Real Life Superhero

Like any other comic book fan, I’ve oftentimes wondered if our “real world” (that is, if we’re not all plugged into some sort of Matrix already) could house the stories from comic books. What if there were costumed crime fighters out there, taking on the injustices of the world that the government cannot (or chooses not) to face head on. Would they succeed? Would they overstep their bounds? Would they be loved, or loathed? Would their identities be secret? What sort of person would do this?

Of course, thinking about it, is very different from actually trying it, something a band of citizens calling themselves “the Allegiance of Heroes” have taken on themselves to do (via WLWT news):

He calls himself Shadow Hare, and he wears a mask and a cape to conceal his true identity. He’s Cincinnati’s own version of a superhero fighting crime and injustice where he finds it.

“We help enforce the law by doing what we can in legal standards, so we carry handcuffs, pepper spray … all the legal weapons,” said Shadow Hare. “We will do citizen’s arrests. We will intervene on crimes if there is one happening in front of us.”

The man behind Shadow Hare’s mask is 21 years old and from Milford. Those are the only clues to his true identity that he will reveal. Shadow Hare said he was abused as a child and grew up in foster homes, perhaps leading him to a life helping others.

“My message to Cincinnati is that there is still hope and all we have to do is stand together,” he said.

It’s touching and refreshing to see that there are citizens who are not apathetic to the injustices around them and, in the case of Shadow Hare, not willing to inflict the scars they were faced in their upbringing on others. However, good intentions aside, I’m not too sure I can be supportive of this. It’s not that I don’t think the justice system has its own serious flaws or that I don’t want to encourage people to take action when they feel that something needs to be done. But, I am concerned mainly with accountability.

To take a very nerdy but pertinent example, recently the Marvel Comics line had a big story event called Civil War (the cover of the first issue is on the left) – which saw the US government, in response to a group of immature superheroes botching up a rescue operation and causing the deaths of many schoolchildren, pass a law to register every single costumed crimefighter in the United States. The idea? If you want to fight crime, you register with the government so that you can (a) get trained and equipped properly, (b) have some system be accountable for your actions and any damage you may cause, and (c) better coordinate the efforts of multiple crimefighters.

In the comic book, this was an interesting debate, as many of the superheroes that picked a side were those who were well-established (had been doing this for years if not decades), well-trained, and well-liked. Do Iron Man, Captain America, Wolverine, and Spiderman really need to register with the US government? Probably not. The government would probably slow them down.

But, I took a different lens to the issue – what about the many other costumed heroes that we don’t know? Who aren’t trained, aren’t accountable, and haven’t learned all the rules that keep guys like Spiderman and Iron Man responsible? After all, while Batman knows that he needs to collect evidence when he captures a criminal, and Spiderman knows that there are limits to what he can morally do, does the random 21-year-old who’s been bounced from foster home to foster home know? Has he or she been trained to minimize property damager or the consequences to innocent people, or how to collect sufficient evidence to put someone away? What if the well-intentioned, civilian misinterprets evidence and assaults an innocent?

When a police officer screws up, they are punished and either re-trained or dismissed. As a result, they follow rules that they are not only trained to follow but are better able to produce convictions which are legal (and ethical). It’s not the most exciting or even necessarily the most effective way to do it, but it is the accountable way to do it. No one can deny the good that Shadow Hare and his brethren have been able to do, but I hope they can extend that by joining up with the police or the legal system and share their unique insight and expertise that way.

(Note: if you’d like to read more about the Civil War, I’d strongly recommend Iron Man/Captain America: Casualties of War; the other issues of the story primarily deal with the conflict between the two sides, this one issue actually lays out the arguments and justifications between the two)

(Image credit – Justice League) (Marvel Civil War Issue 1 cover)

18 months

My consulting experience has been pretty atypical so far. Most consultants rotate between cases and roles every couple of months. Me? Up until about a few weeks ago, I had been doing corporate strategy work for the same technology client for 18 months (which is a long time – hence the picture of the old man – I know, I’m clever).

