A year in review — This article originally appeared on SamSpurlin.com on December 24th, 2022. Ten years ago I wrote a yearly review that I cheekily called State of the Sam. I was going into the last year of a positive psychology master’s program at Claremont Graduate University and was a couple weeks away from…

Originally published on SamSpurlin.com on December 13th, 2022 As a knowledge worker, the software I use determines a lot of my experience at work. I seek software that either gets so out of my way I never think about it (like a reliable appliance) or even better, gets out of…

A Seven Year Retrospective and Looking Ahead to What’s Next — I recently celebrated my seventh anniversary at The Ready. I’ve been involved with basically every aspect of our business (being the first employee means you kind of don’t have a choice but to wear a lot of hats) but the vast majority of that time has been spent as what…

Today, Friday, July 8th, I’m commencing a four-week experiment centered on the need to make progress on an important project. In what I’m hoping isn’t a too egregious case of cultural appropriation, I’m calling it Monk Mode. This article, and this experiment more broadly, are part of the project that…

My hockey career died several small deaths before finally dying for good at the end of 2019. The first death was when I decided to stop playing AAA and go play for my high school instead. The second death was when I played my last college club hockey game at…

The Problems With Habits Developing good habits is not the best path to happiness, productivity, success or any of the other things self-help books seem to think you want or need. Don’t get me wrong, having “good” habits is certainly a nice-to-have. All else being equal, I’d rather have “good” habits than “bad” habits…

DAOs are complex and frequently chaotic environments. As a new organizational technology, there are very few best practices that have permeated across the ecosystem. Everyone is rapidly experimenting and learning on their own. It’s a tumultuous and exciting time for those of us who are energized by the potential of…

A year has always felt impossibly long. Something that happens in January and something that happens in December have always felt like they were on opposite ends of an infinite divide. This was even more true when I was a child and the endless expanse of a summer vacation felt…

Thoughts on starting fresh in a new domain, keeping a beginner’s mind, and looking to make an impact — The Ready exists to change how the world works — to realize a more adaptive, equitable, meaningful, and human way of working. This has meant partnering with some of the world’s largest and most well-known organizations as they strive to remove decades of organizational debt to become better versions of…