary device, then you can sketch live and wireframe while you talk through the problem with your team member. 
• Use Balsamiq in the cloud – If you go past sketching jump into something like Balsamiq and start throwing boxes and arrows around while you’re both talking and working through the design problems. 

Beyond that there’s some other interesting options out there: have a camera pointed at a whiteboard, use InVision Freehand, or similar. 

It’s great if you can have two people sketching at the same time or whiteboarding, or wireframing. But in practice I’ve found it can be a bit messy. At the moment it feels best to have one person do the majority of the sketching or wireframing, while both (or more) folks discuss together. 

It’s a bit of a circular game. You’re available to do stuff, so you say yes, and yes, and yes some more. Then pretty soon you’ve taken on too much, and things start to slip.

At first it’s just a little, barely noticeable. 

Then, over time you get used to it. The slipping becomes normal. Now you’ve gotten comfortable with medocrity in a bunch of areas, versus excellence in a few. 

You’re generous, understanding, and forgiving of your best friends. You understand when they mess up and aren’t able to meet everything they thought they could.

You’re there for everyone else, you’re making a difference for others, giving consideration for when things just couldn’t quite come together, and recognizing the frailty of humanity. 

So, why aren’t you doing that for yourself? Give yourself a bit of a break on things. You’re trying, you’re doing, you’re awesome and making a difference. Recognize that, celebrate it, and be as kind to yourself as you would be to your dearest friend. 

My son is five years old.

I’m busy. Life gets in the way. Work is always there, another conference call, another task, just one more email.

It never stops. It’s easy to keep going, to tell yourself that an extra couple of hours in the evening will make a difference.

But then my son sits there waiting. 

“Will you play with me now daddy?”

No, not right now. I need to take care of this thing that’s really urgent. 

Right now I’m a key figure in his life, and all he wants to do is spend time with me. He’s not asking for much.

One of his favorite times of the day (at least on days when he’s home from school) are the few minutes I can disconnect and play with him. 

It’s almost instant, his eyes light up when I tell him I can now play with him. 

How do I make sure I don’t miss this? How do I make sure I’ll be there for this? 

It’s hard. It’s a struggle. I want to spend time with him, and yet so many other things beckon for attention. 

What I’ve finally realized in recent months is that a daily habit is more important than grand gestures every few months.

Spending a few minutes in the evening, right before bed, is one of the easiest ways to make sure we can connect and do something together.

This is so easy, and I need to do it more.

I write this more as a note to myself. 

Today we spent 15 minutes playing a game together on the iPad. It’s not ideal, but it’s time together, and he loved every moment of it.

Is there something you care deeply about? 

Do you regularly find yourself frustrated with how things work?

Are you constantly thinking about ways to make something better?

Your voice should be shared. 

Even if you don’t feel that you’re the most qualified (hint: you rarely feel qualified), the impact you can create by sharing cannot be fully measured.

Recently a colleague of mine gave a talk at our company about an important topic related to privacy. We discussed the talk and the impact it made; taking a topic that some might not have paid as much attention to, and finding the angle to make it interesting and relevant.

I suggested he speak at public events with this topic. Initially he hesitated, citing some valuable reasons I can’t quite remember. 

What I felt impressed to do at that stage was push a bit harder and suggest he do the talk

He applied and was accepted.

Now, I know that I wasn’t the only reason for this happening, but I do recognize the value in personal connections and encouraging others to share their voice.

There’s a passage in the Bible where Paul, one of the early church leaders, talks about a problem in a community (1 Corinthians 3).

Apollos and Paul, two preachers who loved to share with others, were both teaching and preaching in the same general area. As a result some people started calling themselves followers of Paul, while others said that Apollos was the one they followed.

Paul’s counsel was to not call yourself a follower of either. Neither he nor Apollos could take credit for helping to share their belief, it was a slow process that took time. He said (my paraphrase) that one person could sow the seed of information, and another might come along and add water to help it grow. 

This reminds me of a situation I’ve run into often over the past few years.

Let’s say I have an idea that I want to share with a friend. I’m really excited about a new way to slice bread that I just read about. I tell my friend about it and try to convince them to try it.

