FRAMEWORKS

THREE TYPES OF DEBT

The pile you're not counting.

Technical: ways of working built for a different time. Process: the gap between how it's designed and how it's done. Knowledge: what lives in one person's head.

LOME · THE LAW OF MINIMAL EFFORT

Not a character flaw. A structural outcome.

With no documentation, no instruction and no context, the rational move is the minimum. The manager stays indispensable, nothing gets written down, and round it goes.

AI AS A SANDBOX

Not instead of the consultant. Before the consultant.

Test things without risking things. Use AI to turn a vague unknown into the right questions, then take them to the people who know.

THE WAREHOUSE ERAS

Most warehouses still live in the era they were set up in.

Stone Age: pen and paper, easy wins, no idea where to start. The Aughts: ahead once, now stalled. Techtopia: robots and AI, the 1%. The fundamentals stay the same in every era.

BEFORE YOU BUILD

For every "let's just build it ourselves".

Draw how things move now. Find the part causing the issue. Ask the front line: they usually have ideas. Check whether your existing systems can already do it.

THE SUPPLY CHAIN CHESSBOARD

Supply chain is easier to understand as a game.

Ideas are pawns, marketing the knight, production the rook, shipping the bishop, storage the board. The last mile is the queen: lose it and you're in trouble. Strategy is the king.

THE TRIFECTA OF CHOKING

"If I don't do it, it won't get done."

The task is simple. The boss wants it a certain way, so I'll ask. Now I'm waiting. Each time the manager does it themselves, the lines pull tighter. Where LOME started.

ADS VS ASSETS

Pay for content the way you'd pay for a forklift.

You value a forklift by the work it does over time, not its resale price. Ads are useless. Content can be an asset if it's timeless: the longer it works, the more it's worth.

MORE ON THE HORIZON

New frameworks land here first. Head back west, or read the latest field notes.