“People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other ideas that they are. You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done.”

Again and again, in my coaching practice, when people develop plan to evolve and change their life, I encounter that one very fundamental question is:

“What are you ready to stop doing?”

It’s a tough question. It is hard – but necessary. You can’t just add up stuff to your life. Letting go of something you are doing shows commitment, prioritization, focus.

Are you as proud of the things you have stopped doing than of the stuff you’ve been recently starting?

The first powered flight by the Wright brothers

However, there is plenty of substantial evidence, at least anecdotal, that the most impacting and most fundamental inventions were rarely created by government or centralized spending. For example, computers created in a garage; or powered flight invented by self-taught bicycle shop owners. Sometimes R&D spending creates something unexpected, not part of the original program.

The competition between the Wright Brothers and Samuel Langley, a well established academic with generous funding from government, is possibly the best example.

Samuel Langley (a true academic!)

It went to the point where the US government denied the Wright brothers recognition for forty years, so upset were they that they had succeeded and not the program the government had funded!

Some details on that story can be found here, here. On this link there are some interesting thoughts about the effect of government and bureaucratic funding, with reflections around this story.

(Centrally planned) government or corporate funding might not be the most effective way to foster innovation. Letting an ecosystem of innovators create, destroy, fail and finally evolve into suitable innovations is certainly a much better solution. But central planning and bureaucratic management is unable to support or control such an arrangement.

The issue is more about creating a social context where failure needs to be accepted as part of the search for innovation, and where innovation needs to remain nested in action. It is not certain that the huge push of China in R&D and academic research will be effective if there is no possibility to experiment and to fail in Chinese society.

How can we release the inventive potential in a society better than spreading centrally controlled funds?

All individuals and organizations know their “What”. Some organizations know their “How”, but very rarely their “Why”.

Watch Simon Sinek give a great explanation with fantastic examples related to the Wright Brothers versus the establishment, and other great examples in this TED speech (if you’re a hurry, watch from 1:20 to 5:50 – if you can stop then!):

(Here is the link if you can’t see the video)

“People don’t buy What you do, they buy Why you do it” – Simon Sinek

Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle (Why-How-What) is an interesting approach. It triggers important questions for ourselves and for our organizations.

Is your personal “Why” clear and compelling? Is your organization’s “Why” clear and compelling?

If not, what are you going to do about it?

Whenever in a workshop or a meeting, for example in organizations, I instill the rule of ‘no blaming’, it soon becomes apparent how natural it is for us to find (good) reasons why we did not do what we committed to, or what we intended to. When you pay attention to it, you’ll find people fall all the time into the blaming mode. Not only blaming others, but also blaming the weather, the system, their family and/or their origin, and so on (our inventiveness in the field of excuses is truly fantastic)…

By the way, the higher ranking the participants are, the easier they will find excuses, which makes it even more fun to instill that rule of no blaming in executive or board meetings!

What if we would take responsibility more often? What if we would take responsibility for the delay, for the screw-up, for our incapacity to exercise more or eat less? Just taking responsibility changes everything. It makes us in charge of our own life. It stops creating this tyranny of unchangeable fate and destiny.

Once you are aware of it, you’ll realize each time you use blame and excuses. You won’t bear it any more. And slowly you’ll become more responsible. You’ll become more human. And you’ll change your fate and destiny.

How much of a creature of habit are you?

It’s quite amusing to think that we are probably all insane to a certain point. In our lives we often repeat behaviors out of habit and still, expect that something different will happen. That, somehow, fate will overcome our lethargy. Look at yourself and ponder how often we tend to fall into this mode.

It is so prevalent that it is sometimes incredible. Is that not the dream of the average person to somehow become rich and famous (refer to all the relevant TV shows) – and still… not to change anything, not one detail, to their daily behavior and occupation?

So, stop doing what you have always done, stop blaming everybody and anything for the fact that things don’t happen in your life the way you’d like. Change, introduce new experiences, even serendipity if you can. In summary – stop being on the brink of insanity by repeating ever and ever again the same routine! Come back to sanity by changing something – or even everything if you dare!

In an interesting blog post where she describes her transition from Google to Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, the current CEO of Yahoo, describes the issues she faced in taking a key career decision. Her choice was to made in a personally challenging context as she was 6 months pregnant and that meant foregoing the long maternity leave she had been planning.

