4.2 279 Tunnelvision (very bad)

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SETH GODIN  The paradox of brittle

Optimizing a device or system means squeezing every drop of productivity out of it. In the short-run, optimization works as long as the world stays the same.

We can optimize a device to work at capacity. However, something working at capacity blows up if you step on the gas when you need 5% more out of it. It’s brittle.

Smart leaders build for resilience instead. Power plants, transit systems, careers–they’re built to be sub-optimal some of the time, with slack built in, so they can thrive all the time.

And the paradox?

If you’re a competitive capital-driven market where little head starts can become bigger leads which can lead to lock in and monopoly, the obvious strategy is to optimize early and often.

Outperforming your more resilient competitors is possible in the short run.

And if you’re lucky a few times in a row, you get access to more capital or more customers and you can do it again, at a bigger scale, leaving your thoughtful, slack-enabled competitors in the dust.

Until you crash.

And you always will. Because optimized systems cannot thrive in a changing world.

If you don’t want to crash, don’t compete in marketplaces where optimization is required.

PS Britain shut its last coal plant yesterday. 140 years ago, coal began its conquest of the world in Britain, and now it’s over. Change is possible.

October 1, 2024

09-30-2024 podcast 4.1 292 Crisis Leadership

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SETH GODIN Twenty questions

Your next project might feel like a calling, but it’s a choice. A choice that will have an impact on each day you spend on it.

There are no right answers here, but before you fall in love with a business or an organization, it may pay to think about these and other options that are built in:

• Are you selling to consumers?

• Are you raising money?

• Do you serve one person at a time or does a committee have to agree?

• Is there a network effect to the work you do?

• Is the margin on each item low?

• What’s the lifetime value of a new patron, customer or partner?

• Is the work time sensitive?

• Do you meet with people in person?

• Are you answering RFPs or are people seeking you out by name?

• Is price or yield or efficiency the dominant metric in making a choice?

• Will you create value with your personal effort or by managing others?

• How will people find out about what you do?

• Is accuracy the most important part of what you deliver?

• Can a competitor who works far more hours have a big advantage over you?

• What’s the effluent, waste or side effects of what you create?

• Are you likely to spend time working with peers you like?

• Are you likely to respect your customers?

• How much time after you begin before you expect your metrics to be positive?

• Is the learning curve steep?

• After you’ve learned how to do this, does it become boring?

Pick your customers, pick your future.

PS Joel recommended this post from fourteen years ago.

September 30, 2024

3.7 300 G.school #75 Christianity went sideways (huh?)

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SETH GODIN Discovery and invention

Isaac Newton didn’t invent gravity. It was there all along. He simply named and explained it.

The same is true for planets, continents and obscure species. They’re discovered, not invented.

Michelangelo talked about removing all the parts of the marble that weren’t the statue on his way to creating great art. Discovery is like that.

Often, we put ourselves on the hook to invent something, when it might be simpler and more direct to act like we’re exploring on our way to discovering something instead.

September 29, 2024

3.6 305 G.school #74 if there is no God then anything is permitted

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SETH GODIN Who do you want to become?

Emotional enrollment is at the heart of performance, learning and connection.

A coach can quickly tell when someone is committed to changing their approach in order to change the outcome–it’s easy to tell this person apart from someone who simply wants what they’re already doing to be more effective.

“I want to become someone who’s shift is over,” is very different from, “I want to become someone who knows how to write copy that earns a sale.”

Bonnie Raitt partnered with producer Don Was to make her 10th album. If she had insisted that it simply be the tenth album, another shot at being discovered, it wouldn’t have become the album of the year. Instead, she and Was worked together to bring a new approach to the studio. After the album hit, she was still Bonnie Raitt, of course, but she was also a different sort of performer.

Being validated for who we are today is great. But it’s more likely that we can achieve our goals by choosing to become someone who can solve problems that the people we serve need solved.

