Altruism Is For Other People

By Kenneth Lim on October 15, 2006

As a founder and member of multiple online communities, I’ve seen the altruistic effects of community in action. To an outsider, it might be baffling to hear that people are willing to voluntarily help another person with a problem or a question.

In essence, it might not be so baffling at all. People have knowledge. People have good intentions. People have an ego. Whereas there might not be any financial remuneration, people enjoy the attention they get as an “expert”, they enjoy the appreciation and status that it brings within a community.

The receivers of help will (sometimes) feel inclined to give back as well. As a result of those exchanges, a community flourishes and grows.

Don’t be afraid. Share your knowledge to your advantage. And leverage the kindness of strangers to your advantage.

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Let Your Goal Be Your Pilot

By Kenneth Lim on September 17, 2006

Frequently, pilot projects are initiated to test new products/services. When the pilot is successful, companies prepare the product/service for wide-scale launch.

However, there are also instances where the product/service is killed after the pilot wasn’t successful.

Re-evaluate. Re-adjust. Re-think. Re-design. What went wrong to warrant a pilot failure? Was the concept thus flawed that an unsuccessful pilot could be predicted? Did the pilot produce new information about the product/service that was overlooked? Success can be unpredictable but shouldn’t be discarded after a setback. The pilot isn’t an end in itself. It’s merely another means to an end.

Let the end guide you.

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There Is No Such Thing As Work/Life Balance

By Kenneth Lim on August 20, 2006

A lot of companies claim to respect employees’ “work/life balance”. The only problem is that no such thing exists. Work is part of life for most people and the term “work/life balance” is semantic more than anything else. It basically assumes that “life” consists of all the things you find important or enjoyable. Inversely, “work” represents that mountain of stuff you actually don’t like to do.

It’s almost like the companies embracing the “work/life balance” mantra are saying “Hey, we try to limit it but we understand that you don’t really like doing your work!” and there is something rather disturbing about that.

So before you start buying into the “work/life balance” movement, create your own definitions of “work” and “life” first.

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Good Design Is More Than Good Looks

By Kenneth Lim on July 16, 2006

Good design is often underrated or undervalued. People focus a lot on what something looks like and whether they consider it to be user-friendly.

However, user-friendliness is not the same as usability. Design encompasses so much more than aesthetics. Design sits at the core of everything: aesthetics, user-friendliness, usability, functionality, scalability, flexibility and level of standardization just to name a few criteria.

Of course there are factors that relate to the target audience and the market / industry, but good design is generally universal.

As a second measure of quality, try explaining the design over the phone to someone, preferably someone who’s from another country / lives under different cultural circumstances / has a different mother language, to test your design.

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