And, although many consultants (yours truly included) entered the field to experience as many industries/functional roles as possible within a short period of time, I’ve found that spending this much time on a single client in a single functional role has benefited me greatly by letting me build:

• Depth of expertise – Simply put, there’s no way that a consultant who’s constantly changing functional roles and clients to develop a deep expertise on the same level as a client’s employees. I can’t say I have the same level of expertise as someone who lives and breathes the stuff, but given the technical knowledge and understanding of the broader industry that I’ve picked up over the past 18 months, I’ve become knowledgeable enough to see connections/moves which people with less experience have yet to be able to see.
• Deep relationship with management – Having worked 18 months on a case, I’ve built up a level of rapport and trust with the technology industry partners/managers at my firm. They now routinely include me on emails about tech industry developments, and don’t hesitate to put me on special projects. It is a position which grants me greater input and exposure than most people of my tenure, and it is one I am very grateful for. It is also good from a professional development standpoint, as I now have partners/managers whom I respect who will be in my corner.
• Perspective on corporate strategy – I think very few people (even those in the technology industry) understand how corporate strategy at large companies is done. 18 months of watching a firm chew over the same issues again and again gives one a unique perspective on the pace and process of major strategic discussions, something that a consultant who’s rapidly rotated in and out of cases is unlikely to develop.

Several of my coworkers have asked if I’ve felt like I’ve missed out because of being on only one client. My answer is a no for three reasons. First, I am deeply interested in technology so being on a tech strategy case was like a dream come true. Secondly, as corporate strategy is an ongoing process which looks at a wide range of topics, I have had a wide range of topics ranging from premium branding (where I actually went to a Safeway’s to see how Procter & Gamble price their products relative to others), to emerging computing trends, to mobile convergence, to manufacturing outsourcing strategy, and even to formulating a process for the client to actively monitor and evaluate acquisition opportunities. Lastly, although I came into this job hoping for one thing (wide range of diverse case experiences), I believe that experiencing the exact opposite of what most consultants do see has given me a unique perspective on the corporate world – one that I would not trade away.

So, to all the new consultants (or even to the old ones), don’t knock the long-term client engagement path. You’ll be surprised at how valuable the experience can be.

(Image Credit)

Play Classic

While all of my friends were playing their Super Nintendo (and later, their Gamecubes, Playstations, and XBoxes), my parents disapproval of video games meant that I continued to play classic games on my Famicom (which to the uninitiated, is the Japanese name for what is essentially a Nintendo Entertainment System).

It helped that I wasn’t very good (arcade/action games aren’t really my forte – I’m more of a strategy gamer) – so it took me longer to win (I’m somewhat ashamed to admit this, but I still haven’t beaten Super Marios Bros). But, even though the new games had a lot more glitz (and I couldn’t help but pine after a more sophisticated console when gems like GoldenEye and Final Fantasy came out), there was a certain “old school” charm to my dusty old system.

And now, you too can experience that “old school” charm. Thanks to Jamie Sanders, whom I can only describe as a 17 year old prodigy, who has figured out how to turn the NES system into a Java virtual machine — translation: you can now play ANY NES game in your browser just by going to virtualNES.com.

Oh, and if you’re wondering, the screen shot above is a picture of me getting beat pretty badly in my all time favorite NES game: Mega Man 6 (or as my Japanese version called it – Rock Man 6)!

(Image credit)

It was a dark and stormy night in the data center

One of my favorite aspects of Charles Schulz’s Peanuts are Snoopy’s attempts at novel-writing and his classic opening sentence:

It was a dark and stormy night…

This was, of course, immediately followed by some comically ingenious sentence which made it immediately obvious that Snoopy, although quite creative (and talented! how many dogs do you know who can use a typewriter?) would probably never realize his dream of being a published beagle.

Well, Snoopy, you shouldn’t give up, because bizarre story settings actually do get published! Popular mystery author Michael Connelly not only convinced a publisher that he could write a mystery novel set in a data center (about a killer who actually works in a data center), but convinced enough people to read it that it’s now ranked #3 on the New York Times’ Best Seller list (at least as of June 18th, 2009).

Cloud Computing/Data Center blog Data Center Knowledge has an interesting interview with Connelly on his use of some of the most mysterious and unusual settings to ever grace a novel:

Data Center Knowedge: What led you to choose a colocation center as the workplace for Wesley Carver?

Michael Connelly: [My researcher] sent me a link to a video tour of a colocation center. I was impressed by all the security and hardware, how the center was located underground and how it was protected from forces of nature as well as electronic intrusion. It was a fortress and these sort of things always interest me because it always comes down to people, who you have inside the fortress is the most important thing.

Interestingly enough (although I haven’t read it yet), the novel relies on a few real-life technical features in many data centers including cutting edge fire suppression systems, VESDA smoke detection systems, and man traps. Very impressive, considering how few people know what goes on in data centers (which is a shame as data centers are a driving force in the web/computing space, and are massive contributors to jobs in under-developed areas and local energy concerns).

