Most Popular Editorials: The Long History of Japan's Tidying Up

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The Long History of Japan's Tidying Up Japan's fastidiousness in matters of cleaning struck outside observers from the earliest moments of contact. Commodore Matthew Perry, whose gunboat diplomacy opened Japan to the West in 1854, marvelled at the organization of the streets in the port city of Shimoda and "the cleanliness and healthfulness of the place." The British diplomat Sir Rutherford Alcock noted "a great love of order and cleanliness" in his "Narrative of a Three Years Residence in Japan," from 1863, and, a few years later, the American educator William Elliot Griffis commended "the habit of daily bathing and other methods of cleanliness." If Marie Kondo's book sales are an indication, Westerners haven't lost their fascination with this aspect of Japanese culture. But her work is just the most recent manifestation of a long tradition of cleanliness, one that reaches a zenith in the ohsoji, the "great cleaning" that is carried out at the end of December in anticipation of the New Year. Continued here

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What Happens When Your Career Becomes Your Whole Identity Dan*, a partner at a major Boston law firm, was due at the office, but instead, he was curled on his bathroom floor, unshaven and in his pajamas, crying into a towel. It began slowly, in a meeting with a particularly pushy client, when a thought bubbled up in his mind: "Why the hell am I even here?" From that moment, he noticed that his impatience, unhappiness, and frustration with his job grew deeper, until all at once, he realized: he didn't find happiness or fulfillment in his work - and maybe he never had. For someone who had built his entire idea of himself around his career, this thought sent Dan into an existential crisis. Who was he, if not a high-powered lawyer? Had he wasted so many years working for nothing? Would he have had more friends and a happier family if he hadn't spent all those nights at the office? Continued here

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How to Make People Trust You If you were to take the title of this post literally it would be my shortest post ever. That's because you cannot MAKE someone, anyone, trust you. That's not within your control. But what is within your control is making yourself trustworthy. You have control over doing things that people will feel makes you a safe bet in the trust area. You also have control, complete control, over not doing things that would cause people to lose trust in you. If you want to be seen as trustworthy then you must honor your commitments. You must do what you say you will do and you must do it when you said you would. Every time you fail in this area you cast doubt on the next commitment you make. It doesn't take long before your commitments are worthless. Remember that... it doesn't take long. Continued here

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Adam Grant: Stop Giving Advice and Start Doing This Instead Don't refuse to offer others guidance. Just do it differently.Warren Buffett's father told him not to go into securities. Oprah was warned moving to Chicago would destroy her career. Lyft co-founder John Zimmer was advised to give up on the transportation sector. These stories of celebrities' being told to not do the very thing that later made them hugely successful are entertaining, but they also illustrate a larger point. Bad advice is incredibly common. This isn't just due to ignorance or outdated information, though that's a huge issue. As investor Paul Graham has said, "When experts are wrong, it's often because they're experts on an earlier version of the world." It's also because of systematic biases in how we ask for and dole out advice. Yale research shows people are more risk averse in their recommendations than in their own actions. Doctors recommend more screenings than they themselves get, and financial advisers are more aggressive on their own behalf than when managing clients' money. Other studies show we often seek out advice from those who are friendliest rather than those who are most competent. Continued here

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Is Sitting the New Smoking? A Harvard Professor Debunks the Myth, With One Catch Sitting at work? Not such a big problem. Sitting when you're not at work? That's another story. I've written before about the laundry list of reasons that sitting for long periods of time can be really, really bad for you. Like studies that show sitting all day won't just make you fatter, it can also make you dumber. Or that when you sit for the majority of the day, your risk of cardiovascular disease doubles compared to people who stand. Or that if you sit for more than six hours a day you could be 18 percent more likely to die from diabetes, heart disease, and obesity than people who sit less than three hours a day. Or that -- and this one is literally a killer -- if you sit for more than 11 hours a day, you could be up to 40 percent more likely to die in the next three years compared to people who sit for less than four hours. Yep: Sitting is really, really bad for you. Kind of. Continued here

