Category: personal AnGoL

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The Difference Between Good And Bad Organizations

seems like some place i know.

Me: “Do you know the difference between a good place to work and a bad place to work?”
Steve: “Umm, I think so.”
Me: “What is the difference?”
Steve: “Umm, well . . .”
Me: “Let me break it down for you. In good organizations, people can focus on their work and have confidence that if they get their work done, good things will happen for both the company and them personally. It is a true pleasure to work in an organization such as this. Every person can wake up knowing that the work they do will be efficient, effective, and make a difference for the organization and themselves. These things make their jobs both motivating and fulfilling.
“In a poor organization, on the other hand, people spend much of their time fighting organizational boundaries, infighting, and broken processes. They are not even clear on what their jobs are, so there is no way to know if they are getting the job done or not. In the miracle case that they work ridiculous hours and get the job done, they have no idea what it means for the company or their careers. To make it all much worse and rub salt in the wound, when they finally work up the courage to tell management how fucked-up their situation is, management denies there is a problem, then defends the status quo, then ignores the problem.”
via The Difference Between Good And Bad Organizations.

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The Secrets To Handling Passive-Aggressive People

With all due respect to these studies, it’s safe to say that PA (Passive Aggresive –gian) behavior is problematic and annoying. But whether it deserves to be defined as a bona fide mental illness — and subsequent stigmatization in society at large — seems debatable. Calls to restore its place as a formal pathology are indicative of the struggles of psychiatry to justify its (often qualitative, normative) definitions of mental illness. It’s important to draw a line between pathologizing PA behavior and figuring out how to deal with difficult individuals in one’s life. What’s more, it risks pathologizing compliant defiance in the face of authority, whether it be work-to-rule actions, the Occupy Movement, or (sadly) a potentially abusive home or work environment.
via The Secrets To Handling Passive-Aggressive People.

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rePost::There's a functional $1 million mech robot for sale on Amazon | The Verge

Bloomberg Businessweek journalist Brad Stone billed Amazon as “The Everything Store” in his 2013 book about the company. Now, here’s irrefutable proof: if you have ¥120,000,000 (about $1,020,000) handy, you can currently buy a rideable mech robot through Amazon Japan.
COMPLETELY NORMAL AND UNASSUMING
The robot is Kuratas, a passion project of Japanese blacksmith Kogoro Kurata that has been in development for several years. It’s 3.8 meters (12.5 feet) tall, weighs 5 tons, and should be able to scare the snot out of entire towns with aplomb. (Kurata bills the machine as a “toy,” but that seems like a liberal use of the term.) Its terrifying BB Gatling gun can rattle off 6,000 rounds per minute, set to trigger when the pilot smiles.
via There’s a functional $1 million mech robot for sale on Amazon | The Verge.

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Don’t overestimate the downside of risk — Medium

He’s been at it for three years, and he’s wondering — like many of the founders I meet with — what it will be like if he raises money.
“Will I have a board?” he asked.
“How often will we meet? What will their expectations be?” he quickly followed.
“How will things change?”
I thought for a minute before answering — something I’ve added to my Jedi skill set later in life — and told him “It will change.”
He looked at me and I realized he wanted the details. Was he ready for it, I wondered. Yes, he’s ready for it.
“You are going to have to learn to take bigger risks and get comfortable with failing more. You got one of those kids who has worked for you since the beginning, who has been super loyal and does anything you ask him to?”
“Yeah actually, we do” he replied.
“Well, you’re going to take the three jobs he’s doing poorly and hire three people to do them right — and there is a 50–50 chance there won’t be a place for him when you do.” I told him candidly.
“Hmmm… “ he replied. I could see it sinking in — things change.
“And you’re going to have to take $500,000 and come up with 10 really good ideas to try, knowing that eight of them are gonna fail. You’re gonna burn $400,000 big ones in a pile of ash — so that one or two ideas might transform the business. Those ideas will take you from $1m this year to $3m the next year — and $10m the year after. How many $50,000 crazy bets have you made in the last three years?” I asked.
Zero.
Of course, you can’t make crazy bets when you haven’t learned to turn off your fear. Just like Luke needed to face Vader in the cave trial and then in person, founders must face their fears … without feeling fear.
It takes time, and there is no silver bullet, but as my pal E told me once, “people overestimate the downside of risk, Jason.”
via Don’t overestimate the downside of risk — Medium.

