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Essays On Business On Leadership

Maintaining Vision

500,000 visitors, wow. It’s been a journey. Thank you!

When it comes to building a business or starting a venture, what is vision? What does it mean to maintain vision? Is vision important? How does one grow their business in a changing landscape, with wavering demands, all while maintaining their vision?

These are among the questions I’ve been asking myself the past couple months.

I enjoy learning from others and I believe it’s a privilege to live in an age where so much information is given freely. So when I have a question I find myself digging into the archives of Youtube, listening to podcasts and audio books, and turning the pages of well read classics.

But when it comes to these questions on vision, I’m finding, or not finding, any concentrated material on the subject.

Is vision even important?

If you follow the excellent advice of Steve Blank or the Lean Startup, or other go-to-market tools, one may begin to question the need. For example, a truly customer lead company pitches ideas to the market, gathers feedback and insight, and makes adjustments accordingly. With enough feedback you will have a product with high demand and a model to grow your business. No vision required.

But what happens when competition shows up or you have a major setback?

Do you continue with your current strategy, do you pivot and reapply the lean startup process, or do you throw in the towel?

Visit any major city in the US and you will see a Starbucks on every corner. Coffee shops is a competitive market, but it took over 3 decades for Starbucks to saturate their market in the US. Starbucks opened their first store in 1982. And coffee houses have existed since the arrival of coffee in Europe, the Middle East and North America – with the first shop opening up in Damascus in 1530.

In Bob Dylan’s famous words, “Times they are a changing,” and it seems they are changing at a faster rate than ever before.

Any outsider will likely recognize that startups are the new gold rush. With tens of thousands starting every week and only a few striking it big. You may have a bold new idea, raise capital, launch to market and find yourself in hyper competitive marketplace within just 6 to 12 months. The problem with emerging markets is that while they may be growing, the competition is there too. So I ask you, what’s the difference between a growing startup and the graveyard of belly-ups?

Sure some businesses have promise but run out of money, others die from “board-em”, or get distracted by new ideas and jump ship. Yet, I believe only one thing separates a thriving startup from the rest. It’s called vision.

Steve Jobs once said, “You have to have a lot of passion for what you are doing because it is so hard… if you don’t, any rational person would give up.” But where does passion comes from?

I was sitting across the table from a friend at a local cafe. The cafe has a really neat vibe, with bikes hanging on the wall donated by loyal customers. My friend is sharing his concern about his kids. They will be graduating soon and he wants them to take their school more seriously so they get into the right colleges.

He had more passion about his children’s education than they did. Why? Because he had a clear vision of where they could end up. He saw them graduating from a well respected university, getting a job at a reputable company, and starting off life with a promising career. As a result he was more invested then they were.

Now there is a famous psychologist who would argue that he has made a common mistake, and taken on his children’s problem of their future as his problem. As a result they don’t need to take it seriously, why would they? Their dad has taken it seriously enough. I digress.

He has a vision for his children, and as a result he has a natural passion to see it fulfilled. When a founder loses passion, they likely lost their vision and their sense of purpose. Possibly, they never had a sense of purpose. Instead we often set a target such as money, or accomplishments, or prestige as our purpose. But they don’t last. Instead having a motivation beyond any reward does.

Just yesterday I was watching an interview between Richard Branson and David Rubenstein. Richard quietly mentioned, “I never go into a venture with the idea of making a profit. If you can create the best in its field generally you will find that you can pay the bills.” When you look at all great business leaders, they seem to have the ability to ride things out for the long haul. Why? Because despite all the hurdles, set backs and competition that can come their way, they have a vision that’s greater than the discomfort and hardships they may experience along the way.

A couple weeks ago I noticed to my surprise that this blog has received over 500,000 views. What makes this amazing is that the odds of getting any traffic hasn’t been in its favour. When I started writing here I didn’t write for anyone else. This may sound strange or selfish or unusual, but really all that I wanted was a place where I could record my thoughts and share some of them along the way. Also, I have interests that don’t create a nice content niche. If you read advice on writing for a blog they say to pick a topic and stick to it. But my vision was different. I wanted a place where I could catalogue learnings on any subject. So I did. This site consists of posts about car maintenance, cycling, computer programming, leadership, startups – you name it. Finally, this site was hacked. So until I could fix it, it was literally banned from all search engines for 2 years. But again, I wasn’t writing for anyone else. So while that was annoying, I recreated the blog and kept writing.