Big choices in our lives generally don’t happen when we are quiet expecting them – and they tend to happen in moments where we really would like to avoid them (and look significantly like additional worries!).

That’s possibly why most people don’t take those opportunities that come to them in those hectic times. Why most people don’t re-plan.

According to Marissa Mayer, “ In the end, we are all capable of so much more than we think.”

Whatever happens in your life right now, if it’s the right opportunity and the good decision… Go for it. And don’t look back.

Did you realize that it is exactly the opposite of what large organizations do! They typically:

• remove responsibility and initiative from the individual in the bureaucratic and hierarchical organization
• build very inflexible systems (anybody has experience with an ERP system?) for the sake of ‘discipline’

It is amazing how much of my consulting work in the field of large complex projects can often be summarized in giving more confidence and empowering the people; and releasing them from the tyranny of complicated and inflexible systems.

I am almost keen to see a bit more of shake-up throughout the world to destroy those organizations of the Industrial Age that won’t be able to adapt because of these two basics principles which they have forgotten. Systems in particular are often used in such a complicated manner that organizations lose all agility to face unpredictable circumstances.

Maybe those organizations thought they could shape the world as a predictable world.

Luckily giving back power and leadership to people is what worked and what will continue to bring us to the next Age. Why did people forget such basic principles during the Industrial Age illusion of scientific management?

Quote from General Vincent Desportes in his book “Decider dans l’Incertitude” (in French)

“Culture happens. Whether we plan for it or not, culture will happen in an organization. Why not create a culture we love?”

This reminds me that it is our responsibility to create the culture we love in our organizations. What do you do about it?

In the Industrial Age, not so long ago, society wanted us to become a standard conforming commodity. A class of weird artists was (barely, sometimes) tolerated. It is now quite obvious that boring conformity is not the best solution, neither for society as a whole (its needs increasing innovation), nor for us as individuals (we need purpose for happiness).

Yet most people are still asleep and need to become alive in the Fourth Revolution. They are not connected with their purpose or whatever would make them enthusiastic.

While it is difficult to envisage an organized world where everybody would be following its passions (some compromise might be needed at some point!), there is certainly a huge leap that can be made to reveal our common potential.

As a coach, what I am achieving most of the time is to make people become alive around a burning passion that they discover within themselves and that they realize can do more of it in their lives.

How alive are you in your daily life? How about NOW for a good time to wake up and start living?

If you want to read more about coming alive, visit Manal’s excellent blog post “What Makes Us Come Alive“, from which I noted the quote that inspired this note.

Preparing for the crisis

Actually a crisis is often felt as such for people who have something to lose. For people that have something to gain from the situation, it is often called “opportunity”. It is the same event though. It’s just the way we look at it.

An event that is felt as a crisis leads to all sorts of defensive measures. It is important to isolate oneself and one’s belongings and entitlements from a threat that is sometimes difficult to understand. One hides behind walls and prepares cannons to respond to the enemy. It is a very sedentary reaction.

Nomads with a light luggage will be more on the side of the opportunity. They will see a crisis as a possibility for change, for the better or worst.

Crisis is a subjective word. It all depends how you feel threatened and how you respond to the situation. Be on the side of those that take changes for opportunities!

Joblessness for youth is a constant of the ‘crisis’… since 30 years. The decline of manufacturing and middle class is also a ‘crisis’… since the 1980′s

No, it’s not a ‘crisis’, it’s a transformation! It’s just the Fourth Revolution in action, changing our lives, our institutions, our economy, our world! Yes, there is a deep tsunami of changes in our environment, and our Industrial Age social and life model is now obsolete.

It’s only a crisis for those that want to remain where they were. It’s only a crisis for the settled. For many others, it is a once in a lifetime opportunity – in developing countries as well as for some in developed countries. New companies had appeared that have a presence in our daily lives which we could not even imagine ten years ago. They have been incredibly successful at the same time as the ‘crisis’.

Please, ban the word ‘crisis’ from your vocabulary. It’s a transformation, and it is time you surf on its wave.

Keep your business plan simple!

After starting my consulting company Project Value Delivery on my own as the single… everything (employee, director, accountant, webmaster, technical writer etc etc) we are now 3. Are a real Fourth Revolution company, we still have no office as in our consulting work we are mostly in our client’s premises. The market has been tested, and it is clearly there to sustain the company. The business model has been slightly revised but remains grossly what was anticipated at the beginning.

