Category

Strategy

StrategyTactics

Choices: the guts of ‘invention’

A songwriter can write an original song, but she doesn’t invent new notes. A painter can paint an original painting, but he doesn’t invent the colors. A writer can write an original story, but she doesn’t invent new letters. A chef can cook an original dish, but he doesn’t invent…
Chris Chambers
December 11, 2017
StrategyTactics

There’s more than one way to skin a…

Note: I am fascinated by LEGO® products . Always have been. And I recently learned some things that took the WOW factor up several notches. * There is a proprietary software used by LEGO Group that takes any image and transforms it into a 3-D image…a blueprint of LEGO bricks, layer by…
Chris Chambers
July 6, 2018
Strategy

Even without the vowels

See if you can read this sentence: “th brwn dg jmpd n th bx.” Studies show that you can. That even though the vowels are missing, your brain puts everything exactly where it should be. Have you ever tried to proofread a document that you’ve been working on for hours, even…
Chris Chambers
August 5, 2018
StrategyThe business side

Thousands of attempts

Thomas Edison made thousands of attempts before the light bulb actually worked. And it was great when it worked. And I’ve never heard anyone bemoan the thousands of failures. They were, dare I say, worth it to get to the end result. There’s this video that I love. And by love I mean, I might have…
Chris Chambers
September 5, 2018
Strategy

How nice, how aligned

As a parent of school age children, there is nothing more frustrating than the sudden realization that my kids are now getting their information from sources other than our family. When we were their one and only encyclopedia, things were good. It gave me this sublime sense of control. Even…
Chris Chambers
October 4, 2018
PeopleStrategyThe business side

Keep it in the jar

A friend of mine was telling me about her chicken soup. Or rather, the process of making it. It’s long and involved, and includes things like soaking the chicken in cold water with two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar for one hour before cooking it for 24. She cooks the…
Chris Chambers
October 11, 2017
Onsite ActionStrategy

Some things just aren’t contagious

Some things just aren’t contagious I was at lunch the other day with a good friend who is a chemist for IBM (he’s got like 10 patents under his name for them…so clearly he loves this stuff!). He was feverishly telling me about the advancement he just made in their…
Chris Chambers
March 11, 2017
Onsite ActionStrategy

Riffing to find new ways

A couple of weeks ago, I headed to New Jersey to hear my boss play. Besides his gig at WPP, he is a prolific jazz guitarist. On this night, he had pulled together a trio—his guitar, bass and drums—and as jazz musicians tend to do, they played together for awhile,…
Chris Chambers
January 11, 2017
Scenic/EnvironmentsStrategy

The cool is in the pudding

The Fonz. Arguably one of the coolest cats of our time. But not because of the leather jacket. It wasn’t the tight jeans. His hair. His bike. Or the fact that a single finger snap pulled hot chicks to him faster than the spark of a dumb idea lured Potsie…
Chris Chambers
September 13, 2016