September 28, 2024

3.5 300 Sour grapes... (?)

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SETH GODIN Snowballs and avalanches

Residents leave a town because of a lack of services, which cuts the tax base, which leads to more services lost, which leads to more residents leaving…

A hip new brand attracts a few opinion leaders, who flash the logo, which attracts more hipsters, who then establish a status standard, which attracts more customers…

The key variable in both spirals is time.

The rise or fall happens day by day, not all at once, and normal interventions rarely make a difference. Instead, it’s the apparently irrational overinvestment in the moment that can change the dynamic going forward.

September 27, 2024

3.4 300 Seek chaos (it's good) (?)

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SETH GODIN Unintended consequences

…are still consequences.

We’re all participants in the systems around us, and complicit in their consequences even if we didn’t intend them. First, we need to see the systems, and then we have the opportunity to work to change them.

September 26, 2024

3.3 297 Hiring for stuck ... (?)

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SETH GODIN Hiring for stuck

Once an organization figures out a successful model, it begins to grow.

And when it grows, it needs more staff. And they often hire for specific tasks and the skills that go with them.

They need a person who will reliably and obediently deliver what they need right now.

And that’s the foundation for stuckness.

When the world changes, and it always does, the organization is filled with people who signed up for (and were hired for) a specific competency.

What would happen if instead, we hired problem solvers and resilient improv artists who were willing to do today’s job because it needed to be done, but were prepared (and eager) for tomorrow’s challenge as well?

September 25, 2024

3.2 299 Let it Go

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SETH GODIN Knowing the territory

There is always room for someone who really knows their way around an industry, a technology or a problem.

That’s what agents, agencies and organizers do.

The hard part isn’t in finding people who will value true on-the-ground expertise.

The hard part is actually earning it and maintaining it.

As long as there are folks who are lost, we will need guides.

3.1 301 Outside our skull-sized kingdom (?)

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SETH GODIN Embodied energy

It might only cost $2 in the vending machine, but that can of soda is a complicated battery.

It stores the energy of the machines that were used to mine the bauxite, the ship that brought the ore to Iceland, the astonishing temperatures used to create the aluminum, then more shipping, more processing, more handling, the lights in the store and the power to the vending machine.

But what about that book you just read? Not simply the energy to print it and ship it, or even the energy to grow the trees…

What about the energy of a life well lived by the author? The edits and rewrites and dead ends?

Everything feels different once we realize that something happened for it to become what it is now.

September 23, 2024

2.7 305 G.school #74 Anselm vs. Abelard

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SETH GODINS  Taken for granted

A poignant definition of civilization is all the conveniences, courtesies, standards, insulation and tools that we hardly notice now but that we would miss if they were gone.

September 22, 2024

2.6 306 G.school #73 visiting the incarcerated

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SETH GODIN Sharp tools

Professional woodworkers rarely have to be reminded to sharpen their tools. Of course they know this.

The rest of us, on the other hand, regularly use digital tools we don’t understand, don’t maintain and haven’t optimized.

Sometimes, our lack of care in the choice and use of tools only wastes our time. Often, it actually degrades the quality of what we’re seeking to create.

If you’re not regularly getting better at your digital toolbox, you’re actually getting worse.

September 21, 2024

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SETH GODIN Professionals are consistent

Authenticity is for amateurs.

We want the surgeon, the broadcaster or the musician to show up fully, as the best version of themselves.

We know you might be tired from an overnight shift, and authentically feel like phoning it in, but hey, this is the only aorta I’ve got, and I’d prefer it if you were the consistent, world-class surgeon you’re capable of being.

Authenticity is for friendships.

Professionals simply show up. Especially when they don’t feel like it.

September 20, 2024

2.4 312 Time travel (?)

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SETH GODIN  The ledge

Drowning is devastating, a tragic and painful way to go.

So much so that feeling like we’re drowning is a trigger, an overwhelming emotion that causes us to grasp, struggle and leave our best self behind.