Oh, and to the uninitiated who don’t realize how bizarre and amazing data centers can be, check out this video of a data center in Stockholm built in what looks like a supervillain’s fortified hideout. As it was built in the Cold War, it is even said to be able to withstand a direct nuclear assault!

Now, can we make the next James Bond movie in a Google data center?

(Image credit)

One Man’s Sewage

… is another man’s gold.

Every investor dreams to find something that nobody wants (and hence are willing to part with cheaply) and be able to turn it into something that everyone wants (and hence something you can sell for a lot). Well, a prefecture in Japan stumbled on just that. From the always amusing Reuter’s Oddly Enough:

A sewage treatment facility in central Japan has recorded a higher gold yield from sludge than can be found at some of the world’s best mines. An official in Nagano prefecture, northwest of Tokyo, said the high percentage of gold found at the Suwa facility was probably due to the large number of precision equipment manufacturers in the vicinity that use the yellow metal. The facility recently recorded finding 1,890 grammes of gold per tonne of ash from incinerated sludge.

That is a far higher gold content than Japan’s Hishikari Mine, one of the world’s top gold mines, owned by Sumitomo Metal Mining Co Ltd, which contains 20-40 grammes of the precious metal per tonne of ore.

(Image credit – gold) (Image credit – sewage)

Sleepless in Medicine

Econo/politco blogger Megan McArdle explains her rationale for why we need medical resident work reform (which I’ve posted on here and here):

I am a gold medalist in the macho Sleepless Working Olympics.  I once worked a 60-hour shift without sleep.  (Yes, that’s 2.5 days without any shuteye.)  One stormy February, I put in 468 hours, almost 120 hours a week for four weeks straight, sleeping an average of less than 4 hours a night.  I have enjoyed all the exciting side effects of prolonged sleep deprivation, like uncontrollable “microsleep” which once almost caused me to walk into the path of a cab, or the hallucinations that set in after 48 hours or so–not fun hallucinations, either, just long conversations with co-workers who turned out to have left the building hours or even days before.  I was essentially dreaming with my eyes open.  

So I know whereof I speak when I think about interns training on gruelling regimens.  And you know what I learned on all those sleepless nights?

Well, actually, not much.  It turns out that adequate sleep is crucial to memory formation.  But I did manage to process and retain one fact:  when you have not had enough sleep, you. are. stupid. 

Your attention span shortens.  Your decision making process slows down to a crawl.  Your emotions fray–towards the end of that fateful February, I burst out crying when I learned that the delivery of a hot-swappable backup drive had been delayed.

And, what I think is the most telling argument:

I understand that against this, you have to set the benefits of continuity of care.  But there’s a funny thing:  if continuity of care were really that great, attendings would only have four days off a month, instead of the sybaritic five or more that McNamee is deploring.  Most doctors I know work really hard.  But they don’t work a lot of 36 hour shifts, and they don’t think that two weekends a month off is the height of decadence. 

Let me propose something a little different for all those attending physicians who think that residents should be hazed work in 36 hour shifts. Why don’t you work 36 hour shifts with only 4 days off per month? I mean, don’t you care about your patients and their continuity of care?

Have you tried?

I had an interesting discussion the other day with a colleague about creating a growth strategy for Starbucks. The challenge for Starbucks is one of success – how do you continue to grow when you’ve:

• saturated your home market (for the purposes of the conversation we ignored the very obvious “grow internationally” strategy which was too obvious to be worth discussing)
• are already running a relatively lean operation
• are now facing a new onslaught of competitors (e.g. McDonald’s) who are eyeing the profit you make

And, of course, the big one:

• you’ve already tried DOZENS of new strategic initiatives (e.g. CDs, restaurant food, utensils/cups, branded credit card, etc), many of which have flopped

(As Dilbert points out, “jargon” is not a very good answer)

After I fleshed out all the more interesting adjacencies as ideas (e.g. dessert food, franchising, coffee machines, online banking services, renewable energy credits, etc), my ideas turned to capability moves, and the most promising one that I came up with was supply chain services. I can’t think of many firms/stores that have the same distribution network that Starbucks has (~11,000 stores in the US). After all, in San Francisco, I know of corners where I can see 3 separate Starbucks stores – and I’m sure this happens in other big cities as well!

