Faint Signal

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References

2030 – Guillén (2020)

A More Beautiful Question – Berger (2014)

A Whole New Mind – Pink (2006)

Abundance – Diamandis and Kotler (2012)

Antifragile – Taleb (2012)

Cognitive Surplus – Shirky (2010)

Connectography – Khanna (2016)

Creative Confidence – Kelley and Kelley (2013)

Cynefin – Snowden, et al. (2020)

Elastic – Mlodinow (2018)

Exponential Organizations – Ismail, et al. (2014)

Factfulness – Rosling, et al. (2018)

Frame Innovation – Dorst (2015)

Good Strategy Bad Strategy – Rumelt (2011)

Grit – Duckworth (2016)

How Big Things Get Done – Flyvbjerg and Gardner (2023)

How Do Committees Invent – Conway (1968)

How Innovation Works – Ridley (2020)

Ideaflow – Utley and Klebahn (2022)

Influence – Cialdini (2021)

Lessons from the Hanoi Hilton – Fretwell, et. al. (2013)

Letter to the American Church – Metaxas (2022)

Linked – Barabási, Frangos (2002)

Loonshots – Bahcall (2019)

Make It Stick – Brown (2014)

Martin Luther – Metaxas (2017)

Metaphors We Live By – Lakoff and Johnson (2008)

Mindset – Dweck (2006)

Moonwalking with Einstein – Foer (2011)

Movements That Move – Reach (2016)

Networks and Netwars – Arquilla and Ronfeldt (2001)

Never Split the Difference – Voss, Raz (2016)

Nudge – Thaler and Sunstein (2021)

Originals – Grant, Sandberg (2016)

Outliers – Gladwell (2008)

Persuadable – Pittampalli (2016)

Playing to Win – Lafley and Martin (2013)

Range – Epstein (2019)

Resilience Thinking – Walker and Salt (2012)

Simple Rules for a Complex World – Sull and Eisenhardt (2012)

Supercommunicators – Duhigg (2024)

Superforecasting – Tetlock, Gardner (2015)

Switch – Heath and Heath (2010)

Taking the Medicine – Burch (2009)

Team of Teams – McChrystal, et al. (2015)

The Black Swan – Taleb (2010)

The Box – Levinson (2016)

The Checklist Manifesto – Gawande (2009)

The Design of Everyday Things – Norman (2013)

The Fifth Discipline – Senge (2010)

The Great Upheaval – Levine and Van Pelt (2021)

The Infinite Game – Sinek (2019)

The Lean Startup – Ries (2011)

The Master Switch – Wu (2010)

The Molecule of More – Lieberman, Long (2018)

The Paradox of Choice – Schwartz (2009)

The Power of Habit – Duhigg (2012)

The Scout Mindset – Galef (2021)

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions – Kuhn (1962)

The Three-Box Solution – Govindarajan (2016)

The True Believer – Hoffer (2011)

The Tyranny of Experts – Easterly (2014)

The Tyranny of Metrics – Muller (2018)

The Voltage Effect – List (2022)

Think Again – Grant (2021)

Think Like a Rocket Scientist – Varol (2020)

Thinking in Systems – Meadows (2008)

Thinking, Fast and Slow – Kahneman (2013)

Transforming Mission – Bosch (2011)

Understanding Variation – Wheeler (1993)

What Matters Now – Hamel (2012)

When Helping Hurts – Corbett and Fikkert (2012)

Where Good Ideas Come From – Johnson (2011)

Writing to Learn – Zinsser (2013)

