Diving and business
They’re both about leading, and it will… frustrate you. stretch you. for sure scare the shit out of you. When you go diving, you go see what’s below the surface. When you go in business, to best help your customers, you go below the surface. Business feels like diving because it involves the unknown. It involves risk. And it involves facing your fears. Dealing with the unknown → How to be prepared on different (and sometimes unexpected) scenarios. Involves risks → How real, realistic and…
What it takes to see under the surface
Understanding. Yeah, that simple. Understanding of principles, of the conditions, of the stakes themselves. Diving is a different kind of fun (from snorkeling), you can explore for longer what’s underwater. Even prepare to study things in their own environment. And understanding comes from getting prepared, do the thing and increase the level of difficulty / complexity. You need trained skills to get oriented. To look for different landmarks: the coral reef, a slope, the boat’s shadow, the…
Below the surface
To go below the surface, you need special gear —more than just a snorkel and fins. And the stakes also get higher. What do you think it takes to see under?
Snorkeling and business
For snorkeling, you: don’t need quite a lot of equipment: usually just a snorkel, a vest to float and fins. stay on the surface, need lots of sun protection, the risk on it is VERY minimal. have fun, yet, you can’t really explore for longer then what your lungs can hold to see below (a starfish, an angel fish, coral…) have a simpler sense of orientation: you stick your face off the water and figure out where you are. On the other side, you also experience more resistance: sun, wind,…
A truthbomb
Friend of the list, daily emailer and author, Shweta dropped this post on thought leadership —and on thought leadershit, too. “No one can create thought leadership content for you, except you. You have to have worked in your “field of expertise” long enough and deeply enough to have your own unique ideas/angles. That’s what thought leadership is.I, or any other writer, can help you polish the piece, but the core thought must come from the “leader” themselves.” The core thought has to come…
DIscomfort
To lead, you need to feel discomfort. And to be cool with it. More than feeling comfortable in discomfort, it’s about feeling discomfort and still going through it. It’ll frustrate you. It’ll stretch you. It’ll for sure scare the shit out of you. And that’s awesome. It means you’re trying things that are not guaranteed. You get creative. You get to see different alternatives. Even new ones you never thought of before. The practice and getting used to seeing thigs through that lens is what…
Thought leadershit
“You can produce thought leadership.”It’s bullshit. That’s like saying that you can produce leaders. A step-by-step process where you get a person in and, like an output, they return being leaders. That can be anything but leadership. Just think about it: if it were the case, why don’t we have more, better leaders? Leadership is the personal decision to help others to do and be at their best. It’s not about having followers, but to open the path for others so that they can lead. First,…
Maybe you need help
If you were thinking of writing, publishing and share your POV in your industry so that you can help your customers, doing it solo is ultra hard. And maybe you need help. (Maybe not, and that’s ok, too) I know I did. And I found it, after 5 —or was it 6?— attempts of starting and quitting in different ways: programs, cohorts, solo… It didn’t stick. I didn’t stick. I couldn’t. But, here’s where E365 came in, led by Jonathan Stark. The guidance, and especially the way you get interactions and…
The problem with thought leadership
Most people think it’s about showing things and that “you know”. But who are we kidding? It’s most to get followers and do sales. It’s about paywalls, subscription or funding things. All focused on “me, me, me”. ???? It should be about thinking. Nothing else. And not even about showing how you think, but about what your thinking can do to help them get better.To move them to take action. To move them to take new perspectives. To challenge their own beliefs and thinking. Thought leadership is…
What’s with writing every *freaking* day anyways?
You can tell me how close or far this thing gets. You’ve often thought of ideas you have, but rarely got to publish them. You considered the idea of putting your views out there to help your customers and market, but found a roadblock on “Who am I to write/say this?” You actually started publishing content to grow your audience, but lost momentum and let it slide. You thought about publishing more often, but also asked yourself “What if I run out of things to say?” “What if what I wanna say…
