Aisle & Window Seat Brain Power

Pandemic Traveler

As business leaders, we are beginning to travel again. Our work needs some in person attention, so you must buy the seat, and get on that plane. Here’s what I’ve experienced in my recent journeys that you may find helpful.

Information:

  1. The airports are pristinely clean. I’ve flown in and out of JFK on JetBlue to Florida and California. All of the airports were exceptionally clean, with hand sanitizer dispensers, and all associates at security and airlines are wearing gloves and masks at all times.
  2. Airline and airport associates are trained for the new process, and will help travelers get through check-in and security and boarding as smoothly as possible. The JetBlue team is stellar.
  3. The new process is functionally the same, but logistically different. The security lines are set up for social distancing. The boarding process reflects the spirit of social distancing … travelers are still figuring this one out. There are children and families traveling, and the expedited services for business travelers are not in place.
  4. You can purchase water and snacks and coffee, and socially distance to consume if necessary.

Travel advice:

  1. Eat and drink before you get to airport. You are required to wear a mask at all times, so eating/snacking can be difficult.
  2. Bring wipes that you tuck into your travel bag. Wipe off your hands and feet after you clear security. I know, feet … really? Yes, you feel fresh and clean, and also remove any stuff you may have encountered in the shoe removal and screening process. If you are a sock wearer, replace your socks with clean socks after the security process. Wipe off your seat area, including the tray, seat & seat belt. Dispose of the wipes in the trash, and do not leave in the seat pocket.
  3. Arrive early enough to allow yourself to be patient. Wearing a mask is a new experience, and even with my N95 mask, it restricts airflow and field of vision. Double check to make sure that you get all of your things out of your airport transportation, and after you get through security. The mask and cleanliness mindfulness are great, but they can also be a distraction from your previous and typical travel auto-pilot routine. This is an excellent moment to slow down, move purposefully, and focus on what you are doing in the moment.
  4. Say “thank you” and express appreciation to the people who are showing up to keep the travel system functioning for you. If you feel the urge to complain or verbalize negative words, this is a great time to press your lips tightly together, and remain silent. Even better if you can frame that thought as “everyone is doing the best they can right now, including me,” and express gratitude.

The CIBO Express person said it best, “Nothing is perfect right now.” Accept this reality, and be practical about what this means to schedules, and flexibility, and maneuvering through your travel experience. We’ll step through this moment together. #SeatMates

The TriBeCa Film Festival screened Hell on Earth: The Fall of Syria and the Rise of ISIS last night in a powerful and moving experience at SVA in Chelsea.  Sebastian Junger, Nick Quested and National Geographic create cogency out of chaos and complexity as they piece together a history of pain and devastation in Syria.

Told by Sebastian Junger, the stories rip into your soul … jihadists with murderous, treacherous, malevolent postures & words … politicians whose platitudes fall woefully short in confronting this culture of chaos … both terrifying in their threats … the obviously overt, and the cloaked insidious.

Junger’s voice guides the film in a image-rich chronology of loss, despair, destruction … stories we know of Aleppo and Damascus attacks, and black shrouded creatures wielding machetes, become more startling as you see them layered together. We learn new stories of families desperately trying to escape … and meet Marwan, the father who shares, “I smile because I do not want the children to be scared.” The moments are raw and real because they were captured by the participants themselves on phones & GoPro cameras provided to them because the conditions were too dangerous for film makers & crews.

To tell you more would rob you of the revelatory moments that were so powerful to me … and you should experience this film for yourself. During the Q&A after the film I asked Sebastian Junger what he wanted us, the audiences who experienced it, to do and react. At his core, he is a journalist, with an iron-clad, war-molded journalistic integrity. His response … “just know.”

The announcement of the partnership between @Uber and UN Women to create 1,000,000 jobs for women by 2020 sparked discussion among my friends and colleagues.  Reactions ranged from openly skeptical (is this really supposed to fool us into thinking that Travis Kalanick, the Uber CEO is a good guy given the past ethical business challenges?), to optimistic (yes, Uber has stumbled in the past, but that’s expected for a rapidly growing enterprise led by a young, maturing leadership team — they’re working to turn it around, give it a chance. Jobs for women, hurray!)

