In the opening pages of his private journal, Marcus Aurelius β the most powerful man in the Roman world, commander of its armies, the Emperor himself, answerable to almost no one β sits down and lists what he owes to the people who shaped him. Near the top of that list: gratitude to his teacher Rusticus, for introducing him to the teachings of Epictetus, and lending him his own personal copy to study. Epictetus was born a slave. Two very different lives, one shared discipline Epictetus spent...
about 1 hour agoΒ β’Β 2 min read
Most incentive thinking happens backwards. Something breaks β a team stops collaborating, a good employee starts cutting corners, a partner quietly deprioritises you β and only then does anyone ask what's actually rewarding it. Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett's business partner of over fifty years and Vice Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway until his death in 2023, built his reputation on exactly this kind of question. His most quoted line: "Show me the incentive and I'll show you the outcome."...
5 days agoΒ β’Β 2 min read
What I focus on and write about in these Insights traces back to two sources. One died in 2023. The other has been dead for roughly two thousand years. Neither was writing for the modern workplace. Both describe it with uncomfortable precision. The question about everyone else Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett's business partner for over fifty years, built his reputation on one question: what is actually being rewarded here, regardless of what's being said? "Show me the incentive and I'll show...
5 days agoΒ β’Β 2 min read
In March 2026, Nvidia's CEO stood on stage and declared "the ChatGPT moment for physical AI is here." A few months later, Figure's humanoid robots were running logistics sequences at a BMW plant, receiving spoken instructions, and verbally confirming them before acting. Tesla's Optimus is doing battery cell sorting on the Fremont line. Boston Dynamics' electric Atlas is deployed at Hyundai. None of this was science fiction eighteen months ago. All of it was science fiction eighty-four years...
5 days agoΒ β’Β 2 min read
OK, I rested. And what now? You did it. You actually switched off. No Slack. No email at breakfast. Maybe even a few days where you forgot what day it was. Good. That was the point. Now what? The problem nobody talks about Most leaders return from vacation the wrong way. They sprint back in β inbox zero missions, back-to-back catch-up meetings, a week of reactive chaos. Within 72 hours, every benefit of the break has been erased. The energy is gone. The clarity has vanished. And they're left...
10 days agoΒ β’Β 5 min read
These are nine of the books I've returned to over time, some every summer, some in hard moments, some when I needed to be reminded of what actually matters. So I want to share them with you as a meaningful summer reading list because the best things I've ever received came from someone saying: Here, this changed how I see things. Maybe it'll do the same for you. Before we get to the list, a word about the thread that runs through it... Most of us think of philosophy as something that happens...
10 days agoΒ β’Β 5 min read
There. I said it. And before you dismiss this as motivational fluff β let me be clear. This isn't about being lazy. This is about performance. Your long-term performance. And the science on this is unambiguous. The illusion of the always-on leader After more than twenty years in tech β Microsoft, Salesforce, Databricks β I've watched exceptionally talented people run themselves into the ground. Not because they were weak. Because the culture rewarded it. Long hours became a badge of honor....
10 days agoΒ β’Β 4 min read