Losing five million dollars seems like a lot of money, right?
Unless your market cap is 500 billion, and then it’s just noise.
The first thing you hear can anchor us. Unfortunately, the first thing we hear isn’t always real. Sometimes, it’s just noise.
Take a moment, take a breath and get the context to understand if it is noise.
One of my favorite books to read this year was Marshall Goldsmith’s What Got You Here Won’t Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful.
One of most valuable lessons from the book is about “providing value.” In some cases, it is the worst thing you can do.
What is the problem with adding too much value? It would seem like it would be better for all concerned if our ideas were always improved upon. It’s not. Imagine an energetic, enthusiastic employee comes into your office with an idea. She excitedly shares the idea with you.”
This part is where you offer encouragement. Encourage ideas and resist the urge to give more value by adding your domain experience.
Often, we don’t, and we end up falling into the trap you see here.
You think it’s a great idea. Instead of saying, “Great idea!” you say, “That’s a nice idea. Why don’t you add this to it?” What does this do? It deflates her enthusiasm; it dampers her commitment. While the quality of the idea may go up 5 percent, her commitment to execute it may go down 50 percent. That’s because it’s no longer her idea, it’s now your idea.
Instead of looking to control or “level up” the solution, take the opportunity to challenge them with problems. Trust they have the solutions to solve them.
You, they, and the project end up better for it.
It’s hard to get over the hump of networking with work.
The act of networking is something that feels unnatural to us. We don’t want to come off inauthentic, so initiating and keeping the relationships alive feel phony. We attach images of a weasel to people who network often. They seem like they are power-hungry. For that, I spent most of my life trying to stay away.
There is an invisible script that I have running in my head that tells me that people are not trying to hear from me, that what I offer is noise, and if I sit with something and try to perfect it, it will get better. The flaw with this is that I never get around of posting my stuff out there.
I looked at my backlog today, and I saw I had almost 200 pieces of writing backlogged. This is stuff that is sitting around my hard drive, which I let atrophy. I never made it into something for the arena, and ultimately, instead of getting perfected, it sits there on my hard drive. It dies on the vine. I lose the opportunity to improve for no reason other than my ego.
The truth of the matter is, we have something to offer. We all have value when it comes to making something that matters. The best way to find out and deliver that value is networking. Finding your tribe, connecting with them, and leaning on them to help you improve ultimately makes you a better value to those around.
From the desk of Adam Thomas 