A few months later my friend starts slicing bread the way I described.

Naturally I’ll be inclined to take credit for it.

However, what I could easily miss is that I was only one small step in her journey toward choosing to slice bread that way. I didn’t see the conversations she had with another friend about it, the time she looked it up and read about it on her own, and the fact that heard it mentioned two years before I said anything (but decided it wasn’t for her yet).

This is where humility should come in. My natural inclination is to get excited about something, and then share it with others. Over time I start to see results where friends adopt some of the ideas I’ve been sharing. While I may absolutely have been instrumental in their reasons for changing, I don’t know the whole story.

Ultimately it has to become the idea that my friend chooses to own themselves, and they likely came to that decision with lots of factors involved, not just my telling them.

So I’ll keep sharing about the new method of slicing bread, but with an understanding that I’m not the only one involved. Other people are also sharing things they care about!

March 2019 update: I’ve just purchased the 15L (got a 15″ laptop and the 10L featured here doesn’t fit it). I’ll be posting a followup in the coming months based on a new trip to share on my experience. 

Eureka! The perfect backpack exists, for me at least. Ok, I’ll try not to get too hyperbolic.

Choosing Goruck as a brand

I’ve researched a lot of ways to carry my stuff (junk?) from point A to point B. As a result I settled on wanting a somewhat small backpack as the sweet spot. That doesn’t mean a bag with wheels is out of the question (I love my Travelpro that I found on Craigslist). But it does mean I need a good bag to throw on my back when I go on a trip.

Picking the right size

Thanks to Ben from Brooks Review I was convinced Goruck was a solid choice. A backpack should be sturdy, have a small profile, and be visually understated. I ordered the GR1 and the Echo. The GR1 is a great midsize backpack that can carry a laptop and several days worth (easily) of clothes for a trip.

The Echo is like the GR1, but it’s short and squatty, like someone took the bottom and chopped it off. Since I’m 6’ 2” tall I decide the Echo would look too small on my back and returned it. I used the GR1 for a trip to Amsterdam and found it a nearly perfect fit for bringing a decent amount of stuff: clothes for 4-5 days, my DSLR camera, an iPad Pro and my MacBook Pro (along with other odds and ends). It’s just small enough that I can shove it under an airplane seat if absolutely necessary. However, in situations where I can pack lighter (Summer time), it’s too big for my needs.

Trying another size

So I decided to try the Goruck Bullet 10L. I tested it on a cross country trip for 4 days. I found that it fit my MacBook Pro (13 inch), iPad Pro, clothes for the trip, and a few accessories. The trip wasn’t quite perfect. I ended up tossing my clothes into a collapsible tote bag on the second day to make it easier to split up things during meetings. However, it was small and light, fit well under the airplane seat, and didn’t look silly on my back. It’s really perfect for specific situations.

GR1 is perfect for trips where I have to make compromises and bring more than I want. The Bullet is perfect for times when I can simplify on clothing and not bring a ton of electronics.

What I actually packed
(Minus what I wore to take the picture)

• 1 MacBook Pro (13 inch)
• 1 iPad Pro (12.9 inch)
• iPhone
• Cords and accessories for all three
• Small battery charger for the iOs devices (didn’t end up needing it)
• 1 pair of pants
• 1 pair of shoes
• 5 shirts
• 1 pair of shoes
• Running shorts
• Cubes for sorting clothes
• Belt
• 5 pair of underwear
• 3 pair of socks
• A few small food related items
• Glasses case
• Small quart ziplock with toiletries
• Wallet
• AirPods

Downsizing from here?

For my next trip I want to reduce the number of shirts I bring (Wool & Prince, 2 pair total), and find a pair of shoes that fit well for running and business casual. I’m also interested in only bringing my iPad (or getting a smaller iPad) or laptop, not both. I almost brought my Patagonia down jacket (it collapses into a small pouch), but decided Florida should be warm enough without it. I also left my water bottle at home.

Evernote, Apple Notes, Simplenote, TextEdit, Notepad++, Field Notes, Google Docs, Confluence.

