Why is this?

To me the converging objects of the universe perpetually flow,

All are written to me, and I must get what the writing means . . .

(I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my house by, after all.)

Walt Whitman - Song of Myself

My love of operations started when I was very young. I had no words for it at the time, but I can remember the precise day that it began.

I was at a church, for reasons I can no longer recall, doing some volunteer work. I couldn’t have been more than 8 years old. Two other kids and I were tasked with moving some stackable chairs from an elevated stage to the audience area. Here’s a top view for you:

We began with the simplest and oldest process path known to humanity: individual effort. Each one of us would grab a single chair and haul it off the stage and across the room. We were in our own worlds, disconnected, not speaking to each other.

After a few iterations of this method, I experienced a eureka moment. I realized that the process could be broken down into three steps. Moving the chairs to the edge of the stage -> moving them down to the floor -> moving them across the floor to the new location. I explained this to my compatriots and they readily agreed to try.

We began working together. We started with the first step. Chairs accumulated at the edge of the stage. Without communicating, first one of us, then another switched to the next step. Moving to the place where work most needed to be done. This is how we progressed until the task was complete. There was never a snag, never a moment of doubt, everything flowed.

And it felt good for us. It’s like we were playing a game in perfect harmony.

The textbook definition of operations belie the simplicity of what it actually is: harmony in service to a goal. People dress it up in different guises - MBA language, chemical diagrams, mathematics, but the core is this flow towards ends that is so hard to capture in language.

Jim Simons said “be guided by beauty”. I think that’s incredibly wise. This small moment in the church with my new friends was indescribably beautiful to me. I’ve let it guide me ever since. I’ve come to a point where I really want to start talking about where it’s led me and what I see, hear, and feel from here.

This Substack is my effort to capture the stories and ideas of this place.