I recently spent a month living with my 94 year old parents, after being isolated from them for over two years due to the COVID pandemic. Here are some of the lessons I learned: Fitness Stay physically and mentally active, fit and flexible to the greatest possible extent Get outside frequently. At least every day,…
Continue reading →Starting up a business is hard. Being a founder can seem like a pan-galactic ultra marathon. Here is a list of things you can do to attain and maintain good mental health, including achieving a good overall attitude, maintaining focus, looking after yourself, making space for regeneration, dealing with uncertainty, getting help, and dealing with failure.
Continue reading →What does great leadership look like in a crisis? Read on for an analysis of Jacinda Ardern’s leadership of Aotearoa / New Zealand’s response to COVID-19, and some lessons for how we can become great leaders ourselves. On Monday 23 March 2020, NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced sweeping new measures to combat the effects…
Continue reading →A friend recently reminded me that I’d given this talk at the National Interfaith Forum over 11 years ago. Oddly, the subject has come up a number of times for me over the last few weeks, in the context of how we should develop and celebrate tolerance. But is tolerance enough? Read on… “Beyond Tolerance”…
Continue reading →On the proposed regulation of social media platforms In the wake of the Christchurch Mosques terror attacks on 15 March 2019, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has said that social media platforms must take responsibility for the material that they distribute, that they are the publisher, not the postman. More specifically, We will look…
Continue reading →I was having office hours today with one of the startups I work with, and asked the founder how he was going on sales. He responded by saying that things were slow, as he was preparing thoroughly for the next phase. He quoted Abraham Lincoln: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and…
Continue reading →Today I’m participating in a meeting called Optimistic Futures, organised by the Service Innovation Lab, InternetNZ, and Victoria University – three organisations with which I have an association. Here is my own broad vision for what I’d like the world to look like in 2070. We have solved the big, wicked problems. The environment is…
Continue reading →Natalia Pritchard recently set up a NZGovTech Meetup to collect ideas from New Zealanders for projects that the D5 countries could work on together. At the meetup, people were invited to pitch their ideas, with the best ones being selected for further development. Along with Natalia and Michael Thornton, I proposed that the D5 set…
Continue reading →I was contacted by Radio New Zealand this morning, who asked if I had any thoughts about Lorde’s recent decision to cancel her concert in Tel-Aviv, in support of BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions). This is what I told them. It’s complicated. A lot more complicated than most people can take in or are willing…
Continue reading →Our home landline phone number gets switched off today. When we got our first landline, it was provided by the Post Office. We had a four-week wait – I guess they were too busy delivering letters. When we got our current number after moving into the neighbourhood, it was only six digits. We got a…
Continue reading →