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Starting Your Trading Career? Three Important Requirements For Your Success. If you're considering becoming a trader, this simple guide reveals the profit behind the profession.Being a professional stock trader used to be out of reach for most people. Not anymore. With smartphones, anyone can now potentially turn this hobby into a viable professional career. I should know. I began trading back in 2013 and it's now my full-time profession, along with running my trading communities, Bear Bull Traders and Peak Capital Trading. Just like starting any new business, jumping in without preparation is asking for disappointment. I've realized there are three things every trader MUST have in place if they want to turn a side hustle into a successful entrepreneurial venture. Continued here

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The Psychology Behind Sibling Rivalry You can't avoid fighting. You can only hope to contain it.My 4- and 8-year-old are closer now than they were before the pandemic - I hear the sounds of giggling wafting from their bedroom several times a night. But the more time my girls spend together, the more they fight, too. The most common battlegrounds for my kids are perceived injustices and jockeying for position. The most absurd instance of the latter was when we were waiting to get flu shots this past fall. The girls got into a brawl over who received the first shot. My older daughter "won" that argument, but it was only as she was walking toward the pharmacist's door that she realized a shot was not actually a prize. Continued here

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The Power of Small Wins What is the best way to motivate employees to do creative work? Help them take a step forward every day. In an analysis of knowledge workers’ diaries, the authors found that nothing contributed more to a positive inner work life (the mix of emotions, motivations, and perceptions that is critical to performance) than making progress in meaningful work. If a person is motivated and happy at the end of the workday, it's a good bet that he or she achieved something, however small. If the person drags out of the office disengaged and joyless, a setback is likely to blame. This progress principle suggests that managers have more influence than they may realize over employees' well-being, motivation, and creative output. The key is to learn which actions support progress - such as setting clear goals, providing sufficient time and resources, and offering recognition - and which have the opposite effect. Continued here

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What Resilience Means, and Why It Matters A small but intriguing new survey by a pair of British consultants confirms the importance of resilience to business success. Resilience was defined by most as the ability to recover from setbacks, adapt well to change, and keep going in the face of adversity. But when Sarah Bond and Gillian Shapiro asked 835 employees from public, private, and nonprofit firms in Britain what was happening in their own lives that required them to draw on those reserves, they didn't point to tragedies like the London Tube bombings, appalling business mistakes, the need to keep up with the inexorably accelerating pace of change, or the challenges of the still-difficult economy - they pointed to their co-workers. A whopping 75% of them said that the biggest drain on their resilience reserves was "managing difficult people or office politics at work." That was followed closely by stress brought on by overwork and by having to withstand personal criticism. Continued here

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How to overcome "functional fixedness" and other biases that get in the way of creativity On the evening of April 14, 1912, the RMS Titanic collided with an iceberg in the north Atlantic and sunk two hours and 40 minutes later. Of its 2,200 passengers and crew, only 705 survived, plucked out of 16 lifeboats by the Carpathia. Imagine how many more might have lived if crew members had thought of the iceberg as not just the cause of the disaster but a life-saving solution. The iceberg rose high above the water and stretched some 400 feet in length. The lifeboats might have ferried people there to look for a flat spot. The Titanic itself was navigable for a while and might have been able to pull close enough to the iceberg for people to scramble on. Such a rescue operation was not without precedent: Some 60 years before, 127 of 176 passengers emigrating from Ireland to Canada saved themselves in the Gulf of St. Lawrence by climbing aboard an ice floe. It's impossible to know if this rescue attempt would have worked. At the least it's an intriguing idea - yet surprisingly difficult to envision. If you were to ask a group of executives, even creative product managers and marketers, to come up with innovative scenarios in which all the Titanic's passengers could have been saved, they would very likely have the same blind spot as the crew. The reason is a common psychological bias - called functional fixedness - that limits a person to seeing an object only in the way in which it is traditionally used. Continued here

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The Rich Kids Who Want to Tear Down Capitalism Socialist-minded millennial heirs are trying to live their values by getting rid of their money.Lately, Sam Jacobs has been having a lot of conversations with his family's lawyers. He's trying to gain access to more of his $30 million trust fund. At 25, he's hit the age when many heirs can blow their money on harebrained businesses or a stable of sports cars. He doesn't want to do that, but by wealth management standards, his plan is just as bad. He wants to give it all away. "I want to build a world where someone like me, a young person who controls tens of millions of dollars, is impossible," he said. A socialist since college, Mr. Jacobs sees his family's "extreme, plutocratic wealth" as both a moral and economic failure. He wants to put his inheritance toward ending capitalism, and by that he means using his money to undo systems that accumulate money for those at the top, and that have played a large role in widening economic and racial inequality. Continued here