Over the last decade I’ve tried out a lot of options for capturing notes. My perfect notes doc would:

• Be universal – It’s always with me, or easily accessible. This doesn’t necessarily preclude an analog option, such as my beloved Rhodia notebook, but it’s not going to always be with me.
• Fast – I should be able to start taking notes within a few seconds.
• Pastable – I write in one doc and have to paste in WordPress or Google docs. What does that look like?

So far I’ve never found the perfect solution. However, Bear is very nearly the closest to perfect I’ve found so far. Now if only Markdown was truly universal.

 

Earlier today I attended a talk by Adam Morgan, a senior Creative Director at Adobe. He shared why creativity and design matter, and why they deserve a seat at the table alongside logic and data.

The question that started the talk was, “do creative ideas work better?”. To find out the answer he discussed the differences between logic and emotion, the subconscious decisions our brain makes vs the conscious decisions, the linear vs connotational way of thinking, and the frontal lobe vs the rest of your brain.

Decision making

All of this led to the importance of considering both logic and emotion when making decisions. For example:

A logical decision

If you need to buy a potato peeler – you make a quick logical decision based on a few points of data. It’s that that difficult. 

An emotional decision

However, you’re going to buy a house, there are literally thousands of data points to consider that will make up your final decision. Is the crown molding the kind you want, is the location correct, how about the size of the lot, color of the walls, which direction does it face on the compass, do you have a good view of the sunset, is it an open floor plan, do you like the pain color, tile selections, the list is endless.

Your brain will take all these questions and work through reams of data in an instant. From all that data, which is really just 1s and 0s, you’ll make a “gut” decision on whether you like it; an emotional decision.

Anomalies

Our brains run on autopilot much of the time. Consider your daily commute. You probably don’t remember anything from the time you hopped into the car until you parked in your garage. But the moment you spot a car accident, your brain flies out of auto pilot and the command center takes over.

Our brains focus on anomalies in and fill in the rest of what we see what predictive models. In other words, you’re not really “seeing” most of your daily commutes, your brain is filling all that in and letting your run on autopilot.

Your brain has 86 billion neurons holding data, and that data is locked in with emotions. You can bring your brain out of auto pilot, in theory, with a logical data point. However, the best way to get all the neurons firing is to force an emotion.

If you see a red flame your brain checks its database to decide what that means, it finds a data point – hot fire, OUCH! – and uses that to help you decide you shouldn’t touch it. An emotion helped lock in that data point and helps make it easier to recall.

If you see a blue flame your brain might not have a data point to check against, so it flags it as an anomaly. It will then report that back to your command center to decide what to do with. Once you decide – yes it’s still hot, it’s similar to a red flame – it will burn a new memory to lock in later.

Emotions are powerful things! They create memory traces. If you want someone to remember your the work you’re creating, you can use emotion to help lock it in or retrieve it. Consider likability (versus negative advertising) and nostalgia for encouraging decisions.

Logic and emotion

Some decisions require logic, while others require emotion. This is where creativity needs a seat at the table; if you want to understand how the human brain makes decisions then you need to consider how emotion and anomalies fit into the picture.

The marketing gut is not dead. At Adobe they champion analytics through their own product, but they still use their marketing gut, along with the repository of past data, to help make decisions.

When you’re trying to decide what features or user interface to implement into a product, you should definitely consider all the data you have available. But don’t ignore the value of your own experiences and emotional feelings.

When it comes to measuring your creative ideas you should use data and logic to provide insight into where you’re going with the decision. From there focus on creating an experience and measure whether that experience hits the trigger for decision making with your audience.

Many companies are afraid to be creative and say they only make logical decisions. This is a fallacy; emotion is involved in much of our decision making at a subconscious level.

By avoiding creativity a company risks not connecting with their audience.

Conclusion

Companies are either relationship driven, process driven, or focused on product innovation. If your company is process driven then creativity will likely not be needed. But if you’re a product innovative company (like Adobe) or a relationship focused company, then creativity has the opportunity to thrive.

If you want to learn more, feel free to visit returnonidea.com; Adam will be publishing a book soon to expand on this topic!