Category: Personal Growth

Perception: How An Idea Changes Reality

The movie Inception posits the following:

“What’s the most resilient parasite? An idea. A single idea from the human mind can build cities. An idea can transform the world, and rewrite all the rules.”

This sounds a lot like the mission of TED conferences:

“Ideas worth spreading.”

This can be seen in both a positive and negative way. I was amazed at the Steve Jobs performance last week during an Apple press conference. How he addressed the iPhone 4 antenna issue, by shifting our focus. When he used the word “antennagate,” I wondered if Jobs’ idea would take hold. That instead of people labeling this issue an Apple issue, they would label an antenna issue?

I couldn’t help but be amazed as Jobs didn’t stretch reality, but stretched our perception of it, or at least tried to. Dilbert creator Scott Adams commented on this as well, calling Jobs’ tactic the “higher ground maneuver.”

This is the opportunity and the challenge for companies in transition, for those whose business models have been disrupted by the web.

The ideas in the movie Inception are true. An idea is powerful. It can shape reality. It can change how information spreads. It shifts the course of our culture and changes our behavior and perceived value.

Ideas are an evolution. They are a birth, and sometimes, a death. I couldn’t help but view Inception in relation to 2001: A Space Odyssey. How is something born – how does it evolve? How does each relate to beginnings and endings?

The best example I can find is the double rainbow. An incredible video has been spreading around the web of a guy who sees a double rainbow.

His reaction is incredible in both its depth, and how it evolves. This is his reaction:

  • First: Surprise on discovering the rainbow.
  • Second: Celebration – he cheers the sky.
  • Third: Profound experience – he cries and questions “what does it mean?”

His reaction matters more than the actual thing. The rainbow – the inception of an idea – is neutral. How the world deals with it is what matters.

And this is the challenge for companies in transition: how they deal with opportunity. How they choose to – or not to – move their organizations forward.

Are you working towards building something new, riding a wave of new ideas? Or are you defending your brand from an attack, as your market shifts? How you perceive this situation will dictate your future – perception is reality.

Thanks!

-Dan

Fail Now, or Succeed Later

Too often, we pronounce something to be a failure way too soon. Corporations that rely on quarterly business cycles, or even yearly bonus cycles, sometimes feel forced to make quick decisions about the potential success of a given strategy.

In doing so, they fail to pivot, fail to iterate, fail properly measure, fail to listen to their customers, and fail to succeed.

Even when you look at personal projects, you often see a hint of what could be, if only there is enough passion to wait out the failure. Everyone is a failed writer before they are a successful writer.

To be okay when things become grim, when failure surrounds you, envelops you, and holds you down beneath the water – it takes an incredible sense of perseverance. Those who wait it out may find that success is just around the corner. Maybe patience was all that was needed, or a shift in the business model, or the right partnership or market timing.

I recently listened to the DVD commentary tracks on the TV show Entourage and the movie Good Will Hunting. In each, the creators told similar stories:

  • Entourage: The show’s creators had to wait something like two years from the deal with HBO to actually getting a pilot on the air, and then another nine months for the series to actually begin. Plus, there was the time they spent trying to sell it to HBO before the deal was even signed.

    Again and again in he commentary track, you can hear it in their voices – how tentative there success was in the beginning, how it took a series of two steps forward, one step back type situations. Their success relied on so many factors, not just having a great idea and some connections.

  • Good Will Hunting: They had a very similar story, it took something like five years of work to slowly get people to support the project, to keep iterating and changing to make it better. Even when big names were attached, the movie wasn’t a done deal – it was constant effort to get someone to recognize it.

    That it was nominated for and won Academy Awards can mask this uncertainty – a success can often seem like a foregone conclusion after the fact. And of course, what follows is tons of people say “I had that idea,” as if they idea alone was all it took to bring the movie into existence and make it a success.

Sometimes we rush to failure. There is fear embarrassment if something isn’t an instant success, and it is easy for people to give in to self-doubt, allowing others to define their experience, and their value.

Anything great that was ever achieved was likely wholly different than anything that came before it. It challenged others before it inspired them.