500000 views on machiine

 

Vision doesn’t need to be grandiose, or even compelling to others. It doesn’t need to fit a market or break the rules. It just needs to be a picture of what you want to see exist. It’s not your mission and it’s not a destination.

Instead, vision is simple. When I launched Saint clothing in 2005 my idea was to see if it were possible to create a successful business around your interests. That was my vision. It grew over time to help others who also had a sense of purpose and a desire to do something that was outside the norm. But it was a truly simple idea.

If you were to ask Steve Jobs his vision for the world, I doubt he would say, “I want an iPhone in everyone’s pocket.” That’s a mission, not a vision. I doubt it would have anything to do with an iPhone. His vision was likely more simple. To give the creators, the innovators, the outcasts the tools they need to change the world.

When a vision is clear the product can change, marketing can change, competition can change but the course never changes.

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Essays On Bicycles On Leadership On Teams

Triangle of Change: How To Achieve The Improbable

In 2012 British cycling amazed the world by claiming the prestigious Tour de France and 70% of the Olympic cycling podiums. Never before had an English rider won the Tour de France nor had their cyclists performed so well in the Olympics.

July 22, 2012 Team Sky Procycling rider and leader's yellow jersey Wiggins of Britain cycles during the final 20th stage of the 99th Tour de France cycling race between Rambouillet and Paris
July 22, 2012 Team Sky Procycling rider and leader’s yellow jersey Wiggins of Britain cycles during the final 20th stage of the 99th Tour de France cycling race between Rambouillet and Paris

At the heart of British cycling is Dave Brailsford. He and his team around him set an ambitious goal. They proclaimed that they would have a British cyclist win the Tour de France in just 5 years of creating the new Team Sky.

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Essays On Culture On Leadership

More than a profession or a job description

To say we are one thing is to say we are not another. In preparing for his talk, Bassam Tariq says, “Here I say, ‘I’m a blogger, filmmaker and butcher.’ The hardest part of my talk was saying that I was x, y and z. I have worked hard to dodge these kinds of labels. But when you are giving a five-minute talk, you have to simplify and pray that people will then read these annotations.”

All to often content is created to fit the Zeitgeist, or “spirit of the times”, in an effort to be relevant. But isn’t that only going to perpetuate preconceptions, stereotypes or world views.

To give you an example of what I mean, in Bassam’s talk he describes creating a movie in Pakistan titled These Birds Walk. In it he tells a story of Pakistan’s poorest children. He was encouraged to use his movie to raise awareness of drones, target killings, and the impact they are having on people. “To make the film ‘more relevant,’ essentially reducing these people who have entrusted us with their stories into sociopolitical symbols.” But, he didn’t.

Instead he told the story of street children trying to create some semblance of family.

I don’t know Bassam Tariq, what he stands for, or who he is. But in his talk he represented people who are more than a profession, or a job description, or a title, or a religion… These people help to bridge social divides.

Breaking from a norm, while still holding respect for traditions and the people who stand before us, improves opportunities for everyone.

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On Leadership

A challenge! I accept

Barney Stinson Challenge Accepted

I was browsing through books on business and leadership at Chapters and was alarmed at the number of authors who weren’t in business themselves. They were journalists for news agencies like the Wall Street Journal or professors at highly esteemed academic institutions. Wanting to get better at business myself I was looking to read about other entrepreneurs that had experienced similar hurdles to the ones I was facing. I wanted to know the hard learned strategies these entrepreneurs used, not a chapter about the value of discipline and what I ought to do to become a better leader.

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On Business On Leadership

As the captain of your startup are you keeping your ship pointed in the right direction?

Ship wheel steer your startup

It’s funny how things tend to take a shape over time. Like this blog, I can see that it is becoming a kind-of anecdotal story of where we are going with our business and some of the lessons I have learned. That’s not what I had intended with it, but at the same time I don’t mind the direction it is going. I find that the direction of a company tends to take a shape overtime too. But you need to be careful, because if you aren’t the one defining the shape as the company grows, it may take a shape very different from what you would like it to take.