Here are 8 lessons learnt from this first year:

1. Entrepreneurship is not risky if you don’t over-develop before checking the market. The key is not to spend too much time developing a great glitzy product to find out nobody wants it. The philosophy is – do some homework to be sure you can do it but get the contract (i.e. a paying client) before you develop it!!
2. You need to define a niche where you are the best and only in the world – and have the discipline to stick to it! (say ‘no’ to other opportunities and to your other ideas if they are not aligned. Even if you are hungry, better say no to what is not aligned)
3. Don’t over-plan. Forecasts are wrong anyway. I am working with a 6 months plan that’s quite enough.
4. Be conservative in your finances. Keep sufficient money in the company. It will give you freedom: freedom to invest, to take time off to create, to say ‘no’ to an annoying client or because you want to stick to your niche.
5. Everything is in the relationship with the clients. Integrity and commitment are key to long term relationships
6. What prevents you from starting your activity (or asking for a client to pay the right price) is in your head, nothing else. It’s purely psychological. The lizard brain creates that fear of the unknown. Remember, today employment is possibly more risky than being on your own!
7. Make sure to have a permanent council of advisors you can rely on (if needed, get them interested in your business)
8. Once you have found a great idea that resonates with clients, the harder part is to figure out how to scale your idea (I am not yet there but working on it)

I am now looking forward working as a team with exceptional co-workers that have complementary skills, and not any more individually like we started working. Our biggest challenge for the year to come is to figure out how to scale and expand geographically. Stay tuned!

“Shun the non-believers. First you must pick yourself, then you must pick your audience”

Connect with your tribe!

Seth goes on to explain that the key is to grow your own tribe of believers so that you expose yourself often to people who know you and believe in your ideas. That’s also an other way to deal with critics. Make their voice disappear in the background of your tribe.

The thing is, it takes time, patience and consistent production and interaction to slowly create a tribe that is well connected with you to a point of supporting your initiatives. It is something that needs to be started early. Still it can be done. It must be done if you want to benefit from a louder voice in the world and from support for your projects.

It also requires to take a stand on a number of issues that are unconventional or outright contrarian. Because growing a tribe is like marketing: you need to define a narrow niche market where people that are particulary interested will join immediately.

How can you grow your supporting tribe to deal more easily with ever more difficult projects and endeavors? How can you define better your voice niche?

It’s also bad to have critics when it influences you not to give out your best. There are times where you shouldn’t listen to them. There are times you should only listen to you, what brings you alive and what you know the world needs.

Typical critics at work

So, when should you shun critics and when should you listen to them?

Let me take an example which is close to my heart.

As I am considering a new book it is clear that the topic of the book is non negotiable. It is a message that is growing within me for some time now and that I need to deliver to the world.

The format of the book, whether it will be a story or a non-fiction style, that’s more open to discussion and suggestions. I will still have a strong opinion and I will own the final format.

Finally, the detailed word-for-word editing is something that I consider to be quite open to criticism and improvement (in particular, as English is not my first language).

So it should be for your creations: the main message should not be negotiable; you should own most of the outline of the delivery; and leave critics deal with the detailed editing.

Alas, many people let critics influence their main message and make their detailed editing not negotiable. Don’t fight the wrong battle. It is your main message, coming from your heart, that is the most valuable.

That’s not how we’ll reach greatness. An acute observer of companies taking decisions in complex environments, Jim Collins, the famous author of Good to Great and his latest book Great by Choice, states:

“Most people start with the outside world and try to figure out, how can we adapt to it? Greatness doesn’t happen that way. It starts with an internal drive. And there is really a key question with big decisions: What are your core values and your real aspirations?”

While the storm might bring you astray from the route, you sure still know where you want to go!

It is vital to have a direction when it comes to taking decisions, even in a complex world. Personal Purpose is essential, aligned with your core values and true aspirations. And actually, Jim Collin’s research shows that the most successful companies are those that maintain their heading the most consistently. Like the captain of a ship in the midst of a storm, he can accommodate temporary changes of direction to minimize the effect of wind and waves, but still knows where his goal lies.

