The best way to invest willpower in support of skill acquisition is to use it to remove these soft barriers to practice. By rearranging your environm… - Josh Kaufman

The philosopher kings behind what passed for management psychology were Ivan Pavlov and, later on, B. F. Skinner, who believed that if you discovered and applied just the right stimulus, people would behave however you wanted.

Absence Blindness is a cognitive bias that prevents us from identifying what we can’t observe. Our perceptual faculties evolved to detect objects that are present in the Environment. It’s far more difficult for people to notice or identify what’s missing. Examples of Absence Blindness are everywhere. Here’s a common example: great Management is boring — and often unrewarding. The hallmark of an effective manager is anticipating likely issues and resolving them in advance, before they become a problem. Some of the best managers in the world exhibit a quiet sort of competence: there’s little drama, and everything gets done on time and under budget. The problem is, no one sees all of the bad things that the great manager prevents. Less skilled managers are more likely to be rewarded, since everyone can see them “making things happen” and “moving heaven and earth” to resolve issues — issues they may have created themselves via poor Management.

Every successful business (1) creates or provides something of value that (2) other people want or need (3) at a price they’re willing to pay, in a way that (4) satisfies the purchaser’s needs and expectations and (5) provides the business sufficient revenue to make it worthwhile for the owners to continue operation.