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“The only way to win is to learn faster than anyone else.”- Eric Ries, author of Lean Startup
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“In this heat it is already difficult to do the minimum necessary, I will be ready in September to work on the strategy…”
You said you would work on it after Easter….
You also said you would think about it after Christmas….
If you are waiting for the right moment to stop and think about Strategy, the one with a capital S, in all likelihood, that moment will never come.
So let me give you one piece of advice, one that I never thought I would give, having founded a company called precisely STRTGY…
Forget strategy, at least for a moment, and focus on execution!
We are obsessed with perfection, with elaborate processes and detailed roadmaps, with not looking unprepared with our team…
Do you know that most strategies never fail?
Not because they are successful. But because no one has ever performed them.
But beware!
Execution without strategy, still produces results.
Not always the ones you expect, but concrete results that you can measure, analyze and learn from.
Why does execution beat strategy every single time? Simple: a poor strategy executed brilliantly will always outperform a brilliant strategy executed poorly.
The action plan that looks perfect on slides is often unexecutable in the real world where people are imperfect, budgets are limited, and competition changes daily.
They were not ready. They were tired of procrastination.
If I look at my CRM, I can name hundreds of people who are still waiting for the perfect time to start. Do you know what I have found? That those who have been successful have done exactly the opposite.
Stop procrastinating, scientifically
Standing still and looking at the water before diving in will not make the sea warm. Imagine how you will feel afterward.
It is called EFT (Episodic Future Thinking ) or, in Italian, Episodic Future Prefiguration, and it is the ability of our mind to project into the future and pre-experience an experience. Think not of the effort you will make but of the feeling of relief, pride and energy you will feel once you complete that thing you cannot begin. It is proven1 that this taste of the future will give you the boost you need to dive in because the reward will be so palpable and desirable that the initial discomfort will fade into the background.
Obstacles indicate direction (quoting Marcus Aurelius)
The increased pushback you receive often highlights exactly the most critical areas to address. Resistance is not an enemy to be avoided, it is a signal to be interpreted that tells you where change is most urgent and necessary. At MAKE PROGRESS® we have a tool called Now&Next that tells you this by numbers.
Don’t die of over-planning
How many hours did you spend last year perfecting slides that no one will remember three months from now? Or the budget in excel that wasn’t met? Eric Ries in LeanStartup (Start Light in Italian), one of the most influential books of all time, says it in no uncertain terms: figuring out what works and what doesn’t, faster than your competitors, is not just a competitive advantage, it’s a matter of survival!
80% ready
Don’t wait until everything is 100% perfect. 80% is more than enough to get the first results. That missing 20% you only learn by doing, not planning. Action generates data that no brainstorming meeting will ever produce.
Think long term
The best strategy is the one you can maintain over time, the sustainable one that doesn’t lead to burnout. It’s not just about making more sales today and growing the margin for one or two months. It’s about building something that works for the next ten years.
Progress vs. Perfectionism
You don’t have to wait for Monday.
You don’t have to wait for September.
You don’t have to wait for Q4.
You don’t have to wait for January 1…
You just have to get started.
And focus on the idea that done is better than perfect.
As you get more practice, you’ll want to keep increasing the quality, precision, and volume of your results–and the fun will increase, too!
It is not about remaining mediocre forever, but about starting from where you are and improving iteration by iteration.
Don’t read MAKE PROGRESS® with OKRs
It is understandable that you don’t want to pack a 400-page book, but…
Reading the first chapter for free is better than not knowing what it is about.
Downloading the toolkit with more than 13 ready-to-use templates is better than starting with a blank sheet of paper.
I repeat, do not read it. Use it!
ALWAYS MAKE PROGRESS ⤴
Antonio
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PS: I have made some spots available in my calendar for you to build your implementation roadmap together. Click here to book one.
- Rebetez, M. M. S., Rochat, L., Gay,P., & Van der Linden, M. (2016). Procrastination, consideration of future consequences, and episodic future thinking. Consciousness and Cognition, 43, 85-93. doi:10.1016/j.concog.2016.04.010. ↩︎
