Week Notes 10 - 17 May 2024

This week

I facilitated a team’s second OKR check-in. We had some good conversation about the overlap between OKRs and project management. Remember: OKRs aren’t tactics.

I had a great conversation with a senior leader about when and how to start “layering” OKRs throughout an organisation.

I independently won my first government contract! 🎉 Now it’s time to actually deliver… 😎 Still lots of hoops to jump through before it’s actually signed but I’m allowing myself a modicum of enthusiasm.

The wonderful John Cutler has a terrific new podcast with a recent episode featuring my other techie idol Gene Kim with reflections on how Amazon is pulling back from it’s APIs-everywhere approach and revisiting the monolith.

My mother in law is visiting and gave me a terrific lesson on investing. It turns out it’s not not as terrifying as I thought. Now I’m probably trading too much but it’s good practice and I’m sure it will soon lose its shine (after I take some big losses).

I’m really looking forward to staying at Amaravati this weekend for Luang Por Sumedho’s 90th birthday! This week I published a short story of my path to buddhism and some Buddhist ideas I find useful.

The White Cube has a George Baselitz exhibition on right now. I popped in briefly while I was in the neighbourhood but was underwhelmed. These things usually deserve a longer second look.

I picked up a tattered old copy of My Ántonia at my local Oxfam Bookshop. I wasn’t ready to read it in highschool but I’m glad to have it now. It’s really making me feel nostalgic for the American west or at least my mental construction of it: Arches, Zion, The Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, Taos, Valley of Fire, and Nebraska for days. See more books I’m reading.

The northern lights made an appearance on my street (and over most of the Northen Hemisphere)! They were very subtle but it was my first time seeing them so I was thrilled.