second thoughts

OUT THROUGH THE IN DOOR

Paul Rutherford

Dec 9, 2019
3 min

OUT THROUGH THE IN DOOR

“There’s a lot worse out there.” E – a long-standing friend – was wondering whether he had one more career move in him. “Coming up to 20 years with the company, albeit under four different owners. “A lot of change, and there’s more to come. I wonder if I should get out before the new owners make that decision for me? “But while it isn’t perfect, there’s a lot worse out there.” E’s comments sent me on a flashback, to my first full-time job after graduation. The company owner g

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THE SELFIE TEST

Paul Rutherford

Nov 18, 2019
1 min

THE SELFIE TEST

Sometime when you're feeling important When your ego is fully in bloom. Sometime when you take it for granted You're the best qualified in the room. Sometime when you feel that your exit Will leave an unfillable space. Sometime when you cannot imagine How others will continue with grace. Take a bucket and fill it with water. Put your hand in it, up to the wrist. Pull it out - and the hole that's remaining Is the scope of how much you'll be missed. For Rutherposts direct to y

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CARPET BOMBING

Paul Rutherford

Jun 24, 2019
4 min

CARPET BOMBING

(It was early 1980s: I had my marketing degree, and a new job at an agency. Not long after my first day, I met Larry - a new client who was adding a security hardware business to his growing portfolio. I asked him how he started…) Larry’s first venture was selling carpets. His office was a back bedroom at home, his logistics operation was a white van. He gave the impression that he ran a big company because his wife answered calls by saying “this is reception”, and he had t

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BULLETS FOR CONVENIENCE

May 27, 2019
1 min

BULLETS FOR CONVENIENCE

Excerpt #2/2 from 'How PowerPoint is killing critical thought', an essay by British author, essayist, and documentary-maker Andrew Smith. He is the author of 'Moondust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth' (Bloomsbury 2009) and 'Totally Wired: The Wild Rise and Crazy Fall of the First Dotcom Dream' (Simon & Schuster 2013). '... PP can only present propositions and arguments as equations... They appear to have no owner; no one need feel responsible for them. In the post-ban

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FEEL THE MIND IN MOTION

May 20, 2019
2 min

FEEL THE MIND IN MOTION

Excerpt #1/2 from 'How PowerPoint is killing critical thought', an essay by British author, essayist, and documentary-maker Andrew Smith. He is the author of 'Moondust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth' (Bloomsbury 2009) and 'Totally Wired: The Wild Rise and Crazy Fall of the First Dotcom Dream' (Simon & Schuster 2013). 'I still remember the best lecture I ever attended. It was part of a joint series offered by the English and philosophy departments in my first term at

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THE GREAT JOB TITLE CHASE #6

Paul Rutherford

Apr 15, 2019
4 min

THE GREAT JOB TITLE CHASE #6

This series of ‘TGJTC’ blogposts was originally prompted by an email signed by the Chief Deputy Auditor. Not Deputy Chief (the second in line) but Chief Deputy. I imagine that there were more than one ‘Chief’ at that level too, just to keep everyone on their toes. TGJTC #1 started with my General Manager role, which was a misnomer at best. I’ll come back to that in a moment. Subsequent postings about VP, CMO, Director and Partner tried to give each some context, definition an

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SO MUCH WITH SO LITTLE

VERBAL VOCAL VISUAL XMAS

Paul Rutherford

Dec 10, 2018
4 min

VERBAL VOCAL VISUAL XMAS

It's that time of year, when that level of stress is felt on both sides of the sales counter. Trudging from shop to shop, the only thing that keeps me sane is reflecting on interpersonal behaviour - mine, the Shop Assistants', and everyone else. Hence I've been testing Mehrabian's theory about verbal and non-verbal communication. Scene 1 - The Bookshop. The Assistant stands in front of doors, opened under the stairs. It might be the entrance to Narnia. I've been a customer h

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STANDARD DEVIATION

Paul Rutherford

Oct 14, 2018
3 min

STANDARD DEVIATION

At the start of this week I noticed this bar graph (below). It had been reposted by a LinkedIn 'Strategic Advisor' and subsequently 'Liked' by several LinkedIn members. Suitably inspired, I posted an observation: "So what? Data without meaning." then sat back, like an angler waiting for a bite. It didn't take long. The next post appeared from C, who described himself a student intern at a large corporation. "In my view, the data shows that the world's most performance orienta

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PET. DISCOVERY

Paul Rutherford

Sep 17, 2018
3 min

PET. DISCOVERY

A venture fund investor asked me to look into a small company that had attracted him a couple of years before, now he wasn’t so sure. “Either the proposition is falling behind a fast moving market, or it’s the way the Founder addresses the market. Take up the drains and let me know what you find.” He was right about both. Founder wasn’t a bad person, just someone who was in love with the technology and had no interest in his customers. Of course, he wanted to sell his sol

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THE THREE BEARDS

EN GARDE!

