Memorial Day 2014 — Remembering the Cost
By MaxSigma | Mar 26, 2014 Memorial Day is often a pleasant pause—hot dogs on the grill, a cold drink in hand, time with friends and family. Enjoy that. But don’t let the day pass without thinking about the families for whom this holiday is anything but light. For them, Memorial Day parades, flags on […]
Who is “Running the World?”
By MaxSigma | Mar 6, 2023 | Leadership & Decision-Making, Power & Institutions A question that hit closer to home than intended. I received an email recently with the subject line: “Who is running the world?”It contained a list of prominent companies and political offices led by people of Indian origin, followed by the implied conclusion that […]
Presidents and Conflicts
By MaxSigma | February 1, 2026 | Power & Institutions Donald Trump is clearly a different kind of president than Biden, Obama, Bush, or Clinton. For them, conflict tends to be institutional. Disputes move through agencies, regulators, and courts in the name of the public. The president may set priorities, but the litigation itself is […]
When Standards Matter More Than Strategy
By MaxSigma | February 6, 2026 | Leadership & Decision-Making, Power & Institutions I have spent most of my professional life working across borders—geographic, cultural, institutional, and ideological. Aviation, by its very nature, demands this. Airplanes do not care about politics. Physics is stubbornly bipartisan. And progress, when it happens, almost always comes from collaboration […]
Personal vs State Power Litigation by Presidency
By MaxSigma | February 12, 2026 | Power & Institutions Sometimes the difference isn’t in what’s said, but in what’s done—and how often. I’ve been looking at how modern U.S. presidents engage with the legal system, not as defendants, but as plaintiffs. Who files lawsuits, how often, and through what mechanisms? The charts below are […]
When Lawsuits Become Policy
By MaxSigma | February 17, 2026 | Power & Institutions In a recent post, I looked at how differently modern presidents approach conflict. For most presidents, the law is something the state uses. Agencies investigate. Regulators act. The Department of Justice files suit. Conflict moves through institutions—slowly, and somewhat impersonally—buffered by process and precedent. The president […]
Reverse Imposter Syndrome: The Visibility Gap
By MaxSigma | March 20, 2026 | Leadership & Decision-Making, Long Arcs There are periods in building a company where, from the outside, it looks like nothing is happening. No announcements.No headlines.No visible momentum. And yet — beneath the surface — everything is happening. Design iterations.Difficult trade-offs.Decisions with long-term consequences. Progress is real.It’s just not […]
The Divide We Don’t Understand – Part I
By MaxSigma | March 26, 2026 | Leadership & Decision-Making I find myself increasingly puzzled—not just by politics, but by people. Specifically, by the depth of conviction on both sides of the divide around Donald Trump. There are those who see him as a dangerous aberration—unfit in tone, temperament, and method. And there are those […]
The Leadership Question Beneath the Divide – Part II
By MaxSigma | March 30, 2026 | Leadership & Decision-Making If the divide is ultimately about leadership, then the real conversation hasn’t even started yet. Because we’re not just debating a person like Donald Trump. We’re debating something more foundational: What kind of leadership do we actually want—and why? 1. What kind of leadership are […]
The Tone at the Top—And Why It Matters Now
By MaxSigma | March 30, 2026 | Leadership & Decision-Making The President of the United States referred to critics as “really stupid people.”He publicly criticized Supreme Court justices.He spoke about negotiation while simultaneously threatening to destroy a nation’s economic lifeline. This is not a one-off moment. It is a pattern. And it raises a straightforward […]