Ex Post Facto no. 7: Dog Days, Disney, & Deliberateness

And we’re back! After a bit of summer break, here’s the latest Ex Post Facto, the weekly-ish email from The Snow Report with three things you’ll wish you’d known earlier—just in time for the weekend.

Here we go:

One EXcellent bit of wisdom

“The riskiest thing we can do is just maintain the status quo.” This comes from Bob Iger, the longtime CEO of Disney. I just started reading his excellent book The Ride of A Lifetime and cannot recommend it enough to anyone in a leadership role.

We often think about taking risks as going out on a limb with something new. But as Bob points out, not moving forward is an enormous risk in work and life. Maintaining the status quo in our disease preparedness and public healthcare systems has left us swimming in tragedy of late—as heartbreaking as it is to say that.

Bob Iger dealt with a lot of tragedies at Disney, as he recounts in the first pages of his book. I think there’s a lot to learn from that.

One POST you won’t want to miss

I Feel Therefore I Think <— This verbal habit has gone viral, so to speak, and it could be muddying both your credibility and problem-solving abilities. But warning: once you start noticing it, you’ll never be able to un-notice it!

One FACT Of great interest

As of two days ago, we’re officially in the “Dog Days of Summer.” But what does that mean exactly? I used to think it meant that it’s so hot that dogs all walk around with their tongues out. Turns out I was way off.

The Dog Days refer to the time of year when the brightest star in the sky, Sirius—also known as “The Dog Star”—is visible at night in the Northern Hemisphere. During the rest of the year, Sirius is below the horizon at night, but in late July and August, it shows up. Sirius is called “The Dog Star” because it’s the bright one in the constellation Canis Major, aka the “great dog.”

This is also why Sirius Black of Harry Potter turns into a dog when he’s in his “animagus” form. Author J.K. Rowling named several characters after stars: Draco, Bellatrix, Regulus, and more.

I’m pretty sure my animagus would be a pine marten.

Happy dog days everyone!

Much love,

Shane

P.S. If you enjoyed this email, please pass it along. Or even better, pass along one of my books!