Be agile in responding to events. But keep your eye fixed on where you want to go, and come back to your initial heading! Only then, of course, will you be able to reach it!

Quotes are from the foreword to the book The Greatest Business Decisions of All Times by Fortune Magazine editors

Simplicity quote by Leonard de Vinci

During my time as a civil servant I could not stop wondering (and admiring) how bureaucrats were constantly complicating rules and processes “to better take into account individual situations and avoid threshold effects”. Bureaucrats cannot imagine anything different than complicated systems and procedures. But what they did not realize is that real life is complex. And complication is not the same as complex! Their quest to manage the complex using even more complicated rules is doomed to fail. Yet they continue. Legal systems become increasingly bloated as they try to deal with all sorts of situation. This quest will be lost – nature will always be far more imaginative than the most imaginative bureaucrat.

Let’s stop this stupid quest for complication. The solution lies in simplicity. Because complex systems – real life – will react and adapt to simple messages and solutions. Because the cost of complication is far greater than its advantage. Let’s seek simplicity in all we do – and suddenly we’ll tame complexity.

A watch: a complicated system – predictable and reliable

A watch is complicated. It is composed of a large number of pieces; yet they are carefully engineered to fit and move together. The system is very reliable (it’s a watch!). Most engineered systems are complicated, yet reliable. The more the components fit seamlessly together, the better the reliability.

A complex system: a representation of the situation in Afghanistan

On the contrary, a complex system involves a lot of different components or contributors; they are all interconnected and inter-dependent; but they all follow a different interest, and they make the system unpredictable. The now classical slide describing the situation in Afghanistan to General McCrystal is a classical example of the depiction of a complex system.

Complex systems are unpredictable. They are what happens in real life outside what can be carefully engineered. They are what creates the unforeseen, the adventure.

Because we mix all the time those two concepts we misunderstand a lot of what is happening around us. The way to tackle and repair complicated systems is completely different from how we can influence complex systems. The way these systems fail belongs to different realms. And when a complicated system encounters unpredictable complexity, it is where our engineering capabilities are overwhelmed. It is where our certainties become shaky. It is when catastrophes like Fukushima happen.

Our life is uncertain and unpredictable. We can’t know what will come out of our latest initiative, and possibly, it will look quite different from what we envisaged.

What we can do, though, is make sure we plant everyday enough seeds so that when they grow, we’ll have a few successes among the outright failures and those other seeds that won’t grow any useful products. Most of what you start will fail. It’s just a matter of starting enough stuff to succeed.

Ask yourself how many seeds you planted today: how many new people you met, how many initiatives you started or tested. That’s what should be your golden standard.

How will you double the number of seeds you plant daily, weekly?

Are our current democratic institutions reaching the limits of the complexity they can manage?

When that maximum level is reached, fragility becomes a key property of the system, and the system will one day break apart. Suddenly. Completely. The Soviet political system was unable to bear the complexity driven by the Western world in the 1980′s; and to manage the inherent complexity of the modern world (as shown by the Tchernobyl accident investigation). The French political system in the 1700′s became unable to manage the increasing complexity and globalization of the world. The French Revolution and decades of instability ensued.

Sometimes (rarely), political institutions succeed in reforming themselves before reaching a critical level of fragility.

Our current representative democracies are probably the most elaborate political system, and can manage a far higher level of complexity than any of the previous political institutions. We can see everyday that autocratic regimes are overwhelmed by much lower levels of complexity. Still, the question is now, whether it can manage the level of complexity we are reaching globally?

I fear that it is not the case and that currently, we are reaching uncomfortable levels of institutional fragility. Representative democracy might need to be replaced by (or, evolve in) a new political system that will be better to deal with the current level of complexity – by choice or by default if we reach the limits before we can change. That new system needs to leverage better on networks and direct democracy. It needs to be much more global.

Let’s start now to build this new political system, before the increasing fragility of the previous one creates dramatic consequences.

Is that really so? In that stunning demonstration, a Microsoft executive demonstrates both live text and audio translation between English and Chinese (if you don’t have time to watch the 9 min video, watch after 6:40 for the live audio – here is the link to YouTube for that part of the video):

More information on that technology breakthrough on this TheNextWeb post: “Amazing: Microsoft turns spoken English into spoken Mandarin – in the same voice”

The world just became smaller!