Paul Rutherford

Apr 30, 2018
2 min

EN GARDE!

As I walked through a shopping mall earlier this week, a young woman sitting at her sales display called me across the concourse: "Do you know what we're doing here today?" Such a bizzare enquiry. Even now, I have no idea what she was pitching; I can remember a display of Victorian-style pharmaceutical drawers, and bottles set on the top, I think. As I close my eyes and try to recall, the display is a blur. Her question is more vivid. "Do you know what we're doing here today?

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MESS WITH SUCCESS

Paul Rutherford

Apr 16, 2018
8 min

MESS WITH SUCCESS

40 Books in 2018 Tim Harford MESSY 328pp Abacus 2016 The argument: that we often succumb to the temptation of a tidy-minded approach when we'd be better served by embracing a degree of mess. Harford weaves dozens of vignettes to illustrate his case. Here’s one from each chapter: COURAGE! (Chapter 4 - Improvising) When Martin Luther King Jr. started giving sermons as a young boy, he also began his lifetime habit of practicing. Before each Sunday sermon, he’d spend as much a

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HISTORY REPEATING

Paul Rutherford

Feb 25, 2018
5 min

HISTORY REPEATING

40 Books in 2018 Natalie Haynes THE ANCIENT GUIDE TO MODERN LIFE 275pp Profile Books 2010 “Caecilius est pater” That wasn’t much to remember after two years at ‘big school’ grappling with the orange-covered Cambridge Latin Books. At the time, I didn’t see the point of learning a dead language. Only when we were told that father Caecilius and his family had perished in Pompeii’s ashes did the interest level increase. Not that it had any impact on my summer exams. My percentage

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SNEAKER SCARCITY

Paul Rutherford

Feb 17, 2018
5 min

SNEAKER SCARCITY

40 Books in 2018 Robert Cialdini INFLUENCE 336pp HarperBusiness 2007 Jan and I are visiting our second son, BJ and his parter E in their new flat. Better equipped, decorated and furnished than anything we achieved when starting out. We’ve seen the Nespresso machine (that we gave as a Christmas gift, but we still haven’t had a coffee) the Playstation 4, the cleanser and conditioner collection in the bathroom cabinet - and the obligatory stacked occasional tables. And now we're

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REMEMBER, REMEMBER...

Paul Rutherford

Feb 5, 2018
6 min

REMEMBER, REMEMBER...

40 Books in 2018 Joshua Foer MOONWALKING WITH EINSTEIN 320pp Penguin Books December 1975. It must have been a Saturday because (a) my parents permitted to stay up late, and (b) we were watching Parkinson, a BBC chat show. Rather than a movie or sports star, a comedian or a musician, the week’s guest was an American called Harry Lorayne. He was described as a ‘memory man’. His warm up: knowing all the Oscar winners over the previous three decades (Best Picture, Director, Actor

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STOIC SUSPENSION

Paul Rutherford

Nov 6, 2017
3 min

STOIC SUSPENSION

Epictetus (55-135 CE): a Greek/Roman philosopher and perhaps the most influential teacher of the Stoicism school. Not bad for someone who started life as a crippled slave, was subsequently expelled from Rome, and never wrote a word. Academics know of him through two volumes composed by his student Arrian - The Discourses and The Enchiroden (aka 'Handbook'). A wider audience found him at the start of the C20th through The Golden Sayings of Epictetus, a sort of greatest hits

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HIDDEN SUBJECT

Paul Rutherford

Aug 14, 2017
6 min

HIDDEN SUBJECT

12 ANGRY MEN Twelve jurors are set the task to reach a verdict on a teenage Hispanic boy who has just been tried for the murder of his father, with a guilty verdict sending him to the electric chair. There must be a unanimous verdict on a capital case. The jury foreman (Juror ONE - no character is named) asks for a preliminary vote: ONE - . . . nine . . . ten . . . eleven . . . That’s eleven for guilty. Okay. Not guilty? (EIGHT’s hand is raised.) One. Right. Okay. Eleven

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MIAMI TO MINSK

Paul Rutherford

Jul 17, 2017
3 min

MIAMI TO MINSK

For almost 30 years, there was only one Xerox 914 copier in the Kremlin. It was kept in a locked room and could only be used by authorised, card-carrying members of the Communist Party. Each document had to be approved, registered and signed. The apparatchik may have been frightened about information sharing, but they certainly looked after their limited resources. Their 914 machine eventually logged over 10 million imprints. The engineering may have kept going, but the p

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NEVER USE JARGON

Jul 3, 2017
1 min

NEVER USE JARGON

Excerpt from 'How to Write Well', by David Ogilvy 1. Read the Roman-Raphaelson book on writing. Read it three times. 2. Write the way you talk. Naturally. 3. Use short words, short sentences and short paragraphs. 4. Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass. 5. Never write more than two pages on any subject. 6. Check your quotations. 7. Never send a letter or a memo on the day you write i

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