Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
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Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
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Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
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Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
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Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
#4This was a breath of fresh air.
The tech sector has grown and changed so much. It has gotten much more "professional" which is arguably good but it this in turn promotes a fair amount of "corporate stooge" behavior. I am guilty here for sure, it is really easy to focus on levels, promo packets, OKRs, especially as you age and responsibility grows and forget what make this industry amazing in the first place.
Good reminder to focus on direction and interests and what you feel should be built. Reminds be a bit of the opening section of "The Art of Doing Science and Engineering" which I only came across because I liked other Stripe press books.
You also meet more interesting and passionate people if you pick a direction vs a destination.
Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
#5This was a breath of fresh air. The tech sector has grown and changed so much. It has gotten much more "professional" which is arguably good but it this in turn promotes a fair amount of "corporate stooge" behavior. I am guilty here for sure, it is really easy to focus on levels, promo packets, OKRs, especially as you age and responsibility grows and forget what make this industry amazing in the first place. Good rem…
Brie, author of the profile here. Funny you mention Art of Doing Science and Engineering. There was a footnote to You and Your Research in an early draft but it hit the cutting room floor in edits. (Also, I helped get Stripe Press off the ground–including tracking down rights to Art of Doing Science and Engineering–so it warms my heart to hear that's how you first came to the essay/speech).
Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
#6[flagged]
Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
#7Really enjoyed reading this article, thank you!
Reminds me a lot of Ryan Norbauer's writings (https://ryan.norbauer.com/journal/the-outsider-option-why-i-...) on why he sold half his company and the satisfaction he got from being able to focus on doing the work that he considered fun.
I hope to engage my interests and hobbies in this way, super thankful that I have the opportunity to try.
Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
#8This so much! great article and Kelly sounds like the type of person I would love to meet..
- having just endured time in a startup that was all about PMF, metrics and the 'growth flywheel', that pushed aside human intuition and creativity in place of 'winning'. It's indeed such a waste of humanity that the Reid hoffman's and Bezos's of the world can push inhuman cultural tropes of "winning" over our humanity. Just who is winning, the board, the VCs certainly not the person who loses his soul? On top of that, in today's world AI Slop and social media and lunatic linkedin influencers pushing those same memes hyped to eleven by AI tools, relentlessly on young founders and engineers via push notifications. day and night -what message do we deliver to ourselves?.
Amazon for all its technical chops and innovation and LinkedIn are anti-patterns in that regard. Do not follow.
Also, its too bad that silicon valley is so ageist that the lessons and wisdom of the older generation tend to get forgotten or cast aside-wish that we could at least take advantage of capitalism in our culture instead of it taking advantage of us
When we lose the pleasure of finding things out, going with our passions and intution and lose our love of creativity and invention, curiosity, patience and empathy we loose who we are as a human in society
Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
#9Just after I took on my new role, I wrote to Kevin Kelly and asked if I could meet him (I assumed he wouldn't know who I was, even though we've met informally, but he did). I wanted to talk to him about talking about how to be optimistic about technology. At my heart, I still remain positive about the contributions and opportunities of technology, but I've increasingly struggled to know how to convey, qualify or transmit that. He immediately accepted, I visited him in his tower, and we had a great, sprawling conversation. Like this author, he renewed my confidence in that framing, and the importance of it existing in the world. That single conversation has kept me going more than anything else over the last three or so years.
I realise in reading this, that I never wrote after the fact to say thanks for that: so, thanks, KK, for everything.
Re: Flounder Mode – Kevin Kelly on a different way to do great work
#10Is this a story about Kevin Kelly or is this an autobiography? It purports to be the former but it's largely about the author's work history. It sort of gestures vaguely at being an interview with Kevin but there's only about four paragraphs in the entire article that contain quotes from him in response to things the author asked, and most of these are about his collection of knick-knacks.
I kept on waiting for a series of questions that acted as springboards for long responses from Kelly that included him talking about the value of an approach to work that he calls "flounder mode" but they never came; the only appearance of "flounder" is in the title. It's an extended intro to an interview that never actually comes. You talked with Kelly all day and hooray, great for you meeting one of your idols! But you barely tell us a single thing he said.