Karthi Subbaraman

An original take on originality.

Originality is overrated. I might be hated for saying this but hey let's get honest. In the design thinking world, our aim is to problem solve creatively. We can't slack on efficiency and effectiveness of the solution but we could (and we do) slack on originality.

Why are we so clingy?

Child psychologists observed our clinginess from a very early age. Whether it is a bicycle or a chocolate bar or a mug, we start putting greater value to the object when we own them. Our sense of ownership vividly emerges as soon as the object becomes ours. We don'

A simple idea that changed my life

One Minute Writing # 1 (a part of OMX series) I distinctly remember that day. It was 2002. I drove up to visit my family in Ohio that weekend. That weekend, we cooked a lot, we laughed a lot, we rented a lot from blockbuster 🙈 and watched a number of stupid

Self vs Audience

Today is a significant day for me 🥁 I finally geared up my guts and executed what I feel is right. I may be wrong. I may even hear some disagreements. I may even lose people. But my authentic self feels full. Something inside me is dancing with joy. It is

Exploring human identity

> A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyse a new problem,

K's Weekly # 5

Welcome to the fifth edition of K's Weekly. If you are new to this weekly newsletter, I share my learnings from week-in-a-life as a maker, teacher, coach, advisor, entrepreneur and a student. Every week I share a bunch of learnings from being curious, doing experiments, building & launching

AND OR

AND is hard. OR is easy (relatively). I want to learn AND I want to get an awesome role is hard compared to I want to learn or I want to get an awesome role. It is an interesting human behavior that we are drawn towards many ANDs compared to

Design Everything

Here is a simple idea I take very seriously. Everything can be designed. The word CAN BE in that sentence is crucial. "Can be" works only when there is intent. "Intent" works only when there is a drive. "Drive" works only when there is

Human life as an emoji-shell

Typically my value proposition lecture series spans across 10 weeks. I love the series because we get to explore all things human nature which we generally don't touch upon in product management or product design or product marketing or value communication. In this series, I start with the

Fake it. Make it. Live it

Do you remember your school annual days? Do you remember that one serotonin-loaded evening where we put up our best performances for our parents and guests? I remember mine from my sixth grade. It was 1990 (sounds ancient 🤔). 6 weeks before our annual day my Tamil teacher asked me to