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On Business On Leadership

Steve Jobs Quotes

Steve Jobs quotes

A hero of mine is Steve Jobs. He built two amazing companies, Apple and Pixar, and brought them both back from the brink of destruction. Sure he had lots of flaws. But also lots of wisdom. Here are some of his quotes I’ve collected over the years. (feel free to add anymore to the comments)

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On Leadership

What would you do if you saw a man sitting beside his car at an intersection?

intersection
Intersection | NYC by Navid Baraty on Behance.net

I had to ask myself this question a couple weeks ago. Biking home I passed a man sitting beside his car at an intersection. The only thought that went through my mind was, “That’s strange for him to be parked there, it’s kind of dangerous.” As I pedal past the intersection I heard someone yelling at me, turning around I saw the man at the car gesturing at me. Screeching my brakes to a halt I spun my bike around, waited for a car to pass, and went to see what was up. Turns out that while driving his car this man, now sitting beside the road, suddenly broke out in a sweat became nauseas and pulled over. Through broken breaths he explained that he was completely disoriented, dizzy and needed help. After speaking to a 911 responder on a cell phone a police officer arrived at the scene and I was released to go. As I biked away I had this thought, why hadn’t I stopped, why did I assume he had everything taken care of? I always imagined that in moments of need I would rise to any challenge and be the hero. But I hadn’t done that, instead I had biked right past this guy without stopping.

This got me thinking, what if I needed to make decisions about what I will do before I encountered disasters, rather than hope I will do the right thing when the moment arises. So I did just that, I made a personal choice that the next time I saw someone that looked like they may be in need (even if they are not), I would stop and ask if they needed help.

Well already a few opportunities have arisen in the last week and a half. Again while biking home last week I saw a man lying beside a women sitting in a wheelchair. But this time I braked  to stop and ask if they were alright. I was quickly greeted with two laughs as the man was only adjusting something on the wheelchair. The next week while driving from a meeting I saw a man on the side of the road gesturing to the traffic. As a car drove past I spun my car around and pulled over and asked if they needed help. Turns out they did. They needed jumper cables. Luckily I had some and we were able to start their car.

The moral of the story isn’t that I am a hero. No, it’s that I’m not a hero, yet after making the decision to help first and ask later I’ve found myself responding to opportunities where I would normally have driving past. I think that my change in behaviour is interesting. It has me wondering if we are wired to act on decisions that we have already made, rather than hoping we will make the right decision in the moment. In other words, will indecision lead to inaction and vice versa. Even as I write this I can think of numerous examples where I can see this applying elsewhere, but I won’t write all those thoughts now. Instead I would love to hear your thoughts on this, have you noticed pre-decisions making a difference in your life or business? Or do you think it matters at all?

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On Business On Leadership

What do cocoa beans and leadership have in common?

Cocoa Beans
photo from http://whiteplate.blogspot.ca/

I have a colleague who is passionate about chocolate. But not just passionate about consuming it, but radically passionate about where he is consuming it from. I discovered this passion one day after giving him a Mars bar. For the next two days the bar sat unopened on his desk until he could determine without a shadow of a doubt that the cocoa beans were not purchased from plantations that involved child slavery. He could not, and the chocolate was politely returned to me. An interesting conversation followed about the horrific world of child-slavery and African cocoa beans.

The thought that our everyday choices could be impacting the world around us is unnerving. As a business owner I am out there creating products, in my case it is web products, whereas you might be creating products in an entirely different space. And from my perspective the thought that is even more unnerving is that we are relying on consumers to make the ethical decisions. Are we creating a product that is ethical? Or are we making a product that makes it really easy to be unethical? Like the tasty chocolate bars fuelling child slavery. (Not all chocolate bars are made from plantations using child-slavery and Mars Bar may not use child-slavery either).

Some people don’t care about this. I’ve heard the following statement just a couple weeks ago, “First make money, then care about making the world a better place.” I wrote another post on the 10 traits of a leader, which is a summary of a talk given by Dave Olson. One of the points is that you can look around a room and see the leaders by observing where the buck stops. Who is taking responsibility for the problems and doing something about them. That is the leader. When we create products we often avoid the awkward questions and pass the responsibility onto either the consumer or the factory managers? We have the ability to empower people to make good decisions by giving them good products. However, if we aren’t taking responsibility for our product lines then we aren’t being leaders.

With the web we have a huge opportunity to use technology to empower the individual to shape one’s own self. Let’s give people more of the good choices. Let’s be leaders.