It’s easy to experience this even when we’re out of the water. When the stakes are high and time is short, we can activate drowning mode, losing our focus, resilience, and generosity.

The ledge can be a useful way to talk ourselves out of the spiral.

If you’re in 8 feet of water, it’s easy to feel afraid. But once you realize that you’re only a few inches away from a ledge, one you can return to whenever you like, it’s possible to reset, to find your bearings.

It’s not that hard to imagine a ledge. Sure, the parts didn’t arrive on time, but our deadline isn’t for a few days, back to the ledge, let’s regroup and come up with a new plan. Yes, the project didn’t work, but our budget has enough slack in it that we can try again with a new project tomorrow.

The ledge is a combination of time and money. It’s the buffer between here and disaster. The ledge is a foundation, a place we can find our footing as we think about the next steps. And the ledge offers perspective, because we can realize that even if this moment feels momentous, it might not be.

Resilient project management and risk-taking requires investing in a ledge. When we put everything on the line and cut the timing to the absolute minimum, the stakes get higher and we expose ourselves to failure.

Part of the art of innovation is choosing projects we can afford to dance with.

And the daily emotional work is reminding ourselves that the ledge is right there. So we can refocus and go back to being our best.

September 19, 2024

2.3 316 Prime the RAS (?)

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SETH GODIN  A next frontier for spam and scams

Please be on the alert for:

Spam that includes your name, address, phone number and other personal details.

Phone calls that are from human-sounding bots that pretend to be from friends or trusted brands.

Job offers.

Video mashups that include AI-generated people that seem to be made just for you.

Security alerts that are actually precisely the opposite.

Links that sure look trustworthy, but go somewhere you don’t expect.

It makes me sad that people with skills spend their time building ever-more ornate scams. It also bums me out that the emails from this blog often end up in the spam folder, but spam somehow manages to make it to my inbox.

PS a few typos in yesterday’s post. Sorry. If you encounter a bad link or a typo, visit my blog for the latest, corrected version. Thanks.

September 18, 2024

2.2 326 Neurotransmitters (?)

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SETH GODIN Vocal fatigue

Most of us talk, some of us do it for a living.

When your voice is on the fritz, it can affect your entire body as well as the way you approach your day. I’ve read all 25+ of my audiobooks myself, and I used to be able to complete each one in a day or two. Now it takes months. I wanted to share some of what I’ve learned the hard way.

First, a hack: Gether’s pastilles are a miracle. Not cheap, worth it.

Next, if you’re encountering vocal challenges somewhat regularly, consider getting a voice coach.

If it’s chronic, go to an ENT specialist and get scoped. Don’t take steroids unless three different doctors confirm you need them.

One cause of persistent vocal issues could be posture. I’ve found great success with in-person help from a coach certified in the Alexander Technique. It’s not invasive and sort of fun.

But here’s the latest thing I’ve had great results from. It’s free, easy and a little silly, and it really works. The official name for it is a semi-occluded vocal tract exercise, and you can do it two ways:

Get a straw and a tall glass of water, filled about three inches deep. You’re not going to be drinking the water.

First thing: Blow bubbles. Do it calmly and slowly and consistently for a full long breath.

Experiment with changing the shape of your mouth as you do. It’s lovely.

Second thing, which is surprisingly tricky at first: Blow bubbles while you’re humming.

[Thanks to Andrew Keltz for the insight.]

Feel better.

September 17, 2024

2.1 326 Exceed expectations

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SETH GODIN  Bye now

The difference between ‘buy now’ and ‘bye now’ is very thin.

Sometimes, when we push very hard for a commitment, we break the trust we’ve earned.

For a while, you might not notice the broken trust, because we’re encouraged to keep pushing, treating every individual as a walking ATM, not a relationship to be nurtured and a person to be helped.

Soon, though, you run out of the gullible and all you’re left with is distrust.

September 16, 2024