When we give in to failure too easily, we give in to mediocrity, to the leveling of new ideas down to the accepted middle. And if there is one thing we need – it’s people shooting for those great inspiring goals – of birthing something that has never been before, but the world desperately needs.

Thanks!

-Dan

How Experience Prevents You From Doing Great Things

Michael Arrington wrote a blog post over the weekend, explaining why experience can actually prevent someone from doing incredible things. That, because they have wisdom enough to know that an idea is a bit wild, a bit unlikely to succeed, that the experienced person or company avoids them, and looks skeptically on those who try new ideas.

He describes how inexperience and blind passion can lead to building something of value:

“Nearly everything that is really disruptive is created by someone too young to know that they never had a chance of winning. So they blindly charge ahead, and they win. Most startups look sort of dumb in the really early stages, mostly because if they were so obviously going to win then someone would have likely jumped in already.”

And how so many mature and established businesses and individuals continually pass on innovative ideas – on exciting ideas – on profitable ideas – because of their experience:

“The wisdom that comes with experience seems like such a valuable asset to have. You have advice that people should listen to, you think, as you smirk condescendingly at the kid with the big idea and no clue what terrible obstacles stand between her and success… I sometimes feel that skepticism creeping into my thinking when I look at a new idea being presented by an eager and innocent young entrepreneur… Who am I to tell someone that they can’t change the world?”

Michael frames this around age – that he’s noticed himself become more skeptical now that he is 40, having heard so many entrepreneurs pitch him ideas over the past five years. But I would add that this same thing happens at any age, for two other reasons that hold us back:

  • Fear of Failure:

    We don’t want to fail. Even for someone who is young, many of us feel we have something to prove, or desperately want to find success after years of work. By the time you are 20 years old, you have been in school for most of your life, spending thousands of hours studying, learning, and trying. You’ve likely played hundreds of games or prepared for dozens of recitals or debates or what have you. Maybe you’ve loved and lost already.

    So you don’t want to lose. You get on track and try to find a path that guarantees success. And things that aren’t well established, that aren’t yet proven, can be seen as risky, or outlandish because they are risky.

    This is why many people pile in way too late for investment opportunities. They didn’t have the foresight or guts to take the risk when it was meaningful. Later on, when everyone around them feels it’s safe to invest in a particular business or industry, they do too. This goes beyond bubbles around things like housing, this is how most people invest in both good times and bad. The follow the pack.

    Fear drives many of us to make the safest decision, the one with the best chance to succeed. And this is why so many people avoid trying wild new ideas… they are too afraid to fail.

  • Pride:
    Basically, few of us want to look foolish. We don’t want to lose the respect of our family, colleagues and friends, by taking a risk, failing, and then being made fun of. So we hide behind our pride, not only not trying new ideas ourselves, but tearing down others who do try them.

    Many people would LOVE to try new ideas, but feel boxed in by responsibility, so they can’t. How many people do you know that looked at a successful business – eBay, Craigslist, Facebook, Priceline – and said “I had that idea, I could have done that.” Or looked at a successful business, and were convinced that a current strategy was wrong, and that THEY knew the right move to make.

    Clearly, they feel they have the experience and wisdom for great success, and yet, they don’t act.

The solution? Find small ways to test out ideas that you have. Instead of risking your entire family’s savings on a business venture, invest in small ways, either with your time, support or money. Encourage those around you who have ideas on how to build something new – something unproven – something risky.

We watch sports because there is a chance for glory, and a chance for failure. Take the chance in your own life to find the glory, regardless of the risk of failure.

Thanks!

-Dan

Ideas vs Execution (An Idea Alone is Not Enough)

This week, I watched a documentary about ordinary people who did an extraordinary thing. They didn’t have much money, they didn’t have great connections, they didn’t have a particular expertise above anyone else in their field, but they had passion. And with that, they amassed an important collection of modern art, and became celebrities in the art world.

“Anybody can have these ideas, but to actually do it is quite a miracle.”
– Dorothy Vogel

The documentary was “Herb & Dorothy,” and it told the story of Herb & Dorothy Vogel, who spent the past 50 years collecting artwork in New York City. The crux of the story is that they ended up with a multimillion dollar collection on the salary of a postal worker and librarian – that these two unassuming people infiltrated the art world. But there is so much more to it than that.

