Saying vs. doing
Does this group have a loyalty oath?
Brittle organizations are focused on which end of the egg you open. Are you wearing the team jersey the right way, saying the incantations each time, saluting properly...
Resilient organizations are more focused on what you produce, and why.
Petty dictators care a lot about words, about appearances, about whether everyone is genuflecting in precisely the same way.
Galvanized
When George Martin first met the Beatles and became their producer, he liked their sound and their energy, but he didn't think they could write songs. So he licensed a song, handed it to them and had them record it. John and Paul hated doing this, so they asked if they could write one. That became their first hit. Faced with opposition and competition, they became better songwriters.
Sir George didn't think much of Pete Best, their drummer, and he said so. He wanted to hire session musicians as drummers. Faced with a loss of cohesion and control, John, Paul and George took action, fired Pete, found and hired Ringo.
George didn't think there was a chance this Ringo guy was any good, so he had a session musician sit in for the first recording. Ringo brought his A game on the next track and that was the end of session musicians sitting in.
Often, our best work happens when we're in a situation we wouldn't have chosen for ourselves. The hard part is choosing to be in that sort of situation in the first place, the uncomfortable one where we have no choice but to do better work.
Give up and go up goals
You will benefit when you tell lots of people your give up goals. Tell your friends when you want to give up overeating or binging or being a boor. Your friends will make it ever more difficult for you to feel good about backsliding.
On the other hand, the traditional wisdom is that you should tell very few people about your go up goals. Don't tell them you intend to get a promotion, win the race or be elected prom king. That's because even your friends get jealous, or insecure on your behalf, or afraid of the change your change will bring.
Here's the thing: If that's the case, you need better friends.
A common trait among successful people is that they have friends who expect them to move on up.
Your big break
...isn't.
Your big break might be a break, but in the long run, it's certainly not big.
Breaks give us a chance to do more work, to continue showing up, to move a bit further down the road.
Perhaps it would be more accurate to call it, "your big new start."
"No one clicked on it, no one liked it..."
These two ideas are often uttered in the same sentence, but they're actually not related.
People don't click on things because they like them, or because they resonate with them, or because they change them.
They click on things because they think it will look good to their friends if they share them.
Or they click on things because it feels safe.
How to talk about your project
Not in a marketing sense, but strategically, to yourself, your partners, your coaches, your investors:
What is it for? When someone hires your product or service, what are they hiring it to do?
Who (or what) are you trying to change by doing this work? From what to what?
How will you know if it's working?