A missed signal is an opportunity wasted

Adaptability is the capacity of actors to manage the resilience of a system

Adjacent Possible is the edge of the future

All linked adaptive cycles govern the behavior of a system

All-Channel Networks can function without hierarchies

Ambiguity aversion favors the known over the unknown

An idea can fail in any number of ways

An idea is a new connection between two things

Analogical thinking uses a known example to explain something new

Anchoring Bias pulls an unknown value toward a known anchor

Antifragile systems are configured for adaptability

Antifragile Systems become stronger with shocks

Availability Heuristic overestimates likelihood of events

Backcasting works backward from a desired outcome

Bandwagon bias is social proof

Bed of Procrustes

Behavioral change fails when it requires absolute recantation

Black Swan events are rare, impactful, and retrospectively predictable

Blame Instinct hinders thinking by pointing fingers

Blue Ocean strategy creates demand

Causal Loop Diagrams model system dynamics

Centralized innovation is beset by two weaknesses

Centralized systems are efficient, not disruptively innovative

Challenges are now open, complex, dynamic, and networked

Communicating ideas requires overcoming the curse of knowledge

Compartmentalization blinds you to new possibilities

Complex adaptive systems are unpredictable and non-linear

Complex networks have unique topological features

Complex problems have many interconnected elements

Complex systems are characterized by VUCA

Complex systems exhibit emergent behavior

Complexifying overcomes binary bias

Concept Networks are the building blocks of thoughts processes

Concrete communication explains in terms of human actions and senses

Confirmation Bias defends one's assumptions

Constant change requires constant reformation

Course-correcting early and often

Creativity doesn’t look creative when you’re doing it

Credible communication carries its own credentials

Cynefin framework helps interpret systems

Decentralized systems accelerate innovation

Design Thinking is innovating routinely

Design thinking seeks to discover and solve the actual problem

Destiny Instinct hinders thinking by forgetting that small changes add up

Dichotomous thinking simplistically resolves ambiguity

Divergent ideas come from the right brain

Diversity of a system affects resilience

Double diamond implements design thinking

Dynamic problems add elements and shift connections over time

Efficiency is purchased by a loss in flexibility

Elastic Thinking can hold two contradictory ideas simultaneously

Elastic Thinking is parallel and integrative

Emotional communication makes people feel something

Every problem is an idea problem

Extrinsic rewards can crowd out intrinsic motivation

Faint signals are whispers from the future

Familiarity is not easily distinguished from truth

Fear Instinct hinders thinking by confusing risk with fear

Flexibility, simplicity and adaptability are simple rules of movements

Forecasting calculates the future from known data

Frightening and dangerous are two different things

Fundamental Attribution Error blames others and exonerates me

Fundamental insight can trigger disruptive innovation

Gap Instinct hinders thinking by ignoring the middle majority

General resilience depends on diversity, modularity, and feedbacks

Generalization Instinct hinders thinking by using misleading categories

Getting to Trusted

Globalization is a complex system

Grand strategies link means to ends

Groups whose identity is defined by changing a paradigm become committed to preserving the original paradigm

Halo effect is the tendency to like (or dislike) everything about a person

Hanlon's razor avoids paranoia and ideology

Human-centered design is the process of ensuring that people’s actual needs are met

Idea quotas foster creativity

Ideaflow is the single most important creative metric

Increasing efficiency tends to lock up a system

Institutions become committed to preserving the problem they were formed to solve

Integrative, Macroscopic Thinking is antithetical to higher education

Integrative, macroscopic thinking sees the forest and the trees

Inversion illuminates solutions by identifying what would make things worse

It is difficult to make someone understand what their salary depends on them not understanding

It is impossible to teach a man what he thinks he already knows

Kind vs. Wicked Learning Environments

Kinds of networks

Large systems tend to disintegrate during development

Lateral thinking is range in action

Lateral thinking with withered technology

Liquid Networks foster innovation

Listen to the Suck with Curiosity

Loss aversion values avoiding losses more than achieving gains

Maps of connectivity reveal strategic dynamics

Memory palaces use physical locations to improve memory

Metaphors form the basis of our ability to think

Metcalfe's Law defines network effects

Metric fixation invites gaming

Modularity of a system affects resilience

Monkey First principle dictates building the hardest part of the moonshot first

Motivated reasoning is the soldier mindset

Near misses lead to taking unwise risks

Negativity dominance processes the bad more thoroughly than the good

Negativity Instinct hinders thinking by emphasizing bad news

Networked problems influence each other

Networks at scale increase the number of links more than nodes

Occam's razor leads to first principles thinking

Open licenses provide 5 freedoms

Open problems have unclear or permeable borders

Opportunity Cost is the sum of all the benefits provided by the options not chosen

