Approaches to Life

I recently read a transcript in Paul Graham’s blog of a talk by Richard Hamming on March 1986 at Bellcore. The talk is titled “You and Your Research.”

Hamming was a mathematician who in his lifetime made several field-changing contributions to computer science. According to Wikipedia, Hamming joined “the Manhattan Project at the Los Alamos Laboratory, where he programmed the IBM calculating machines that computed the solution to equations provided by the project’s physicists.” In 1946, after World War II, he joined Bell Labs. “Over the next fifteen years, he was involved in nearly all of the laboratories’ most prominent achievements.” He was awarded the Turing Award in 1968.

Hamming’s talk is about achieving significant things. The major objection to setting out to do great work—says Hamming—is that people think that great things are mostly done by luck. Hamming counterargues by quoting Pasteur: luck favors the prepared mind. Usually, he adds, people who do great things have some trajectory of doing good things. So, you should say to yourself: “Yes, I would like to do something significant.”

Hamming focuses on the importance of consistency and hard work. But consistency by itself is not enough. You need to work consistently on the important things.

Hamming:

Edison says, “Genius is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration.” He may have been exaggerating, but the idea is that solid work, steadily applied, gets you surprisingly far. The steady application of effort with a little bit more work, intelligently applied is what does it. That’s the trouble; drive, misapplied, doesn’t get you anywhere. I’ve often wondered why so many of my good friends at Bell Labs who worked as hard or harder than I did, didn’t have so much to show for it. The misapplication of effort is a very serious matter. Just hard work is not enough—it must be applied sensibly.

The complete transcript is worth reading. It’s a refresher on what it takes to do great work. Also, from my limited point of view, a justification for paying the cost of being greatly successful. Hamming was obsessed with scientific breakthrough. His priorities were clear, and he pursued them above other interests.

After reading the whole talk and letting it sink for a couple of days, my mind kept remembering Clayton Christensen’s book How Will You Measure Your Life. Christensen also made great breakthroughs in his life. Among other things, he developed the theory of disruptive innovation, which has been called one of the most influential business ideas of the early 21st century.

Christensen and Hamming had very different approaches to life, and different priorities. Christensen argues against the resource-allocation pattern of putting everything into career advancement, at whatever cost. Hamming admits openly in the talk neglecting his wife and carrying ulcers for years. Both achieved great things. Both accepted trade-offs.

Choose your hard.