For Starbucks to function effectively, I would hazard a guess that they must have an efficient way to distribute supplies (e.g. coffee beans, baked goods, materials, machines, etc) to each of the ~11,000 locations in the US on a regular basis. I would also guess that such a system, if designed effectively, would probably see reasonable returns to scale, as I would expect a nationwide distribution network that had to distribute more products would be more efficient than one with less product (as you wouldn’t be sending trucks out on partial routes or with only some of their capacity filled).

That means:

1. Starbucks may have a unique capability that others (e.g. other stores, restaurants, etc) might be willing to pay for
2. Starbucks would benefit from developing that capability. If Starbucks does have such a distribution network, expanding the amount of materials it needs to distribute could, in theory, reduce the cost of distribution. This would help enhance its own ability to distribute supplies/goods to other firms as well as reduce the cost of distributing coffee/materials/baked goods to its own stores.

But this is a far cry from a sure thing. My colleague and I discussed just a few of the possible shortcomings of the strategy:

1. Starbucks may not actually operate its own distribution network so it wouldn’t be in a good position to sell this service
2. Starbuck’s distribution network may be well-suited for distributing coffee beans, but may not be well-suited for many other things (e.g. biological specimens, fresh produce, large equipment, etc)

Now, I just need to pitch this to Starbucks .

Any thoughts from the peanut gallery?

(Image Credit)(Image Credit – Dilbert)

Universal perspective

I recently made a post over at Bench Press on a series of images which really helps to give some perspective on just how large the universe is:
Breathtaking, isn’t it? For more gorgeous pictures (and a sense of just how small you are in the grand scale of things), check out the post at the Bench Press blog.

Farewell to the interviewer

One of my colleagues is leaving my firm today, as he’ll be attending business school at Stanford GSB this coming fall. As is custom, he left a fairly touching email, but the most amusing anecdote is something I will share:

And last but not least, to my first round interviewer, who made this all possible, as he was kind enough to pass me along to final rounds despite my “impressive” guesstimation that there were 30 million Starbucks in the United States (apparently 1 Starbucks for every 10 people is high?).

Awesome.

Hazing by any other name

I read a WSJ piece today about some of the backlash towards proposals to reduce the bone-crushing hours that medical residents (doctors-in-training) need to endure. Having written a previous post on the subject attacking the crazy hours as “hazing”, I was eagerly awaiting some brilliant doctor to point out why I was wrong.

I was not impressed. The WSJ article cited three unconvincing arguments against resident hours reform:

1. Lack of improvement in patient care from reduced hours
2. Hospitals may need to hire more residents, and this will be expensive
3. Patient hand-off increases medical errors

The first argument asserts that the reduction in hours is not a good thing because there hasn’t been a significant improvement in patient care. This makes absolutely zero sense to me. In the business world, if I could achieve similar results but with much lower worker burnout and hourly commitment, I’d call that a great victory. Odd that these doctors think the exact opposite?

The second point sounds convincing at first glance, but has two big problems with it. First, the estimated cost of hiring additional residents (~$1.6 billion) is a tiny drop in the ocean of total healthcare spend ($2.2 trillion in 2007). To argue that this is a ridiculous burden is to argue that $5.33 per person in a year or an increase of 7 cents on every hundred dollars of healthcare spend is an unconscionable amount to spend to reduce resident burnout and fatigue-related error. Secondly, this point assumes that we currently don’t need/want additional doctors. Given the shortage of doctors in the US, you’d think that hiring more residents could actually be a good thing. Again, to use business as an example, if all our clients could fix their staffing shortage and morale/fatigue problems by increasing their budget by 0.07%, my job would be very easy.

Lastly, the same tired argument is rehashed about hand-off errors. I’m too lazy to come up with new points, so I’ll simply re-quote what I said before:

1. I strongly prefer a resident who is rested and slightly unfamiliar with my case over a resident who is half-asleep and is probably not all that familiar with my case anyways given that he/she is probably dealing with many other patients and was probably half-awake/running-on-adrenaline during those patient visitations as well.
2. Really? Handoff errors are occurring at such a high rate that they are compensating for decrease in fatigue-related errors? I find that really hard to believe. 
3. Even if handoff error rates are close to fatigue error rates, it suggests that we aren’t training doctors correctly at all. After all, while fatigue error is practically impossible to control (if you’re tired, your brain doesn’t think properly — there’s not much you can do about that one), handoff errors are. I fail to see why training doctors to communicate more effectively, to learn to collaborate with other doctors more effectively, and to take better records (Obama is committing $19B to developing better healthcare IT) is something that is unfeasible or undesirable or an unnecessary burden.