I’m delighted with the effort to create more jobs — this is good progress.  I’m also an Uber appreciator — sometimes I’m Uber-spent.  I’ve met dozens of Uber drivers globally, and talked with them about their experiences.  They most commonly mention the flexibility in hours, the new revenue source for their families, the empowerment they feel in selecting their passengers, and the ownership of their economic power by working when they can.  In general, they’ve been a very content group.  Like other Uber customers, I’ve paid ridiculously high surge pricing during a rain storm, but also gotten safe, timely and courteous service every single ride.  I have been treated well by my Uber drivers.  I rate fairly, provide constructive feedback, and have a 5 rating.  I’ve met smart people living atypical lives.  I’ve had a little dust in the backseat floorboards.  And I’ve also listened to interesting stories about new projects, good eating spots, best surfing places and “must see” stuff.  In recent months, more and more of my drivers have been women.  On the whole, my Uber experiences have been really good, and I continue to ride with them because the people who’ve interacted with me have delivered a positive customer experience. The shared economy model is creating great things for them which they share with me.

Which got me thinking about the shared economy business model.  What are the impacts of the individual contributors in the system? How do we interact within these models? How are these models effectively managed for growth and profitability? At their essence, shared economy businesses help other people make money using things they already own — the ultimate in re-purposing for revenue.  Travis Kalanick may not be such a likable guy, but in a shared economy, it doesn’t matter. A shared economy doesn’t just mean the literal sharing of your property — it’s also the creation of economic value for everyone in the system, no matter the motivations or agendas … some participants can be motivated by profit and power, some will be easily likable, others maybe not so much. Some can be entitled and a bit more self-involved, while still others are driven by a desire to contribute to the greater good.  However, in a shared economy model, economic value is created that delivers a significant portion of desired outcomes to a majority of participants, across a variety of needs and agendas.  The shared economy model may be the most realistic we’ve seen in modern business because it fundamentally recognizes that each contributor is motivated and driven by different but equally compelling factors.

Margaret Mead said, “Never underestimate the power of a few committed people to change the world.  Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

The shared value model will not be right for every person or every company, but is it possible that it could exist for every business category?  There is room on the planet for a multiplicity of business models.  The market will tell you, usually pretty quickly and sometimes brutally, if you have a flawed business model.  The creation of shared value doesn’t need everybody to work … it just needs you.

Margaret Mead

Figure1 @AmericanAir 1636

Figure 1Figure 1Figure 1

I’m fascinated by the Figure 1 app. It’s the Instagram for the medical profession, creating a way to safely share & discuss clinical cases. It has also become a forum to showcase the vagaries & oddities of the human body in a scroll of crowdsourced chronicles. Today, I’m following 3 cases — a patient with tuberous-sclerosis, a patient with an edematous rash that is dry & pruritic who needs a diagnosis (comments are offering thoughts & questions), and a nurse practitioner who is polling for anomaly identification — comments quickly identified as a dual ureter system.

Posts can be graphic & difficult to view.  @jessiwrites who wrote about the app for Fortune, noted that the images could “make your stomach turn”.  Ashley Feinberg @gizmodo said that it, “approximates the fruit of an unholy union between Instagram and the Discovery Health Channel.”  And it’s true that your finger can just as easily pause at a gaping wound from an unfortunate encounter with a fuchsia bush, as a vivid polycystic kidney — just #lichenification for truly “never seen by most people, not sure we should have seen that” images.  Yet there are also strangely lovely things to ponder, like the fluro imaging of a stomach with a deep sea moodiness, complete with jelly-fish like creature, or melodic-esque cardiac stress test results.

Co-founder Joshua Landy is an MD from Toronto, and reflecting his commitment to patient care & privacy, the app has elegant medical, safety, consent & privacy solutions.   Only medical professionals can post photos and make comments, and these are verified by a medical officer and moderation team prior to posting.  The rest of us can only view their content.  For compliance, users must sign a one-click, one-signature waiver with every photo.  There are also only body parts, no recognizable faces, due to a face detection software that blacks out identifying features.  However, I’ve noted that the community tends to self-govern on this with care taken to show the area of medical interest only.  The patient consent element is an in-app “tap, type & sign” form.  This app is technologically sophisticated.

Figure 1 is currently available in North America, the UK, Ireland, Australia & New Zealand.  The US community has more than 145,000 users, exceeding 30 million views since its May launch, so spending time with the medical minds here is good medicine for informing any healthcare perspective.  Or diagnosing a nagging itch.

@American Air #1448, 19F

Missing my FitBit on today’s trip.   FitBit #3 leapt from its customary jeans loop spot (right side, first loop) about 3 weeks ago at family ice cream time. Sadly, #3 followed in the paths of #1, who over-indulged in watery dip, and #2 that preferred to stay in Prague. The first few days after the #3 FitBit AWOL incident, I relished my newfound freedom from my “digi-sessory”, that wearable that tracked my movements, and with which I willingly shared every morsel I ate, wink of sleep I got, and extra activities beyond tracked steps (barbell, yoga, circuit).