Organizations expand when prestige is correlated to budget size

Overton Window is a range of possibilities

Paradigm shifts create a new framework of thinking

Paradigm shifts reconstruct the field from new fundamentals

Paradigms can have phenomenal longevity

Pareto Principle leverages effort for maximum impact

Paternalism is doing for others what they can do for themselves

Perception is Reality

Perseverance balances faith and honesty

Positive Test Strategy reinforces Confirmation Bias

Post hoc ergo propter hoc

Power Law distributions

Premortem works backward from an undesirable outcome in order to prevent it

Pressure to meet a target value changes the system or the data

Prime directive of institutions is self-preservation

Prolifically creative people pursue a network of projects

Proximity to a threshold decreases the shock required to cross it

Psychological Safety is a prerequisite for creativity

Quality arises from quantity

Regression to the mean

Resilience is the capacity to absorb shocks and retain function

Resilience is the distance between the system and its nearest threshold

Resilience Thinking creates antifragile systems

Resilience Thinking embraces the reality that things change

Resilience Thinking understands thresholds and adaptive cycles

Resilient systems require both specified and general resilience

Rough Consensus enables forward progress

Scale magnifies complexity

Scenario Planning envisions the future

Scouts frequently update their maps

Selection Bias happens when the sample is not representative

Shifting paradigms requires macroscopic, integrative thinking

Simple communication expresses the core of an idea

Simple rules tame complexity

Single Perspective Instinct hinders thinking by having only a hammer

Size Instinct hinders thinking by considering a number without context

Small sample sizes means variations will fluctuate wildly

Specialization tends to reduce range

Specified resilience defends against known disturbances

Spiral of Silence means the price of speaking out rises over time

Status quo bias favors the current state

Story-based communication elicits effective responses

Straight Line Instinct hinders thinking by assuming trends will continue

Strategic forecasting guides decision-making and catalyzes innovation

Strategy is the answer to five questions

Substitution answers an easier, similar question instead

Sunk Cost Fallacy

Superforecasters think differently

Superforecasting is the intersection of range and mindset

Synthesis of innovation frameworks

Systems image their design groups

Systems mindset examines the quality of decisions, not just outcomes

Systems Theory studies the relationships and structure of systems

Systems Thinking perceives the relationships and structure of complex systems

Tactical Empathy understands another's feelings and mindset

Teachers of a tradition tend to resist its correction

The clarity of a map is not easily distinguished from its accuracy

The default carries immense power

The kernel of a good strategy includes three things

The map is not the territory

The taste of better things excites revolt

Three questions form the essence of innovation

Tools both illuminate and limit our understanding

Trailblazers amplify weak signals

Transformability is the capacity to create a new system

Tribalism is human nature

Trolley problem illustrates an ethical dilemma

Trustworthy vs. Trusted

Turkey problem illustrates erroneously predicting the future based on a false narrative of the past

Typologies underscore the most characteristic elements of a type

Understanding the systemic structure is powerfully generative

Unexpected communication violates expectations

Urgency Instinct hinders thinking by exaggerating a decision's urgency

Use of funding for training does not disrupt movements

Using emoji and memory palaces to memorize passages

Wicked problems are difficult or impossible to solve

Writing clarifies thinking

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The Master Switch – Wu (2010)

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title: The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires
authors: Tim Wu
year: 2010
publisher: Vintage
URL:

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Centralized innovation is beset by two weaknesses

Centralized systems are efficient, not disruptively innovative

Decentralized systems accelerate innovation