Category Archives: Industry

Better Writing, Better Communication; 10 Years, 300 Posts, 200,000 Words – 4 Steps to Success

What began as an undirected attempt to share my observations on domains where my background is unique, has shifted to taking those unique perspectives and applying them systematically to broader areas of society which attract a larger readership. Continue reading

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5,000,000 Youtube Views for ‘Filtration’ – Tough Concepts the #1 Video Gets Right

5 million views is a lot for an industrial product – here are the concepts the top Youtube hit for ‘filtration’ got right. Continue reading

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Global Fluids and Volumes

How much water is on Earth? How much beer? How much human blood? Continue reading

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Startups or Big Co?

Born between May 20 and June 20 – the astrological sign of Gemini, defined by the duality of the twins Castor and Pollux, lurks around every corner. While at UVA for undergraduate studies – this was captured in two different … Continue reading

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Industrial Business Models – Customer ROI

Your technology is great.  It makes the world a better place.  Benchtop results were good – but yields actually went up as you’ve scaled results.  You’ve also made your first big decision and you’re going to sell the technology to … Continue reading

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Industrial Business Models – Choice #1

Hardware is dead. Hardware is booming. Hardware is hard and no one should do it. Hardware is different. Hardware is the same. IoT, IIoT and additive manufacturing attract attention to heavy industry – where a thing is being produced and … Continue reading

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Trust: “We’re not following rules, but expect you to.”

There are many great political and social points in Catton’s histories of the American Civil War.  In his 1961 book The Coming Fury, he discusses how Southern plantation authors were going to Union generals and asking to have their slaves returned. … Continue reading

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“What does [did] it take to be[come] CEO?” Answer: Goals / Failure / Reality

StrengthsFinder is a great way to talk about personal motivations (Learner, Activator, Strategic, Context and Input). DiSC profiles (Persuader / Inspirational) are also helpful – but this tool still feels more tailored to corporate HR. StrengthsFinder is an amazing framework … Continue reading

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Biology, populations and VC

The meadow voles we found each morning in our traps were tiny, hardy animals who endured the weighing and tagging before being re-released. There were thousands of them in the fields of Blandy Farm or Mountain Lake, the field research … Continue reading

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The Best SaaS Product I Ever Saw was built by a Towtruck Company in 2006

In 2002, after joining a former customer in the electronics industry which had raised $30 million, we went through a CRM evaluation.  The VP of Sales and VP of Engineering were at odds over the rate at which we were … Continue reading

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