These are my research questions. They are what I’m trying to learn. The problem with asking research questions in your interviews is that humans are bad at accurately answering direct questions out of context. When we ask someone a direct question, their brain generates a fast response. That fast response feels true, but often it’s not.

You can’t write what a character is thinking in a description because the audience watching on screen can’t look at their face and know they’re reminiscing about the girl or boy that got away. You have to use action and dialogue to imply what the character is thinking - an exercise that boosts creativity within the form.

It should also be something you’re already pretty good at. If you’re a great writer, figure out a way to use that skill in an area with huge upside - something like copywriting or brand advertising. Don’t try to become a graphic designer if you’re already a great writer - double down on what you’re already good at.

An ERT test is a research technique we use to understand how people feel about the designs we create. It enables more constructive conversations about the subjective responses people have to our designs. We can agree upon the emotional attributes we want our designs to embody. It also helps us to understand what aspects of our designs need to change to meet these standards.

A heuristic is defined as “any approach to problem solving or self-discovery that employs a practical method, not guaranteed to be optimal, perfect, logical, or rational, but instead sufficient for reaching an immediate goal.”

The first step is figuring out the problem that needs to be solved and then developing a minimum viable product (MVP) to begin the process of learning as quickly as possible

Design the experiment. First, you have to build out the details of the experiment and figure out how everything will fit and mesh together. For this, you must have a solid and reliable method of collecting data, meaning the data gathered must be reliable and actionable.

Run the experiment. This is where you will collect the data. The most common methods include conducting interviews or distributing questionnaires. In some instances, others may come out with prototypes for testing.

Let us go through the phases of this loop. Before you can start, however, there is a need to “frame” the experiment. This is where you will identify what problem needs to be solved, and how you will run the whole experiment. This entails gathering data and detailing the background of the experiment, formulating a hypothesis and considering the variables of the environment. From there, you can now start with the feedback loop.

If you want to create visually interesting slides, less is more. Slide design guru Nancy Duarte recommends following a three-second rule. If viewers do not understand the gist of your slide in three seconds, it's too complicated. "Think of your slides as billboards," says Duarte. "When people drive, they only briefly take their eyes off their main focus, which is the road, to process a billboard of information. Similarly, your audience should focus intently on what you're saying, looking only briefly at your slides when you display them."

Visuals are much, much more powerful than text alone. That's why, if you choose to use slides, use more pictures than words--and don't use bullet points. Ever.

Prevailing wisdom claims that the best way to achieve what we want in life—

It is rare to find a program providing enough rigor in computing, applied math, and specific domains of expertise that is configured for the student to easily encounter all three sufficiently.

If you are still looking for work you truly enjoy, get that graduate degree or additional experience in the discipline you love, not just one you think will give you marketable skills.

What’s the difference between compassion and empathy? Most of us conflate the two. Empathy is the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and see the world through their eyes: it’s a feeling that lives within.

Gratitude can improve mental health (even when you’re at an all-time low).

We’re each capable of many different projects in our lives and work that fits into just one or two of these is plenty.

I think of all the guys who have expensive and complex garage workshops they never use and probably couldn't, or the people who have a huge variety of unused cooking implements in every drawer.

It might be important to include a horizontal line as a reference point for zero, but no data series on our graphs should cut across either of our axes.

A typical line graph will have continuous data along both the vertical (y-axis) and horizontal (x-axis) dimensions.

Practice is what helps you get things closer to what you want them to be.

This process is open and understood and is now being replicated.

This ranges from companies building the first data centers and laying down the cable that would allow Americans to get access to the internet.

As the chapter title suggests, Housel explains that, like everything else in life, investors pay a price to invest with the stock market: losing money on poor investments

The general idea is that as you get older, stocks gradually become a less desirable place to keep your money.

Over long periods, the S&P 500 has produced total annualized returns of about 10%, and performance like this can build substantial wealth over time.

The salience network is a large system within the brain that helps to detect and filter important information from the environment, and then determine how to respond to that information.

Let’s start by defining the target customer. Many startup founders suffer from a common misconception called “everybody needs my product”. Narrow down the customer segment as accurately as possible. You’ll be able to expand it later on if you take off.