Do Better Work by Killing Good Ideas
It seems counterintuitive to think that killing a good idea may even be considered a good idea. Sounds a bit crazy, but Terri Rogers, the author of the blog, “Do Better Work by Killing Good Ideas,” shares some of her favorite post by, Robert Sutton at Harvard Business Review. The blog focused on “Good Boss Bad Boss.” The summary of this blog is going to take you on a journey from a professor’s point of view.
An integral part of a professor’s role is to inspire and encourage their students to be innovative and come up with new and creative ideas and to be able to guide their students to articulate and execute. We can compare, “doing better work by killing off good ideas,” like writing a research paper, purposeful summary or essay. When a writer begins to tell a story they begin to write down all of their ideas. The writer is reading his work at the onset of his journey and feels his ideas are good. He is writing away thinking, “wow, this is a great piece.” He walks away for a few hours or even a few days and comes back to his paper and says, “What was I thinking, “? He begins to re-write and polish his work and dismisses all of his original ideas. This is a simple analogy of how the concept of “do better work by killing good ideas” can be applied.
Revisiting your work and ideas can be painful at times, but if you go through life with a “status quo” attitude will not see what you are capable of producing. Ideas are the foundation of creativity and motivation. I read a bloggers response to the article about do better work by killing good idea. “Ideas are like children, they’re special when they’re your own.” Keep creating…and recreating.
Sounds counterintuitive to think someone winning the lottery and being a paraplegic could possibly be equally happy, right? The way society is today, having more money equals happiness, well that holds true some of the time. As the human anatomy evolved our brains got larger and we have what is called the, “prefrontal cortex”, part of the brain that allows us to experience simulation. We can experience and materialize something in our minds before it even happens. Can’t even imagine life without that part of brain? Would there even be happiness? Interesting, but that is for another time let me get back to “what is happiness.”
Happiness is a choice, we all have a choice to be happy, our brains are like road maps or computers. However, the difference is we as humans have the capacity to change the way we perceive happiness. In the video the narrator shared a few studies that resulted in the freedom to choose is the enemy of synthetic happiness – meaning “you can’t always get what you want.”
If we had a choice to buy a product with a 30-day money back guarantee versus a product without a money back guarantee a majority of us would all pick the 30-day money back guarantee. Why? because we are not stuck and have a choice and in turn will be happy.
Why people find exercise harder than others
It is not counterintuitive to think that exercise is harder for others. Each individual sees the world through a different set of lenses. We are all different, yet the same. Sounds contradictory, but think about how we look at exercise. Some of us look at it as being a taunting task and hard to do. If we set our minds to something being hard then it will, if we think exercise will be easy then the task will. It’s counterintuitive to think that we can control how we handle each situation with conditioning our own minds.
So why isn’t everyone in shape and why is exercise harder for some people? Well, the answer is simple. When humans focus and visualize the end result most of the time they will accomplish the task. Why, because they are conditioning their minds, setting a goal and having their “eye on the prize.” People who find exercising hard are the people who do not have a clear visual of what the end result will look like.
In conclusion, what we put out to the universe we will get back. It’s like putting gas in a car, a debit card through a card swipe at the register, we all know the end result. In order to succeed in any task we need to think, see, and visualize the end result. Everyone has a choice to be fit, happy, sad, educated, etc. Remember we are in complete control of our own destiny. If the choice is to have a good, a good day will materialize.
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Counterintuitive Spring 2024 
Feedback was requested.
Feedback provided. —DSH
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Juggler, I’m worried about your approach to the topics you’ve selected. If I’m right, the trouble begins in the choosing. You’ve selected three topics that resist actual evidence and proof. The topic about Happiness has already torpedoed several writers in earlier semesters who thought they could bring some rigor to the job and ended up stringing together vague paragraphs full of platitudes. Killing Good Ideas is a little more specific and quantifiable. Why Do Some People Find Exercise More Difficult is like the left hand to Why Are We Happy’s right hand. Happiness is a choice and so is Difficulty.