But now I’m in full blown miss mode, a state which my new iPhone 6 is making even more acute. It’s taunting me with the new Health capabilities — what could I learn if only I could pair my digital health information across my devices? I’m one of the roughly 69% of Americans who would like direct access to my health records.  This means that these records must be updated to show an accurate view.  So, sharing my health & fitness data consensually seems reasonable … even favorable. Nirvana if I could do that completely unobtrusively, my private window into my own biology. Managing my own physiological evolution through a fully quantified self — in a cycle of listening, knowing and choosing based on knowledge of what is actually happening within my own body.

The ultimate in unobtrusive? Subcutaneous! Getting under someone’s skin … literally.

Imagine this:

… an asthma sufferer walks into a building lobby & the sensor in her wrist reads the air quality, immediately sending her a message on her smart device of elevated levels of her asthmatic triggers. She gets this message before her body suffers a reaction, and leaves the area, avoiding an unforeseen attack,

… high blood pressure, glaucoma & high cholesterol patients, typically some of the highest non-compliant with their prescriptions, receive a mild vibration from an ear chip when its medication time. This vibration becomes more insistent and longer in duration until the medication is taken,

… a cancer patient undergoing chemotherapy has vital sign information continuously transmitted to the doctor’s smart device from an ankle insert, with the doctor responding to any changes in condition in real time.

In a healthy digital future, we could move beyond trivializing scientific health wearables as “digi-sessories”, and treat them as serious & vital devices that drive humans to knowledge & action. We can skip the “fashion do or don’t” debate, and get to substantive outcomes faster.

Yet, today, I’d be happy if I just knew how many steps I took from the plane to the taxi.

(thank you @_Cooper #inspiration)

TEDMED, Day 2, San Fran

Surfing … in the gym … sweat dripping off the end of my nose … full body bench pressing the board, then sweeping my feet underneath me, finding my balance … sticking the landing — this is a TEDMED morning workout.  Hard core beginning for the body & brain …

And right into the hard stuff with a “Don’t You Dare Talk About This” session that delved into difficult to discuss subjects … like the number of times children get stuck with needles through the immunization process (more than 40!), and the impact to their fear and loathing of needles and pain avoidance reactions into adulthood, addiction & obesity causes, organ donation difficulties, physician transparency resistance and violent threats … and in a raw, witty and candid talk, Elizabeth Kenny revealed her harrowing journey through antidepressant pharmacology.   I held my breath for her when she described the terror of being held at gunpoint in her home … and the greater terror when her brain could simultaneously tell her that no person was actually there … I celebrated with her when sanity returned to her, recognizing that “you’re not crazy, you’re toxic.”

TEDMED also tackled the tough issue of taking time to play, debunking our “work till you drop” mentalities that has many of us wearing our work schedules and sleeplessness as badges of honor and stamina.  @jillvialet is a Recess Champion with a powerful thought that “play matters because it gives us a brief respite from the tyranny of apparent purpose”.  She challenged us with the idea that “Work is not the opposite of play.  The opposite of play is depression.”  I spoke to Jill after the session … and was struck by her commitment to live what she shared … she was on her way home to be with her children … to play … with a sense of purpose and pride and happy expectation.

I had the gentlest, most thoughtful finger pricking of my life — actually warmed my forefinger — by @theranosinc.  This is the brainchild of Elizabeth Holmes — taking a single drop of blood, and running multiple tests at a fraction of the diagnostic costs, with a completely transparent pricing model.  This a fundamental shift in patient access and equity — a unique combination of new technology brought forward with a new way to think about access and business.

We ended today exploring “Stealing Smart”, blowing away the collaboration model in favor of a full-on melding of intellectual power.  Dr. Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, a Zoobiquitous Physician, @zoobiquity, called out the snobbery that blocks physicians from respecting and reaching across medicines disciplines to explore knowledge and experience.  She’s a cardiologist whose patients include gorillas, lions, macaws … and people.  She is passionate about the evolutionary commonalities between human and animal bodies, and is pioneering connections between physicians and veterinarians.  Vets know how to treat and heal multiple species … this valuable expertise can be applied to humans.

