Quotes

It took me a while to realise that finding a compelling story around a problem to be solved is often way more important than its technical solution. Each problem and each solution is observer-dependent, and a well-written question understood by most observers is the first step towards progress.

Creating big visions while delivering meaningful steps is a difficult balancing act across all disciplines. Gall’s Law can be seen as the foundation of agile software development, and you see it in biological systems as well: humans were not created top-down; well-proven functional units such as single-celled organisms evolved into more complex systems over time.

I find this applies very well to big organisations: entire departments or authorities can degrade into doing something, but nothing reasonable. Niklas Luhmann observed that organisations rarely function by their formal rules alone: they also rely on sensible deviations from them, which he called brauchbare Illegalität, “useful illegality” [3]. So for every rule, I ask: what does it intend to protect? Does it still serve that purpose? And if not, how can it be improved to serve it better again, for example to ensure both safety and progress? I do this to avoid enforcing rules that no longer fulfil their own purpose.

Complex modelling is nice, but sometimes common sense and reflective thinking are the best advice.

Art, for example, can be valuable to oneself, even if it meets no criterion of importance: not monetary metrics, not how many people see it, not how good it is from any kind of perspective. You need not aim to become the best guitar player for playing the guitar to be meaningful to you.