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Education Google Innovation Reading

Latest Read: Trillion Dollar Coach

Trillion Dollar Coach: The Leadership Playbook of Silicon Valley’s Bill Campbell by Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg and Alan Eagle. This is one of a few books that I recommend without hesitation to anyone. In addition, you do not need to be a manager to benefit from Bill’s coaching others to wild success.

Trillion Dollar Coach

Surprisingly Bill Campbell spent five years coaching football at Columbia. Then he coached many of the most successful technology teams driving innovation across Silicon Valley.

This book was written by three Google leaders in other words, based upon their coaching relationship with Bill over many years.

Eric Schmidt is the former Executive Chairman of Alphabet and ex-Google CEO. Jonathan Rosenberg was a Senior Vice President at Google. Today he is an advisor to the Alphabet management team. In addition, he ran the Google product team from 2002 to 2011. Alan Eagle is Director of Executive Communications at Google. He has been working at Google since 2007. As a result, all three grew as leaders via Bill’s wisdom.

Similarly Bill was a driving success for several prominent companies including Apple, and Intuit.

Bill’s relationships with Steve Jobs, Larry Page, Eric Schmidt and many more CEOs throughout the book reveal Bill’s coaching mantra.

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Education Reading Vietnam War

Latest Read: The Eagle Weeps

The Eagle Weeps by Lieutenant colonel Keith Honaker offers stunning lessons from his deployment to Vietnam in February 1952. He arrived in Saigon as a member of the US Military MAAG Vietnam program. His experience illustrates the repeated failures of France to defeat the Viet Minh.

the eagle weeps by Lt. Col Keith Honaker

At the same time, Lieutenant colonel Honaker invited his family to join him in Saigon. Only a select few American officers brought their families to Vietnam. Shockingly his wife Wilma was abducted by Viet Minh agents during a trip to Hanoi. Only a French officer saved her from departing a safe zone around Hanoi. Can you imagine if Wilma had been taken prisoner or killed by the Viet Minh? Certainly shocking to read 65 years later.

During his deployment, France was seeking to remove American officers from the field. Lieutenant colonel Honaker and his fellow American officers in Saigon were not even informed of the French plans for the Dien Bien Phu until after the airlift began.

Likewise there are additional moments in the book that reveal a deep misunderstanding to the early American MAAG mission. As Lieutenant colonel Honaker describes in the opening chapters, his arrival in Vietnam was like landing in another world. His experiences are very foretelling to the next for next 23 years for America.

Surprisingly, as we would later learn, the Viet Minh were preparing a very strong defense of their country. A mature network of spies including those who served American military families as house servants greeted the Honaker family upon their arrival.

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Education Reading Vietnam War

Latest Read: Replacing France

Replacing France: The Origins of American Intervention in Vietnam by Kathryn Statler. This book vividly illustrates failures by France and America in determining a free and democratic Vietnam. Kathryn directly addresses America’s tenuous relationship with France, watching as the French consistently flailed at war in Vietnam.

replacing france by kathryn statler

Kathryn sheds much needed light across a very complicated 10 year relationship (1950-60) at the dawn of the cold war. Her research helps fill gaps between US support for France and where we took over the war. The timeline begins stumbling forward in the late 1940s. Her scholarship is elevated by recently released archival materials from the US and Europe.

This is a much longer book review than normal. Even with multiple references, below simply I cannot fully address the deep impact of Kathryn’s research in a single post. This should be required reading for any college history class on the American war in Vietnam.

France made every effort to re-enter Indochina, patiently waiting for any chance to re-enslave the peoples of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Britain also fought to regain colonial control over Malaya at the end of World War II.

Since 1887, every aspect of Vietnamese society was under French control. This colonial monster had 80 years to metastasize across every aspect of Indochinese life. Among my Dien Bien Phu retrospective, this book helps answer how the tumultuous relationship between of France brought America into the war.

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Design Education Google Innovation Reading Technology TED

Latest Read: Measure What Matters

Measure What Matters: How Google, Bono, and the Gates Foundation Rock the World with OKRs by John Doerr. It is easier to understand during a pandemic how organizations should embrace OKRs in a time of dramatic change.

Measure What Matters by John Doerr

Firstly, Measure What Matters begins with John’s story of landing an engineering internship at Intel. Andy Grove is credited by Doerr as the father of OKRs. John was able to work alongside Andy and his team. Certainly this benefitted John in his career. Above all, Grove served as Doerr’s mentor at Intel and left a lifetime impression on the delivery of goals.

Above all, this offers new views against smartgoals or annual performance reviews. Doerr also shares how Adobe, upon viewing OKRs decided to completely shut down legacy annual performance reviews. COVID is a game changer that also helps move away from year long reviews.

At first glance, I have to admit that I was somewhat dismayed to see the name of U2’s Bono on the cover. That is to say many interview of musicians go off the rails. But Bono’s contribution will surprise any reader. His ability to convey his non-profit’s OKRs is very revealing that speaks to the depth and grounding of a business plan that you may not initially attribute to a world famous rock and roll singer.

Similarly there is an inspirational story is Nuna. John shares the story of Jini Kim. Her brother, Kimong was diagnosed with severe autism. While vacationing at Disneyworld, he suffered a severe seizure. At nine years of age Jini enrolled her family into Medicaid. Jini was a product manager at Google Health. Moreover Jini helped launch Google Public Data. When Jini left Google to launch her own startup, Nuna (Korean for big sister) her application of OKRs helped her company win the bid to fix healthcare.gov in 2013.

Likewise there is simplicity to OKRs. But a foundation of solid objectives is key:

  1. Exceptional Focus
  2. High degree of alignment
  3. Uncommon degree of commitment
  4. Tracking progress
  5. Transparent goal system
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Education Reading

Latest Read: The Only Plane In The Sky

The Only Plane In The Sky: An oral history of 9/11 by Garrett Graff. It is hard to believe another September is upon us. Above all and as amazing as it sounds, next year will mark the 20th observance of the 9/11 attacks.

The Only Plane In The Sky

Above all, I found The Only Plane In The Sky holds a very powerful reminder of that day. To a greater extent, even though time has faded some memories, the detailed stories return here to serve me as a reminder of what we hold dear.

Subsequently, those interviewed in the book, from any of the four crash sites have had to endure many challenges. For some, those challenges remain through today. Likewise many stories are filled with heartbreak. For a fortunate few, there is inspiration in overcoming such tragedy.

At the same time, knowing the ending for each crash location does not diminish the impact of details shared throughout the book.

In addition, the audiobook version includes audio recordings of American Airlines 11 flight attendant Betty Ong, who called the airline’s reservation line to report the first hijacking. Also included are the responses and communications between Air Force command, FDNY, NYPD, and the Port Authority in New York among many others.

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