Decisions at the Fulcrum

In this episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum, I zoom into Zoom and go from the train station platform to the teleconferencing platform that became ubiquitous during the early 2020s. This episode opens in Logan, UT, at Utah State University, and I cover early interest and delivery of distance education by train.

From there, I cover Zoom during the COVID-19 crisis, a series of fulcrum points in which a handful of interface decisions t...

This week's Decisions at the Fulcrum is a little different: an actual talk based on my health communication seminars. I begin with a familiar scene: a well-meaning billboard scolding you for "doing the healthy thing" and then waiting for acquiescence. And then I carefully undermine the underlying assumption that if individuals are aware that their conduct is negligent, they would just abandon it. Human behavior does not follow any ...

There was a time when a protein powder didn't pretend to be a personality type, thanks to history doing its irritating job. Inside a compostable wrapping, it offered no intensity, calmness, or equitable harmony. It was only a coarse, chalk-like implement for those who viewed eating as an administrative task.

So how did we get from a few bars in the latter part of the 1980s and early 1990s to today's chaotic, unending protein aisle?

There are state flags everywhere, but they are seldom investigated. In this episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum, I focus on Maryland's state flag, a quartered design that seems to be contrasting a lot with itself. The tension was a decision though about a state sense of place and identity.

Let's be clear: The Civil War was not a conflict of equal moral standing, and acknowledging division or later reconciliation amongst divided par...

Part II of the DuPont episodes begins after the armistice following World War I. The episode begins in November 1918, when the explosions cease, contracts disappear, and a munitions-based firm determines what to become afterwards.

This episode follows DuPont's postwar shift from an explosives firm to a materials empire, beginning with nylon. Nylon was that material in American department shops. We start there, but the episode concl...

In this episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum, we look at BrightSide Produce, a produce distributor that works in impoverished parts of San Diego County, and discover that food availability isn't only a matter of supply, demand, or good intentions.

It's a complex situation with coordination, not optimization.

Let's follow BrightSide Produce through forecasting discussions, uncertain delivery trajectories, and the hushed aftermath of ...

In this episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum, I map out one of the more complex disputes in international resource policy: the seabed mining near Nauru. We'll look at the issue by going from the depth seabed floor to the brightly-lit world of international governance. I employ Paul Wehr's conflict mapping approach to comprehend how conflict arises when parties have disparate "maps" of the same terrain that have different interpretat...

This episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum starts with the Brandywine River, instead of inventiveness, innovation, or even chemical synthesis. This is an account of how a few generations of refugees taught in  European scientific disciplines morphed into an institution much bigger than a company. Instead, this institution gradually became a kind of infrastructure the United States grew to rely on, from the War of 1812 through the Fir...

Part II shifts focus from federal legislation to the marketplace, revealing the painful truth that, after years of expansion, the CBD business in 2025 remains fundamentally unstable, poorly regulated, and dominated by bulk isolates and white-label manufacture. Laboratory tests, including JAMA's 2020 review, continue to demonstrate considerable mislabeling, with products having considerably less or significantly more CBD than promis...

Part I investigates the federal hinge that enabled today's CBD scenario via a minor provision: Section 7606 of the 2014 Farm Bill.

This section enabled universities and state agricultural agencies to grow hemp for research purposes, unwittingly establishing the first legal road for contemporary cannabinoid study in more than 70 years.

It created the structural circumstances that would ultimately sustain a multibillion-dollar market...

In this episode, we plunge headfirst into calamity from a stormy weather event. Using everything from wandering caribou herds to turbulent typhoons, we delve into how scientists truly forecast the atmosphere and why that process is more chaotic than my sleek weather apps being refreshed in a frenzy.

I explain why contemporary forecasts depend on ensembles—multiple parallel model runs that chart a compreh...

This episode is a recording of an asynchronous lecture/discussion I gave in 2025. I cover the opening narrative in "managing the unexpected" from Karl Weick and Kathleen Sutcliffe. The main theme is how we can comprehend High Reliability Organizations (HROs) using 5 principles. I also look at the airline industry in 2024 as another example. WaMu and the airline collapse in 2024 (as well as the more consequential issues in fli...

At 4:46 a.m. in Changi Airport, a robot arm known as Ella the Barista is on the job.  Behind glass, it grinds, pours, and serves coffee with unwavering precision as a traveler effortlessly pays with a flick of their smartwatch and strides confidently to their gate. From a sleek corner closet-like kiosk of Singapore's award-winning airport, this episode dives into the world of automation: from 1980s Pasadena at Two Pan...

Opening in Beiruit, but it's a simulation. We're going to fly with Middle East Airlines (MEA) in this episode as it implements the socio-technical practice of "safety first" by teaching procedures with accurate communication, collaborative sense, and active monitoring.  I discuss MEA's internal program development decision, data collection techniques (documents, interviews, and event narratives), and the importance of considering c...

Happy Halloween! 🎃 Candy corn is sweet, triangular, and curiously adamant: a confection that dwells the center of Halloween rituals, from knocking of doors to collecting a sugar surplus. In this episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum we trace candy corn’s journey from factory floors in Philadelphia to the front steps of 1930s and 1950s neighborhoods.

The episode pieces together empirical social science and...