Lest we were left thinking that physicians are chiefly characterized by white coats and busy schedules, we closed with Rupa & the April Fishes … Rupa is a doctor who rocks the songs she writes on an orange guitar …

#typicalTEDMEDisNotTypical

Riding waves

Riding waves

TEDMED ’14, Day 1

TEDMED is my yearly pilgrimage of inspiration & discovery. Typically in April, this year it slid to September, with a dual simulcast in Washington DC & San Francisco. Ambitious in scale … 2 states, 2,000 delegates, 90 speakers, 80 startups & 6,700 affiliates in 140 countries — and noble in purpose … unlocking imagination in service of health & medicine … TEDMED is an achevement in combining intellect & creativity in a myraid of logistical details that somehow all works.

Yesterday, I heard the stories from an autistic 16 year old, Rosie King who stirred the group with her simple questions, “What’s so special about being normal?  Have you ever felt great because someone told you how normal you are?”, a bioethicist who is more worried about the privacy of her credit card data than her genome sequencing data, and scientists who shared how to clean up your brain (sleep releases a chemical that flushes & cleanses), and that opossums are tick killing machines that impact lyme disease rates.  Good stuff even by TEDMED standards.

Yet, the talk that sits in my head is from Danielle Ofri @danielleofri, who spoke of “errors as the human metabolism.”  I was struck by her wisdom and candor in acknowledging imperfection, and owning our vulnerability in the relentless pursuit of learning more.  Her sensibility that errors are less about exposure for shame and punishment, and more for the illumination & discovery of new possibilities both for ourselves and others.  Maya Angelou said, “Now that I know better, I do better.”  Reflection, discussion & collaboration around our experiences help us know better.  And in that knowing … comes changes … and it is as simple and as complicated as that.

 

 

 

 

@AmericanAir 1171, Seat 11F

1 hour early arrival for flight … so time to wait … then flight has tire issue … so wait until it is repaired …

Which got me thinking about waiting … how much of our lives do we spend waiting?  Fran Lebowitz says,  “the opposite of talking isn’t listening … the opposite of talking is waiting.”  Patch Adams felt that “waiting in line is a great opportunity to meet people, daydream or play,” a sentiment I echo since I’ve met delightful characters while in that flux state of existence we call “waiting.”  This could also explain the fervor with which we dive into the most accessible mobile device — how lax would we be if we were not completely and utterly absorbed by something … how pitiful and pathetic for one’s attention and opinion to be unneeded and unnecessary for even a moment.

So let’s ponder this “waiting” thing … what do we know about it … how do we talk about it — good things come to those who wait … wait your turn … wait for me … wait on tables … just you wait Mister (this with the ominous tone that means you’ve clearly done something unsatisfactory, if not downright unsavory) … Waiting for Godot …

Is waiting active or passive?  Depends on the end state, right? When I’m waiting for something good — my heart races joyously … I allow my mind to run across previous times … I ponder the preparations for the moments to come … while sometimes excruciating, it is delicious excruciation, soon to be relieved by arrivals.

My favored way to think about waiting will obviously be linked to my fav subject, food — this person/thing/event is not a microwave dish … it’s ok to mix the right ingredients, add a bit of heat … and just let it sit on the stove and cook.  It’s a particular kind of bliss to lift the lid, gently stir … taste a tiny bit …

Yet, I’m beginning to think of waiting as belonging to a layered universe, its own “Inferno”, with anticipatory waiting at the surface with its deliciousness and delights, and a labyrinth of layers below, descending into the murky and nefarious.

And when the dark edges of waiting appear … there is a restorative choice to be made … close your eyes and take a nap … just keep your snoring to yourself.

DFW airport

DFW airport

Delta 5851, 2D

We climb on airplanes, find our seat, stow our bags, sit & buckle up.  Exhale.  We made it …. again.  Business travel ritual.  We check out our seat mate … and decide to say hello — or    read … sleep … dive into our device.  Sometimes the polite acknowledgments lead to a good conversation … and sometimes, a fantastic conversation with sharp thinking, funny anecdotes, cool ideas.

Chris and I met tonight on this flight from LGA to DFW — he’s an anti-aging doctor with his own line of vitamins, and I’m a digital chica for a healthcare company.  Perfect combo for riffing on healthcare and patient benefits.  I care about building & providing digital capabilities that patients can access to improve their vision care outcomes.  Chris cares about creating & providing efficacious treatments that gives his patients healthier, more satisfying lives.  Ideas began to flow … building one upon another as the plane door closed & the tarmac taxi began …. and it hit us … this kind of Tarmac Thinking happens when random algorithms mesh humans into seating charts.

So, we’re at +30,000 feet above who-knows-what US town inviting other airborne souls to share your Tarmac Thinking.  Let’s see what flies … sorry, just could not resist it … ha!

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