Categories
On Companies On Leadership

You can’t buy authenticity

Club Penguin Founders
Photo by darrenhullstudios.com

Last night was awesome. I got to sit and listen to three guys talk about their journey starting a business and keeping their values in tact. I learned how they made really important, life-altering decisions. Like how Lance, as the original animator of the game, came to the major conclusion to make all the characters in the game penguins. His reasoning? “It was easier to animate a wobble than a walk.” In all seriousness, these three guys Dave, Lance and Lane built a really cool game, Club Penguin, and a really amazing business while keeping their values in tact. I am writing this blog post as much to share their unique story with you, as for myself, just to unravel what I heard with the kinds of questions I face every day.

I want to be part of a business that holds its values highly, doesn’t care about what “normal business” is, and creates a culture where everyone is free to become better. Sitting, listening, to these guys, reminded me just how much I want that. I’m sorry, but I don’t think money is the only goal. I think making money must come secondary to humanity. Every time. These guys really knew their values, and when big decisions came they didn’t have to run numbers and sacrifice their values. They let their values decide.

How many of you have heard the phrase “business is business”. I have, sometimes it feels like I am hearing it weekly. In my opinion it’s a copout. And after hearing these three talk, I really believe it is. It is saying that we don’t need to be accountable for how we are treating people because making more money is the highest priority. It’s sad, but that disease of thinking seems to have penetrated our business culture so deeply.

The founders of Club Penguin, Lance, Lane and Dave, told a very different narrative. They spoke of how they built a company with a culture that cared about each other. It didn’t calculate shares based on numerical value, but based on a fair partnership. When they sold their company to Disney they insisted that their company continue donating a portion of their revenue. When Disney acquired Club Penguin it instantly became Disney’s largest donation department.

When things get stressful or scary we can sometimes feel like we are unqualified to make the right decision. We look around to see what others are doing and we can sacrifice our values for security. Lance Merrifield said that every bad decision he made was when it was made out of fear. Why do we think fear is a good motivator if we make bad decisions when we are afraid? Lets know our values so well that when we are afraid we can stop and ask, does this really align with my core values? Or am I doing this because everyone else is doing it this way? As the old metaphor goes, just because everyone is jumping off a bridge doesn’t make it a good idea.

Club Penguin is an inspiration because they demonstrate that it’s possible to build companies differently. Let’s build great companies without sacrificing our core values. Let’s change the norm of business. One day we are going to look back and money won’t matter. What will matter is our family and how we treated those around us.

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On Leadership

Did you know that your body language can make you happier? I didn’t.

Happy Body LanguageLook at these characters from Star Wars. They all look so relaxed and happy, despite the fact they are taking on the Death Star. What if we could feel as relaxed and happy as they do in our stress filled lives. A new Harvard study says that we can, and it has to do with our body language. We have known for a long time that body language influences how we perceive one another. In fact 97% of communication consists of body language. But what we didn’t know was that our body language actually changes how we feel inside as well? An incredible study released by Amy Cuddy, a professor and researcher at Harvard Business School, shows just how much our body language can make us feel better or worse.

What Dr. Cuddy surprisingly discovered is that a change in our posture actually changes the levels of coritisol (the stress hormone) and testosterone (the dominance hormone) by a lot. After studying various subjects she found that it only takes 2 minutes of holding either a high power pose or a low power pose to change those levels dramatically. In fact maintaining a high power position for 2 minutes increased testosterone levels by 20 percent. People in low power positions experienced the opposite with testosterone decreasing by 10 percent. Not only that, but, high power people experienced about a 25% decrease in cortisol, reducing their level of stress, whereas low power people experience about a 15 percent increase making them more stressed.

Apparently when people meet in a room we naturally assume either a low power position or a high power one. So what is a high power position versus a low power position? When a person wins a race and they lift their arms and chin in the air, that’s a high power position. Whereas a low power position is when a person crosses their arm or sits folded. Basically a low power position is when a person is making themselves smaller and a high power position is when a person makes themselves bigger.

That means that people who hold high power poses actually are happier, more confident and have less stress! So I guess the lesson here is that if we are conscious of how we posture ourselves we may be surprised by the results. So before you walk into that stressful meeting take 2 minutes to stretch your arms and hold a victory pose in the washroom. When talking to people place your hands on your sides, instead of folded in front of you. You are awesome, when your body language reflects that it will make you feel awesome too.

If you have 20 minutes here’s a video of Amy Cuddy speaking about this at TEDtalks.