Today was a big day for the Netherlands. Back in January, the Dutch Queen Beatrix decided to abdicate her throne to pave the way for the next generation of loyalty to take over. Today was her final day as queen, as her son Willem-Alexander became the new King and youngest monarch in Europe. As it
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Imagine if Buzz Lightyear walked up to you and wished you Happy Birthday at a Disney Park. Or if a smart app could predict when you might be hungry based on your last meal, and proactively send you an alert with a coupon to a restaurant you happened to be walking past. This vision of
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The “Ballbarrow” was never really a product destined for greatness. Replacing a wheel in a traditional wheelbarrow with a ball hardly qualifies as a groundbreaking technological innovation. But it does solve a problem. Great inventions usually do. And when James Dyson first created and produced his Ballbarrow, it was a hit with gardeners seeking an
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TurboTax is like the financial equivalent of anesthesia before a surgery … you know you are about to do something painful, but at least you can suffer a bit less. Yesterday was tax day in America, and for millions of users of the most popular tax software – it was a little easier to get this
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Simplicity always wins. If there is one lesson the modern business world teaches us, it is that complexity kills and simplicity wins. Apple, Flip Camera, Twitter, Uber, Walmart — all are examples of companies that owe their success at least in part to their ability to simplify a service or product to an extreme level.
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Last week no one cared what my Twitter name was – and I was thrilled about that. At dozens of social media centric events, the Twitter or Facebook or LinkedIn or Pinterest question has become the de facto proof of purchase. People write their Twitter names on their nametags. They try desperately to distill their
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Aziz Ansari wasn’t planning to stick around after his show for photos. Most of the people in the packed theater in Washington DC where I saw him perform his Buried Alive Comedy Tour last week probably weren’t expecting that anyway. Despite social media breaking down virtual barriers to conversations with unreachable people (and Aziz has
Continue reading »There are two kinds of coaches in sports. There are coaches who create a playbook before a game and follow it – and there are coaches who make their playbook for a game based on watching the game and making adjustments based on what is happening. Guess which kind of coach usually leads more successful
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For years I have given students in my classes at Georgetown one basic rule for writing assignments: there is no minimum word count. Why? Because the more words you use, the more likely it is that many of them will be meaningless corporate-speak. Today I’m excited to share that I’m part of the team behind
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