Praveen Puri: 2026

Friday, March 27, 2026

Wednesday, March 25, 2026

Tuesday, March 24, 2026

Spoiler alert: Turns out that Pebbles is Marty's great great great....great grandmother :-)

I am now focused on Executive Coaching and Advising

Hi, I just wanted to let all my contacts know that my consulting practice has shifted in the last year. Instead of strategic consulting, I have shifted to executive coaching and advising, for both entrepreneurs and leaders in organizations. I help them dramatically grow their businesses and careers. I advise them in areas such as setting strategy, planning, execution, clear communication, and decision-making.

This change was driven by my clients. They found that hiring me for advice was more valuable for them then hiring me for consulting and, consequently, started referring more people for coaching and advising. I also found that I really enjoy it, and find it rewarding to help others become more successful.

If you know of anyone who might benefit from executive coaching and advising, please have them contact me. I'll be happy to have a short (20 minute) zoom call with them, to see if we would benefit from working together. Thanks!

Wednesday, March 18, 2026

Knuckleball Dance

Stop trying to brute-force your way through business and life. Find your own simple and elegant path to success.

Not following the herd, and forging your own path, makes a lot of people uncomfortable. Most feel exposed without the cover of evidence, indicators, and expert opinions. The majority are really uncomfortable with being contrarian, instead of trend-following.

I compare it to the “Zen of the Knuckleball” in baseball.

Most pitchers learn to throw fastballs, curves, sliders, and change-ups. Their main pitch is the fastball — brute force, throw it as hard as possible.

In every generation, there are a tiny minority who are “knuckleballers”. They throw the knuckleball almost exclusively.

Unlike the other pitches that are thrown hard, a knuckleball is thrown softly. It “dances” in the air.

Instead of controlling the speed and location, the knuckleball pitcher has no control, and has no idea how the pitch will move.

Instead, he surrenders and trusts the process.

He has faith that, even though the knuckleball is moving slowly, its path changes moment to moment, making it nearly impossible for the batter to track and time it.

Now, I’m asking you to discard the other pitches, be true to yourself, and start throwing your knuckleball…

Sunday, March 15, 2026

Fail Your Way To Success

"I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." - Michael Jordan

Saturday, March 14, 2026

Which Came First? The Chicken or The Egg?

Which came first? The chicken or the egg? Evolution provides the answer. The egg came first. A prehistoric creature that was 99.9999999% chicken laid the first chicken egg.

Thursday, March 12, 2026

Great Pyramid of Giza

Here are a couple of interesting facts about the Great Pyramid of Giza:

1. Cleopatra lived closer to the invention of the iPhone than the building of the pyramid.

2. The pyramid's latitude is 29.9792458°N.  The speed of light is 299,792,458 metres per second.

Columbo

Sunday, March 8, 2026

Young Turtles...

Star Trek Meets the Lawyers :-)

Monday, February 16, 2026

Robots At Chinese New Year's Show

Chinese robots are getting incredible:

Will Companies Use AI to Replace SaaS Subscriptions?

Like most decisions, it's not black or white. Bigger companies (especially in regulated industries like health care or finance) are not going to write their own versions of ERP or HR software because of complexity, regulatory, and compliance requirements.

But smaller companies that need a "lite" version of a SaaS, might write their own, unless they target this need.

Also, in this period of turbulent change, if SaaS companies don't keep up with the evolving needs of their customers, and large gaps open up between what they offer and what the clients need, they will be more tempted to create their own apps.

Friday, February 13, 2026

Using AI to Code: Context Engineering vs. Vibe Coding

The way software engineers are using AI to code now (context engineering) is very different from "vibe coding" by non-developers.

With vibe coding, someone might ask, "create a sales website," and it might work, but not have security, stability, etc. issues.

With context engineering, developers first think through the approach with AI (including security, stability, scaling, etc), get the agent to document what they discussed, then close the agent, and open a fresh one, to clear out the old memories.

This is the key. They manage the context (info in the agent's memory) to keep it from filling up and containing different ideas. This limits hallucinations and keeps them focused on one task.

Then, they ask the fresh one to use the design to come up with the plan. After the detailed plan, with check boxes, is developed, they have it written out, and then shut the agent.

Then, they run a loop where a new agent is spawned, works on one item, checks it off, creates notes for its successor, then shuts it down, and spawns a fresh one (with no memory) to read the notes and take off from where the previous one left off. It's thus a fully automated, but controlled process.

Monday, January 19, 2026

Strategic Simplicity® #34

Your PMO isn’t fixing chaos. It’s institutionalizing it.

Sunday, January 18, 2026

Most Valuable Skill in 2026?

The most valuable skill in 2026 isn’t writing code; it’s the ability to articulate the problem clearly enough that an AI can solve it.

Thursday, January 15, 2026

Strategic Simplicity® #33

AI won’t save your strategy. Relentless focus will.

Wednesday, January 14, 2026

Why is Health Care and Health Insurance so Messy?

Ultimately, the issue also is that health insurance is a different animal than other forms of insurance. Could you imagine if your home insurance was run like health insurance? Then, instead of just covering fires, etc, every time you needed the heating fixed, or plumbing done, you would have to see if the company was covered under your insurance. The plumber would have to have staff just to handle different insurances. Insurance companies would employ plumbers who would have to read through the issue submitted by your plumber, and pre-approve the work. The costs would be contractually negotiated between the plumber and insurance company.

Monday, January 12, 2026

Strategic Simplicity® #32

Most transformations fail because no one wants to kill a bad idea early.

Sunday, January 11, 2026

Strategy, Vision, and Planning

I think strategy is different from planning. In my view, you come up with a vision of what you want your future state to be. Your strategy is then that you want to move from your current state to that future state. You keep this strategy in mind as you develop your plan, which is to create a roadmap of intermediate states leading between where you are and your end state.

So, for example, You're in NY. You visualize you want to be in CA. Your strategy is to move from NY to CA. Your plan could include hitchhiking to OH, flying to TX, driving to NV, etc.