Archives February 2021

Deal with it.

Just like you are not as fast as Usain Bolt. Or as effective as Brady.

There are certain limitations in everyone’s life. The kind of limitations that are not removable.

You’ll see, “impossible is nothing” it’s super inspiring, but no matter how much I try to fly by myself, I will never do it. And I’m not talking about doing it by a technology or modifying my biology.

Learning and this limitations, and accepting them, will prove to be a hard quest but a very profitable one.

To show up when everything seems to be against you.

But for that very reason, it is determinant to keep holding on.

Imagine you decide to loosen the discipline. Then by failing to be consistent, now you have one more reason to think you are an utterly failure.

A vicious cycle of self fulfilling evidence of a loser in a mean world is created. Very hard to escape the pull of such a situation.

It should be avoided at all costs.

Now imagine you did show up and maybe the performance wasn’t that great, but hey, you didn’t broke the streak!!!

And then you can cling to that evidence, even if it’sminimal, that not every thing is lost.

The world might represent the same adverse context, but you are not helpless, you are in control of something: yourself.

And that little victory could be just the lifesaver that changes everything.

Old time CEOs, maybe 50 years ago, used to talk kind of different as new superstar CEOs do.

They used to mention: be the first and best in the niche, be clever, outperform your competitors, welcome to the jungle, etc. It was a (vulgar) display of power and pretty self centered.

The new superstar CEO’s vocabulary has changed quite a bit. They use recurrently terms like: purpose, kindness, candor, openness, love, passion, collaboration and global responsibility.

How amazing is that?

Today, the richest man on earth knows about rocket engineering and he can understand the Laplace Transform.

Even more amazing, right? Knowledge and science grasping power over malice.

Also, many of them also are actively donating huge amounts of their fortunes into charity, and more important, into trying to fix some of humanity’s biggest problems.

In times like these, it always gives me hope. For me, faith in humanity is restored.

And now, it makes me think: what kind of human being will be the next generation of mega entrepreneurs?

I would have tacos anytime: breakfast, lunch & dinner. For you, maybe red velvet cake is what you crave.

By evolution, we are drawn to the things, actions and context that gives us pleasure. Naturally, we try to avoid those things that cause us pain or put us in danger (almost all of us, if we are not pathologically ill).

But, interestingly, even if we all share some basic definitions, each individual finds pleasure and/or pain in her own different set of elements.

So if there are differences in those metrics, it means they are defined individually, whether it may be by one’s context or one’s decision, or both.

Let’s say we can define our own metrics. What would you choose? You can decide to find pleasure and thrive in friction (very handy since friction is all around us).

If your goal is to be fit, then you define pleasure as the feeling of exhaustion and soreness.

If your goal is to get some skills, you define pleasure as curiosity fulfilled and new knowledge acquired.

It takes time to let it sink in the subconscious, but repetition, repetition, repetition…and let dopamine do it’s job.

The very same KPIs than 2 years ago….

They used to work. You were measuring the stuff that let you know if your company was moving in the right direction. But I think we may agree that the world has changed. So why haven’t your dashboard also changed?

I mean, come on, what are you trying to do? Do you want people to behave just like 3 years ago? You can’t ask your people to try new things, to get different outcomes, if you are measuring them the same.

It is time to revisit all your controls and your performance indicators.

Please don’t refrain yourself when you are watching the iceberg approaching.

Your boss and peers will be grateful with you if you ask for help when you know you won’t make the deadline or the expected outcome; when there is still time to do something about it.

The greatest anger, and what causes more visceral reactions, like firing someone, it’s when the next question arises: why didn’t you say something?

So avoid putting yourself in that position. It is better for everybody.

And if they end up hating the messenger, then you know you shouldn’t be around that kind of people.

When a new business or project finds its way to your desk, you should see it as a brand new topic in its entirety.

After the obvious research in some sites, articles and books (if you are thorough), there is now a mandatory need to keep digging.

You might think you are done with all the research and conceptualization. Now imagine how many millions of people are out there who, just like you, are trying to implement a new idea, at the same time.

If you can imagine a bunch of people pursuing the same niche, then you know what you have to do: The gold is not in shallow ground. Keep digging my friend.

Comes a really hard phase: brutal honesty with yourself and your team.

You guys will have to evaluate if what you thought about your business as strengths and your commercial promise are actually valuable out there.

You might be in love with your products, you could have the most inspiring mission or purpose, but you could also be wrong about everything and not being valuable or needed by anyone.

It is better to realize this today than tomorrow.

How many times have you started a task without being convinced it would reach the desired outcome?

How many of those times, the results were surprisingly positive? Let me guess…almost zero?

The auto fulfilled prophecy of failure is something very much tangible. You can see it in world championships, in stereotypes of all kinds, and you can see it in your very own life.

Gratefully, there is also the auto fulfilled prophecy of success. It means believing before hand that the outcome might be positive.

Of course, just remain grounded. Given the present conditions (of skills, resources, goals, etc.) it pays to be positive, if there is any room for it. Remember, delusion is not a bug, it is failure to see reality.