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In Bad Times, Decentralised Firms Outperform Their Rivals When there’s increased turbulence, delegating power improves sales and productivity, boosting a firm's chance of survival. Imagine a ship at sea, at risk of sinking in a tempest. Is it better to empower the crew to do whatever it takes to save the ship, or should every decision be made by the captain and top officers? Similarly, what should the optimal form of firm organisation be during a severe downturn? The need to make tough decisions - including layoffs - may favour firms that concentrate power at the top. However, the turbulence and fast-shifting conditions magnify the value of the information held by local managers. The two views can be compelling. Indeed, in the depths of the Great Recession of 2009, a survey of executives by The Economist Intelligence Unit revealed that decision making had become more centralised in the C-suite. The rationale: to emphasise "projects that provide benefits across the enterprise rather than individual units". But in another report three months earlier, the same publication argued that "companies have to deal with dramatically more uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity in the current recession. Success does not come from centralisation." So who should be in charge: the crew or the captain? Continued here

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Leadership Is Like Engineering: You Need to Start with Why To address user challenges, they must first be understood. These principles of why, what and how also apply to management, especially in turbulent times.In times of uncertainty, it is crucial for leaders to rally around the why behind their mission. There is a tendency to overlook the why when decisive action is needed, but it is essential to steering the course of the business. The why illuminates what needs to be done and how it can be accomplished. The why gives the whole team a sense of purpose. As Friedrich Nietzsche is quoted as saying, "He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how." Over the past decade, my perspective on leadership has been guided by one simple mantra: Start with why, inspired by the book of the same title by Simon Sinek. In my time as an engineer, starting with why was fundamental to tackling every new product or feature. Starting with why meant understanding the pain points of the user and defining the success criteria for addressing the pain points. From there, we could specify the functionality needed (the what) and set a plan for developing the product (the how). As I became a leader, I found that these same principles apply to management - always, but especially in turbulent times. Continued here

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How to Successfully Market a 'First-of-Its-Kind' Product With Confidence Customers are often willing to forgive a few bumps along the way when your product is brand new as long as they know you are working on improving the user experience.When it comes to launching a product, finding ways to stand out from the competition is essential. For many e-commerce platforms, differentiation comes from finding elements that make your product unique from others that are similar to it -- such as creating a "minimalist" wallet, for example. But what if you are introducing a product that is truly new? That nobody else in your industry has attempted? In this case, the challenge isn't proving that your product is better than or different from your competitors'. Instead, you have to give customers a compelling reason to try out something they've never considered before. By homing in on some marketing fundamentals, you can get your product off to a quality start. Some tips: Continued here

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How to Help Your Spouse Cope with Work Stress Even if you're able to leave your projects and worries at the office, your spouse or partner may have difficulty doing so - and that stress can rub off on you. How can you help your partner cope? For starters, you need to listen. Show engagement and empathize. Figure out what they need from you. Sometimes they may just want to vent; other times they may need your advice. If you're unsure of your role, ask, "Do you need my help? Or do you just want to be heard?" Play career coach - but do so judiciously. If you get a sense that your partner is misreading a situation at the office or is stuck in a rut, ask questions to broaden their perspective. Whatever you do, never compare your spouse's stressful day to your own. Stress endurance is not a competition. Continued here

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The Best Tech Podcasts for Software Developers in 2021 Podcasts are a great way to learn about tech on the go. They can expose you to a broad array of tools and concepts. Since I started learning to code back in 2012, I have listened to thousands of hours of technology podcasts - usually while exercising or commuting. Many of these podcasts are still going strong. And this article will focus on these time-tested learning resources. A note before we get started: before you start tweeting at me about how I left off your favorite podcast, note that I intentionally excluded most business- and news-focused podcasts. Instead, I've zeroed in on podcasts that are run by developers, and with developers in mind as the core audience. I can say with confidence that all of these podcasts are solid. If you are a developer, or are interested in becoming a developer, these podcasts will entertain you and enlighten your commutes. Enjoy. Continued here