If you like these topics because they suit your world view that we all make our own destiny, I won’t deny you the chance to explore them, but I am concerned that they might lead you into fuzzy thinking / fuzzy writing where nothing can be demonstrated.
Your first Purposeful Summary is quite purposeful, but isn’t truly a summary of the article you read. It’s an expansion on an idea suggested by the original. I appreciate the analogy to a writing class, and I imagine at the moment I am playing the role of the bad boss who stifles inventiveness by thwarting your innovation, but summaries must first be summaries. Yours spends a paragraph tracing the source of the original content, then ignores it.
There’s something missing in your second summary. Clearly not everyone is equally happy. Perhaps what the original article means is that we all have the capacity to be equally happy: both the lottery winner and the paraplegic can choose happiness (but that must mean they are also free to reject happiness, right?). I suppose also that the happiness all that money can buy provides the lottery winner with natural happiness, and that the paraplegic has to synthesize hers, but it already sounds so vague and arguable that I dismay of making much sense of it myself. If you’re really good at nailing down the specifics of an argument, you might be able to describe it well, but if you are the least bit unsure of the original meaning or provide an unclear explanation, we’ll all be very confused.
Maybe the parallel between summaries two and three is that our perception of our own condition creates that condition (at least subjectively). I can synthesize happiness out of my current bleak conditions; I can also synthesize a projection of a happy future that, in turn, brings about that future in reality. If that works for you, I certainly won’t object, but I’ll be expecting some very rigorous evidence to support such a premise. Research projects can’t be made of pure conjecture.
Sorry if I’m so negative. After all, you’re only responding to articles I offered you in the first place.
We should discuss one bit of punctuation and one essential rule of Comp 2 grammar.
—Punctuation. Commas and periods ALWAYS go inside the quotation marks. Yours are outside 13 times.
—We can’t mix singular subjects with plural verbs, or vice versa.
PRONOUN DISAGREEMENT (Singular/Plural)
The writer is reading their work and at the onset of their journey they feel as if all their ideas are good ones. They are writing away thinking, “wow, this is a great piece”. The writer walks away for a few hours or even a few days and comes back to their paper and says, “What was I thinking, “
SINGULAR SOLUTION (forces a gender choice):
The writer is reading HER work and at the onset of HER journey SHE feels as if all HER ideas are good ones. SHE IS writing away thinking, “Wow, this is a great piece.” SHE walks away for a few hours or even a few days and comes back to HER paper and says, “What was I thinking?”
PLURAL SOLUTION (avoids gender):
WRITERS are reading THEIR work and at the onset of THEIR journey THEY feel as if all THEIR ideas are good ones. THEY ARE writing away thinking, “Wow, this is a great piece.” THEY walk away for a few hours or even a few days and come back to THEIR papers and say, “What was I thinking?”
KILL THE PRONOUNS SOLUTION (recommended):
Writers, at the onset of any project, feel every idea is a good one. During the first draft it’s hard not to think: “Wow, this is a great piece.” After a few hours away from the page, the same writer, reading the draft, says, “What was I thinking?”
FIRST PERSON PLURAL SOLUTION (whenever possible):
Writers, at the onset of any project, think all our ideas are good ones. Writing our first drafts, it’s hard not to think: “Wow, this is a great piece.” After a few hours away from the page, we come back to read our first drafts and think, “What was I thinking?”
I hope this has all been helpful, juggler. You can revise at any time, before or after tonight’s deadline. You’ve done all you need to do for this first post.
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Thank you for your feedback. I welcome your constructive criticism and will apply your suggestions and lessons to my revisions. I will also think about another topic.
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I appreciate your understanding, juggler. I’m working on an interesting unit about memory that might intrigue you. It’s not highly technical, but it has so many aspects that blend the physical with the psychological. Maybe you’ll like it.
I want to thank you for the example of pronoun use. I have exported it to a post for the benefit of all. You’re certainly not alone in using the “they pronouns” with singular subjects! 🙂
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I am very interested in finding out more about the unit of memory you mentioned. Sounds like a topic I can work with for the next few months and produce some good work.
Glad I was able to help others and I’m glad I’m not alone!
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