Herb and Dorothy lived in a small, 1-bedroom rent stabilized apartment, and for half a century, they devoted their lives to the art world. Not to gaming it, not to studying it, but to EXPERIENCING it. Primarily, they became friends with artists – they collected people as much as they collected artwork, evidently. They didn’t have children, they didn’t have much of anything, except for art.

 

But it wasn’t about just the work itself, they were participants in the art culture. They met everyone, saw everything, and tracked an artist’s work as it evolved. They became a part of the process. They never sold any of the nearly 5,000 pieces they collected, and eventually gave most of it away to museums. When the National Gallery of Art gave them a small stipend to live on – pay medical bills, the rent, etc – they instead used it to buy more art.

As I watched their story, I took away a few lessons that I thought were critical for building something of value:

  • Sometimes, doing something extraordinary is an act of simple dedication and stamina, not sweeping and dramatic moments.
  • There is opportunity outside of trends. Herb & Dorothy never participated in financial art booms, they focused on what they loved and took a long term view of it all.
  • Traditional limits (finance, connections) can be overcome in the most simple of ways. Herb & Dorothy negotiated their way to not just possess objects, but to create powerful connections and friendships, which somehow lead to the creation of their collection.
  • Many who learn of Herb & Dorothy’s story will think: “I can do that.” And yet, 99.9% of the world will never do anything remotely close to what they did. Herb & Dorothy are an incredible example of how you don’t always need a brilliant idea to succeed, just uncompromising execution.

Thanks!

-Dan

Hustle. The Old-Fashioned Way to Thrive Online.

Gary Vaynerchuk is trying to scale himself. Scale caring. Scale connection. Scale what an individual can become.

He seems to have something to prove.

His mantra is ‘hustle.’ It took me awhile to realize what he meant by that. At first, I considered it a negative word, like, ‘he is hustling you.’ As if you are trying to take advantage of someone.

But THEN, I realized he meant ‘hustle’ like my dad used it on the soccer field when I was 8 years old. Hustle meant to give it that extra effort.

How does ‘hustle’ scale? I was surprised in Gary’s book that he promised no tricks, no shortcuts, and that the secret to winning, is the willingness to do way more than your competition. It meant working from 9pm-1pm after the kids went the sleep, then waking up at 5am to catch another hour of work before they wake up at 6am.

It’s old-fashioned advice, which is why I love it. Tricks are interesting, but they are momentary. Gary inspires a lot of people – I know he can convince 99% of an audience to agree with him because the things he preaches are so primal – they are about connection, building something of value and success.

But I also venture to guess that that 99% of those he’s converted, aren’t able to follow his advice of ‘hustle.’ It’s not that they don’t agree with him, but because they would prefer a shortcut. They want a lottery ticket. They don’t want to work all night, 7 days a week, regardless of the reward. And if even if they are willing to work 24/7, they want to know the specific reward they are working towards, and the specific time frame that reward will come in.

This creates an opportunity for that remaining 1% of people who walk away from meeting Gary. That’s the 1% that will work 24/7 year after year. The 1% that doesn’t get burnt out, that believes that if you connect with a single person, you are connecting with the entire world.

Many businesses are about scale – they don’t value a single customer, they value things that affect large segments of their customer base. There are companies out there that are doing interesting things – loose customer services policies, loose employee vacation policies. They are focused on the individual. But most companies have sweeping policies to limit what customers and employees can do. If you have an issue with that company, they give you the phone number to someone half a world away who has no power to help you, and zero stake in retaining you as a customer.

It’s efficient, sure. But it’s the opposite of valuing each customer. Not because they outsourced their phone operations, but because of the policies that limit what the representative can do.

Gary Vaynerchuk is about scale – about scaling what an individual with a heart can do. And he’s not out there saving baby seals from danger, he is a businessman – his goal is money, but not ONLY money. Gary is building something of meaning – something that gives more than it takes.

Gary is about things that can’t be automated. He is about changing the world one person at a time.

For me, that’s really inspiring. If that type of thing is important to you, I highly recommend you check him out:

Thanks!

-Dan