The Strange Economics of Free Food
Excerpt:
Put a tray of donuts on a conference table and charge a dollar each. Half the room passes. The other half debates it. Make them free — and suddenly everyone eats a donut. At least one person eats three. The colleague who swore off sugar is on their second before the meeting starts. Nothing about the donuts changed. Only the price did.
The Office Chair Market Is Completely Unhinged
A self-described non-complicated consumer walks into a university procurement showroom to pick an office chair. What follows is an afternoon of unnecessary lever-pulling, questionable lumbar decisions, and the slow realization that the $17 billion office chair market has opinions about your spine that it will not keep to itself.
Stay a Student: The One Habit That Never Stops Paying Off
Experience is invaluable. But it is not infallible. Here’s what happens when we confuse the two — and the one habit that keeps you growing no matter how much you already know.
Think You Have Good Judgment? There’s a Test for That.
Most leadership assessments tell you how you communicate or show up. The Judgment Index did something different. It showed me how I think, where I create friction without realizing it, and why self-awareness matters more than I thought.
What People Who Love Their Jobs Have in Common
Most people who genuinely love their jobs are not doing glamorous work. They are teaching someone, healing someone, building something, or keeping something important from falling apart. I asked a simple question online and got 66 answers back. Underneath the wildly different job titles was the same pattern: people love work that matters, work they have gotten good at, and work they have stayed with long enough to see the impact.
When Was the Last Time You Did Absolutely Nothing?
We pride ourselves on being efficient. On getting things done. On keeping seventeen balls in the air without dropping any. And yet the best decisions I’ve ever made didn’t come from meetings or data or planning sessions. They came from doing absolutely nothing — and that’s the part nobody wants to talk about.
Why I Miss Clinical Veterinary Practice Nine Years Later
I thought I was signing up for some charming British television, a little nostalgia, and a few comments about how veterinary medicine has changed since the 1930s. Instead, I found myself looking backward. Somewhere between Darrowby and Des Moines, I realized that for the first time in nine years, I genuinely missed clinical practice.
March Madness, Wrestling Mats, and the Machine vs. the Mirror
This past weekend was a sports buffet of two completely different kinds of pressure. On one side, 68 basketball teams, a million busted brackets, and coaches pacing like caffeinated chess masters. On the other, the NCAA wrestling championships — where the conversation is considerably simpler. There is the mat. There is another person. One of you is about to have a much better evening than the other. What kind of competitor are you — and where did you learn to be that?
Why Side Businesses Are for Everyone—Yes, Even You
A side business isn’t really about the money. It’s about changing how you think.
The moment you create something from nothing—a client, a sale, a small stream of income—you start to see the world differently. Problems become
opportunities. You stop thinking like an employee and start thinking like an owner.
The money is just the scoreboard. The real return is who you become in the process.
Don’t Sleep on the Mailbox
In a world drowning in digital ads and overflowing inboxes, a glossy piece of cardstock stopped me cold last Saturday. Direct mail still works. Here’s why I know.