Luca Dellanna's Blog

Gregg Popovich is one of my favorite coaches in the history of sports.

I've recently published a research project, [Policy Lab](https://luca-dellanna.com/policy-lab), that uses AI agents to design better policy while keeping the electorate at the center.

A common worry I hear about AI is that people using it too often will forget how to do their job.

Two people can use the same AI to perform the same task and get wildly different results.

### Download the checklist Here is the checklist mentioned in the video [(PDF file)](https://luca-dellanna.com/uploads/2024/03/Mentorship-meetings.pdf).

Anyone who, on the second of January, rolled out a "change initiative" in their life by signing up for the gym knows that rolling out a change initiative is the easy part; the hard part is translating it into adoption.

Many countries are already infected with the coronavirus: it's already a pandemic.

I went from 0 to 24,000+ Twitter followers from scratch – never knowing any of them in real life first, living in an isolated city, and without cold-contacting any of them.

_Update: since I wrote this essay, I’ve been thinking a lot about antifragility and damage.

Traditionally, [ergodicity](https://luca-dellanna.com/books/ergodicity) is defined as a binary property.

As a business manager or sports coach, it is paramount to remain true to your principles; otherwise, people will not take you seriously.

You can work to solve your problems, and see them coming back tomorrow, or you can work to resolve the sources of your problems, and never see them again.

The US response to the pandemic has been hindered by the FDA having waited until late February to approve non-government test kits and early March to relax test eligibility guidelines (the latter having been a consequence of the former).

To understand why many change initiatives fail, consider what happens when you bend a business card with your fingers.

Allow me to use a personal anecdote to introduce a concept that's highly relevant to business.

Leaders who think organizational culture is a set of concepts attempt to change it using words and concepts – and inevitably fail, because organizational culture is not a set of concepts.

Earlier this week, an officer shot a woman in Minnesota after she tried escaping with her car in a way that put him in danger.

Pareto’s law states that, in many contexts, 80% of the impact is produced by 20% of the items.

There are two ways to use AI to improve your team's effectiveness: one simple and one complex.

Famous economist Robert Reich recently wrote: “60% of American households can’t afford a minimal quality of life.”

## What is a Positive-Sum Game?

Many of my clients share the following pain point: their team leaders do not manage underperforming workers effectively.

### I In the democratic version of Orwell’s Animal Farm, the pigs maintain control by turning all elections into a choice between two pigs wearing ties of different colors.

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### The problem A core reason employees don’t receive enough training is that it is very time-consuming, and many teams are already overworked.

The three properties of long-term strategies Good long-term strategies have three properties. 1.

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How can you estimate which technology might remain relevant in the future?

The real culture war isn't left vs right, urban vs rural, capitalism vs communism, etc.

If your workers send emails as part of their job, coaching them on writing emails more effectively is a low-hanging fruit, and failing to do so is a massive missed opportunity.

Most advice on soft metrics focuses on what to measure: employee engagement, communication quality, collaboration.

It's that time of the year when people review and plan for the upcoming year.

Santa Clara’s School of Law steadily raised tuition year after year, from roughly $44,000 in 2015 to $63,280 in 2025.

According to [a recent survey](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/03/05/online-opt-in-polls-can-produce-misleading-results-especially-for-young-people-and-hispanic-adults/), 12% of Americans aged 18 to 29 say they have operated a nuclear submari…

[Recent debates](https://capitalgains.thediff.co/p/the-poverty-line) focused on how many dollars should count as the poverty line.

A [recent article](https://www.yesigiveafig.com/p/part-1-my-life-is-a-lie) went viral, arguing that in the US, the poverty line should be set at $140k: what is needed today for housing, childcare, and other costs required to hold a job, raise children, and

I was recently asked what the key skill is for a manager transitioning from one role to another.

New Hampshire, where seat belts are not mandatory, has 9 road deaths per billion miles driven.

Last week, Amazon’s founder, Jeff Bezos, visited Turin.

I am a big fan of detective mysteries, especially Agatha Christie’s novels.

Many corporate-led team-building activities are, to put it mildly, cringeworthy and embarrassing.

Some great tactics make for very poor strategies. - Using your authority as a parent or boss is a great tactic to get your family or team aligned during an emergency.

### Examples of circularity The best way to understand circularity is through some examples: - On the one hand, high IQ is associated with higher education and higher-paying jobs.

I spent my twenties moving between cities, never finding one that felt worth settling down in.

The city of Geneva subsidizes opera single-ticket purchases at the rate of about $541 per ticket.[^1] This phenomenon, in which most opera theater revenue comes from subsidies instead of the audience, is quite common in Europe.

_“The key to success is to spend more time on important-yet-not-urgent activities than most of your peers.”_ I wrote this sentence in my latest book, “Winning Long-Term Games.”

When new leadership takes over a company, particularly following an acquisition, the incoming CEO and executive team need to rapidly assess the organization's managerial capabilities to discover internal problems and opportunities both at the level of ind…

I always found it weird that, despite LASIK patient satisfaction surveys being so positive (95%+ satisfaction rates), so many LASIK doctors wear glasses.[^1] And I always found it weird that everyone I spoke with knew of at least a few friends with painful