Safety & Security, Self-Mastery, UnconditionalRelationship, Worldly, Financial Freedom, Holistic Fitness
Joshua Tiong
Our Six Pillars for Purposeful Living

This has been frequently requested of me ever since my earlier post about ‘The Six Month Conversation’ resonated with so many people. This follow up is about the framework Alexis and I devised with hopes of guiding our life journey together independently and as a couple. I know this post is arriving several years late, after tons of requests, so thanks everybody for your patience!

Our Six Pillars for Purposeful Living

Growth

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Takeaways from Product Camp Vancouver 2018

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Takeaways from Product Camp Vancouver 2018

This weekend, I attended Product Camp Vancouver 2018 alongside hundreds of Vancouver's tech community. I walked away from the event feeling inspired and connected. What a great event and wonderful community!

I attended the event without a clear understanding of what is typically in or out of scope for the Product Management (PM) line of work. My perspective is mostly heavily informed by my firsthand experiences on the delivery and growth sides for high-tech and professional services companies. I learned a bunch that helped connect some missing dots of concepts in my mind - very thankful for this.

Below are some of my takeaways, whether new or old ideas, which I am mulling over. These points are mostly from talks by Chloe Morrow (of Vision Critical), Cory Ayres (of Pendo), and Steven Forth (of Ibbaka), as well as with fellow participants...

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Centres of Influence

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Centres of Influence

Digitizing a thought I had written in a journal back in 2010 around the idea of a Centre of Influence (COI). I had defined COIs as those people we have relationships with who possess a level of influence over our decision-making. The influence is exerted by virtue of their primary relationship dynamic with their network. These are people trusted & networked as an influencer, and their advice is often taken with little further thought.

It's apparent that my then knowledge of personal/professional relationship dynamics was much more limited than it is today, but interesting nonetheless...

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Burden of Leadership - The Other Side of Layoffs

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Burden of Leadership - The Other Side of Layoffs

This post is a follow-up to an earlier blog post, The Burden of Leadership. A lot of people have recently been laid off around BC, and being a friend to some people in this position, I've acted as a shoulder to lean on and an active listener for them to talk through their thinking. 

It's a crappy situation all around, and definitely a terrible experience for the period following in life for those who are laid off. That said, I've come across an article that offered another perspective that I'd like to point out. Please see below for an excerpt from an article by Karen Althen, titled What 1,700 laid-off Target employees can learn (from someone who was downsized by the company 6 years ago), originally posted on BizJournal…

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Hire good people, and leave them alone

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Hire good people, and leave them alone

Past Joshua made note of some book excerpts. Can't remember why... but I'm typing them out here in case I remember, then Future Joshua can write the blog post he intended to :) 

Edit: ohhh, these are from Drive, by Daniel Pink (link below)

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A startup engineer must be all things -- he (or she) is a full time software developer and part time product manager/customer support guru/internal systems maven. As a company grows, an engineer spends less time building the things he personally wants in the product. Our hope is that 20% time gives engineers back dedicated stack time -- of their own direction -- to spend on product innovation, features, plugins, fixes or additions that they think are the most important…

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Making tough choices

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Making tough choices

What's up?

In the beginning of February, I announced that I would begin a search to find the next chapter of my journey. The most important part to me is finding the right organizational values, direction, and fit. Secondary to that would be getting my bum in the right role, which I see as a matter of growing into from within. 

How you doin?

It has been 45 days since this search began...

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Perspective on the "Friendzone"

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Perspective on the "Friendzone"

This is a re-post for an answer by Franklin Veaux to a question on the site, Quora. I'm sharing this because it provides a perspective that people often do not consider. Food for thought.

Original Question: "Why does a girl I like keep sending me random texts even after she friendzoned me?"

Franklin's Response: "Because she's treating you like a friend. Friends talk to each other…

The Next Chapter

The Next Chapter

While wrapping up TDCK's latest project today, I'd like to say thank you to all of our amazing clients. It has been a special privilege to work with such passionate and committed people.

I've decided it's time for me to shift the focus of my career away from working solely as an external consultant and move into a role that builds up a company from the inside. I am looking to join…

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The Burden of Leadership

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The Burden of Leadership

"I'm ready to be a leader!"

I've been hearing this theme come up in many conversations with folks I've mentored during the past couple of years. It's such a joy to see that they are now at the point in their careers where they are pursuing a move into managerial positions, have been recently promoted into leadership roles, or are beginning to forge down the entrepreneurial path.  

If you are in such a position, this post is for you. This post is about something which is most commonly referred to as the burden of leadership. The burden of leadership can be hard to understand because it's not altogether logical or intuitive. When it is discussed among people not already in such a role, it is often with limited information and only in passing during a conversation about other topics. However, the burden of leadership is something that comes with the territory and its implications should be seriously considered beforehand. 

I am writing this post to offer my thoughts on this topic, and I hope it will help you consider how you might approach your new leadership roles and help you plan ahead to set yourselves up for success…