- TIME MIS-MANAGEMENT AT THE LEADERSHIP LEVEL CAN HAVE CRITICAL IMPACTS on productivity and organizational results, particularly from “Initiative Overload… since Leadership time too often gets treated as though it were limitless, with all good opportunities receiving high priority, regardless of the human capacity to drive them forward… New projects which get heaped on top of ‘day jobs’ may well result in a variety of unintended consequences, including failed initiatives when Leaders don’t have time to engage the people whose cooperation & commitment they need; eventually they may lack energy for even those most basic and rewarding.” DCG have decades of expertise in this area, and Dennis provides courtesy ‘Lunch & Learn’ sessions in the Time Management area. We can help. [McKINSEY CLASSICS – 9/19]
- ‘COOTIES,’ A CENTURY OLD GAME, CONTINUES TO EVOLVE and “says a good deal about what 6-year-olds think of the opposite sex.” The word first related to body lice that infected WWI soldiers, but current versions involve “catching cooties by touching in a game of tag, ‘treatment’ with an origami ‘cootie catcher’ or by vaccination from a retractable pen, and a ‘cootie chant’… To historians and social scientists, the phenomenon isn’t just child’s play. Kids, after all, are their own ‘semiliterate society’ with their own cultural touchstones… Like a real virus, cooties mutate and will likely be around for as long as children have insecurities to play out.” [SMITHSONIAN.COM – 5/19]
- “IMAGINE A WORLD where all knowledge, fun & utility of smartphones were instantly accessible and hands-free… Where neural interfaces that link human brains to computers using artificial intelligence allow people to read others’ thoughts – effectively making people telepathic at a conceptual level.” According to Elon Musk, his Neuralink company is leading this development, predicting that “a decade from now, the ability to type directly into our brains may be accepted as a given,” and that by 2040 this technology “will ultimately achieve a sort of symbiosis with artificial intelligence.” The impacts of this direction are causing increasing concern in two areas: (a) Ethical – protecting privacy & preventing undue surveillance; and (b) Technical –“what it means to be human when implantable chips take control of decision processes, is that person now part-machine?” [INDEPENDENT.CO.UK – 9/10/19]
- LATEST ON TATTOO RISKS: The percentage of Americans with tattoos now exceeds 50%, with one-in-five having six or more, despite studies finding that “pigments can leach to accumulate in lymph nodes… and that fragments from tattoo needles can break off during the process, become embedded in the skin, and cause allergic reactions which also might be carcinogenic.” [THE WEEK – 9/20/19]
- THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK: “Patience is becoming exceedingly rare in modern society,” as people have become spoiled in the convenience of digital technology – particularly smartphones & on-demand TV. A 2000-adult survey in Britain found “all it takes is mere seconds of waiting for people to lose their cool:” 16 seconds waiting for a web page to load; two seconds if a show or movie isn’t streaming correctly; 25 seconds waiting for a traffic light to change.
