Author: Tony Tam
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Falling in love with a book
I started reading the book The Pragmatic Programmer, published In 1999! It is such a fantastic book with very relevant tips for professional software engineers. I am just on chapter 2 now, but I have already marked up the book about important ideas that I need to follow up. How did I skip this vital…
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Note taking iteration 2019
For note taking, I optimize for 3 things Being able to quickly create a document and worry about categorization later. Having access to the notes on any of my 3 machines, and phone Being able to find my notes later To do this, I’ve tried the following. Evernote, Google Docs, Google Keep, One Note. Several…
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Mom, did you know?
Happy mother’s day. Today, my sister and I told my mom things she never knew. We hung out with kids who had a bad influence on us. Teaching us to smoke elementary school in China. Getting into fights in middle school with kids who bullied me. I bullied kids and was angry. I shoplifted with…
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Reciprocate
In the last few weeks, I’ve learned the power of the following Reciprocate I asked a team of 6 people for help. They have commit 2 weeks of work and 5 hours of time to do face to face presentations. In return, I give them what they really want, direct access to people who can…
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Overheard through the office cubicle
Person X: “I don’t know why my kids would choose UC LA when they’ve been accepted at UC Berkeley!” Tony: “Where do you live?” Person X: “10 minutes away from the Berkeley campus” Tony: “Well, what do you think?” Person X: “uhhhh”
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BTS enamel pin, from @ceik0
This BTS enamel pin is made by ceikzero ( Instagram @ceik0 ). Thoughtfully designed, meticulously refined. Shipping to you from San Francisco and soon to be from Boston. If you have to ask what is BTS, this pin is not for you.
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Book: Quotes from Skin In The Game that warrants more thought
I’m coming to the end of the book “Skin In The Game”. It’s not an easy book to read but I find the author is able to make some arguments that are not mainstream but very convincingly. Page :217 “you will not have an idea about what people really think, what predicts people’s action, merely…
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Solitude
I know I am an introvert. I relish the solitude of reading, writing, thinking by myself. Solitude doesn’t mean I like to be alone all the time. Just some span of time, where I am by myself with my own thoughts. When I can get these thoughts out on paper, I feel energized. This seems…
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Starting change
Asking people to change is hard. The person asking for change might be asking others to move 10 steps ahead. The people being asked to change 1) Might not be convinced 2) Think it’s too hard and unknown 3) They don’t trust the person asking them. My experience in pursuation is to first build that…
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What does not belong?
Another way to think about “everything in it’s place” is to look at “What does not belong?” You can apply this simply in organizing a drawer in your home. You can also apply this in backlog grooming at work. Out of 50 things on my plate, what doesn’t belong? What is extra that I’m…