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Man Saves Wife’s Sight by 3D Printing Her Tumor | MAKE

Balzer downloaded a free software program called InVesalius, developed by a research center in Brazil to convert MRI and CT scan data to 3D images. He used it to create a 3D volume rendering from Scott’s DICOM images, which allowed him to look at the tumor from any angle. Then he uploaded the files to Sketchfab and shared them with neurosurgeons around the country in the hope of finding one who was willing to try a new type of procedure. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he found the doctor he was looking for at UPMC, where Scott had her thyroid removed. A neurosurgeon there agreed to consider a minimally invasive operation in which he would access the tumor through Scott’s left eyelid and remove it using a micro drill. Balzer had adapted the volume renderings for 3D printing and produced a few full-size models of the front section of Scott’s skull on his MakerBot. To help the surgeon vet his micro drilling idea and plan the procedure, Balzer packed up one of the models and shipped it off to Pittsburgh.
via Man Saves Wife’s Sight by 3D Printing Her Tumor | MAKE.

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Human rights rewritten to jail Celdran | Inquirer Opinion

The appellate decision clumsily sidestepped this fatal defect by discarding Reyes and diluting “notoriously offensive” into “causes someone to feel resentful, upset or annoyed” in the ordinary sense. It astonishingly added, “whether he is a member of the particular religion concerned or not; whether he is present or absent thereat.” Not only does this contradict freshman criminal law classes, it rewrites free speech: The question of whether an idea is protected now depends on whether it upsets the audience. This rewrite destroys free speech because everything down to “The Earth is round” is potentially upsetting. Constitutional law prohibits the “heckler’s veto,” where an audience member claims to be provoked into a violent response, thus censoring the speaker when authorities ask him to stop to restore order.
via Human rights rewritten to jail Celdran | Inquirer Opinion.

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Metro Manilans are the favored offspring | Inquirer Opinion

The population in Metro Manila in 2012 was about 12.2 million. Assuming five per family, that means we have 2.4 million families, and the number of poor families was therefore 2.6 percent of 2.4 million, or 63,000 families.
How can 63,000 poor families generate daily ridership of at least 540,000 passengers a day for the MRT, and 560,000 passengers a day for the LRT1 (I don’t know what it is for LRT2)? Please.
In other words, the majority of the riders in the rail transit system are not poor. Keeping fares down subsidizes the nonpoor more than it helps the poor. If we want to subsidize the poor, charging everybody low fares is not the answer. And remember that the subsidy is being paid by Filipinos everywhere, who are probably poorer than their Metro Manila brethren. Also, remember that the fare increases will only reduce the total subsidy by P2 billion, or only one-sixth of it, according to estimates. So the Metro Manilans are still the favored offspring.
P-Noy, in his 2013 Sona, said, “Wala tayong balak magpamana ng problema sa susunod sa atin.” He is not going to export the problem to his successor. And he is not going to favor Metro Manilans at the expense of the rest of the Filipinos. Bully for him. I wish he would do it more often. In this, he is acting like a statesman, in contrast to the other politicians who, conscious of the Metro Manila vote, are standing on their heads trying to justify an unjustifiable situation.
via Metro Manilans are the favored offspring | Inquirer Opinion.

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Why the MRT Fare Hike is a step towards the right direction

Need Ideas. The MRT is the/a Government’s Subsidy to all the companies located at Makati Taguig and Ortigas while probably 70 of the work force lives in places as far as cavite/bulacan/pampanga/batangas/qc/caloocan/paranaque/muntinlupa.
The same people who bash the fare hike are probably against the concentration of wealth/business in metro manila. If we want to spread the wealth then we have to dismantle the hidden subsidies that support the primacy of Makati/Mandaluyon/Taguig Business Districts.
My Two Cents
 
As an aside I really need to learn to write in long form and well thought out essays. This like most of my one paragraph post could well be long form pieces except I have no time and skill to do such pieces yet 🙁

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How $50 Oil Changes Almost Everything – Bloomberg

Emphasis mine. I have to remember this on judging the performance of the next admin. If the price of oil hovers at 40 USD per barrel and our GDP growth is not anywhere near 7.6% then the next admin is probably failing.

 
If the price falls past $39 a barrel, we could see it go as low as $30 a barrel, said Walter Zimmerman, chief technical strategist for United-ICAP in Jersey City, New Jersey, who projected the 2014 drop.
“Where prices bottom will be based on an emotional decision,” Zimmerman said. “It won’t be based on the supply-demand fundamentals, so it’s guaranteed to be overdone to the downside.”
The biggest winner would be the Philippines, whose economic growth would accelerate to 7.6 percent on average over the next two years if oil fell to $40, while Russia would contract 2.5 percent over the same period, according to an Oxford Economics Ltd.’s December analysis of 45 national economies.
via How $50 Oil Changes Almost Everything – Bloomberg.

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CONVERSABLE ECONOMIST: Why Experts Buy Generic

Need to show this to the mrs.
 

The overall pattern is clear: those who are less knowledgeable are more likely to buy brand names, presumably because they feel that there is quality difference in doing so. Those who are more knowledgeable are more likely to go with generic equivalents, because they feel comfortable making their own judgements about quality–and then going with the lower price.
via CONVERSABLE ECONOMIST: Why Experts Buy Generic.