One of my major frustrations over the years has been people's natural tendency (mine included) to spend more time coming up with reasons why something will fail than why we should go ahead. Essentially demonstrating a "no, but" rather than a "yes, and" mindset 🧵
This is most commonly seen in meetings where one person presents and idea, and then the rest of the participants then come up with reasons why the idea won't work.
If the person who has come up with the idea has organisational power (e.g. CEO), they'll often move ahead with conviction, irrespective of any raised concerns. Often holding the perspective that the concerns are largely theoretical and can be overcome with effort.
It's amazing how much of management (and by extension, coaching) is asking people whether the thing they've just shared with you, they've also shared with the person they're talking about. Ideally in the same calm, even mannered and non-judgemental fashion.
What they've shared is almost always some perfectly rational concern, pitched in a way that makes them sound reasonable. Largely because people want to be seen as reasonable by their bosses (and coaches).
If they shared this concern in the same reasonable, rational and caring way with the person they're referencing, things would almost certainly work out fine. However they've almost certainly not tried this.
Start-ups often fail by running out of money. However I wonder whether having too much money can also have a detrimental effect.
I see a lot of early stage start-ups raising increasingly large amounts of money on often mind-boggling valuations. This massively changes their behaviour and attitude to experimentation and risk.
I think there are fundamentally three approaches to processional career development.
1. Hunter Gatherer 2. Single Crop Farmer 3. Multi-crop Farmer
Most people are nomadic hunter gathers. They're essentially opportunists. One job leads to the next job, which leads to the next job, following the opportunities presented to them. There's some directionality, but it's about the journey rather than the destination.
Some people can be super lucky following this approach and end up somewhere truly special, that they never could have imagined on their own. Others end up feeling a little lost and aimless, not happy with where the currents have taken them.
I see this so much in my conversations with founders. The belief that shipping that next major feature on your roadmap will somehow magically open the floodgates to a tidal wave of new customers.
This often happens because potential customers have told the founders that the reason they're not buying is because the product lacks said feature. However it's often just a polite (and less awkward) way of saying they're not interested in the product.
So rather than hurt the founders feelings they'll make up some excuse why they're not ready to buy. That excuse is usually some non-essential feature that seems like a helpful idea at the time.