When We Know More

William Blake | Sidenotes | Factoids | Elsewhere

Quote of the Moment

Reason, or the ratio of all we have already known, is not the same that it shall be when we know more.

| William Blake

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I’m late and short in this issue. Traveling this week for the worst of reasons: a funeral. Therefore making this free for all.

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Sidenotes Would improve Substack. Here’s Why.

Here’s a series of screenshots showing Tufte-style sidenotes (footnotes that are presented in the margin of a page instead of at the bottom, named after Edward Tufte). A developer recently implemented sidenotes for Obsidian, which is the ‘bicycle for the mind’ app I use for journaling and managing my work. I wrote about it this weekend.

Substack doesn’t provide support for them, but I wish they would.

Here’s me arguing with Ben Casselman’s recent The ‘Great Resignation’ Is Over. Can Workers’ Power Endure?.

Casselman’s swallowed the ‘recession is right around the corner’ argument, so a great deal of what he says is just motivated reasoning. The measure of inflation most useful — supercore: core inflation minus used cars and shelter — has been falling for months. Most of the changes he attributes to ‘fears of recession’ are more likely attributed to actual inflation, which includes shelter, and shelter accounts for a great deal in a country where the average person pays 35% of the income on it.

The threat of a recession — especially in the mouths of CEOs trying to get workers back in the office, and minimize demands for higher pay — is being used as a baton to fight those demands.

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An observation about the technique. Much of my research involves note-taking like the above, as well as linking sections of documents like this into more essay-like constructions. But the method of scrapbooking and annotating material is a wellspring for my work.

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Factoids

Researchers found that firms with the highest level of future preparedness outperformed the average with 33% higher profitability. And it’s not just profits—future-prepared firms also beat the average by a 200% higher growth. And with the rate technology is transforming society, this future-facing foresight becomes more necessary. | Annie Atherton

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Nearly 80 percent of women ages 25-54 are working or looking for work, according to the latest jobs report — a record.

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Three out of four survey respondents identified ‘managing difficult relationships/politics in the workplace’ as a reason for resilience (rising to four out of every five at Executive level). Difficult relationships and organisational politics stand way ahead of other factors contributing to the need for resilience at work. | Sarah Bond, Gillian Shapiro

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People talking on the phone gesture, as do the congenitally blind, even when talking to other blind people. | Timothy Farrington

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Elsewhere

Getting Unstuck | Stowe Boyd

The trick to creativity, if there is a single useful thing to say about it, is to identify your own peculiar talent and then to settle down to work with it for a good long time. | Denise Shekerjian

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9 Ways to Say No to Busywork and Unrealistic Deadlines | Elizabeth Grace Saunders

Good advice about saying no. 'Remember, by saying no you’re saying yes to what matters most with your time.'

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Paradigm Shift | Frances Coppola

Our collective memories of the lessons learned from wars and crises past have faded. Frances Coppola looks for future guidance.