Slow and Unsteady

For the next two days, there will be 2022 planning sessions held for the department I work within and today's session will be in collaboration with another team that is related, to see if we can create more alignment on activities to compound for results. The organization I work for is actually pretty good at internal collaboration, which is refreshing, considering some of the places I have consulted for. Often, a large part of my work is just building communication channels so that the right people, have the right information when they need it. Timing is vital.

I generally (un-stroked Taraz) do a lot of practical work and deliveries in these areas, but what I am (was) probably the best at and find the most enjoyable, is the higher level views and strategizing on what directions to take. I like looking at all the data points available, projecting into the future to work out where and what might be possible (surprised?) and then planning the pathways to get there. It doesn't really matter what the topic is, whether it be company direction, an individual career path or the potential in a product feature, it is fun.

I think part of the reason I enjoy it so much is that even though it is based upon available information, the prediction is a creative exercise that is quite open ended. It is only once things happen and are in hindsight that it is possible to see how correct the predictions and activities made were, which brings in some accountability.

Often in organizations, this accountability is lost and I think we see this quite readily in the media also, where the narrative they perpetuate and is found to be very wrong, is quickly covered by another narrative. I reckon the stories around inflation rates over the last year and a half qualify for this and of course, pretty much anything to do with crypto for the last decade, as the mass media pendulum swings whichever way they are able to get clicks.

Consistency is a key factor to success, but this doesn't mean that a person can't change over time. In fact in my opinion, if a person doesn't change their opinions often enough on various topics, they are likely working on default and will increasingly be wrong in their approach. The reason is that everything is lived within a dynamic environment that is always changing and shifting. This means that a correct solution today will likely be slightly incorrect tomorrow and a decade later, even harmful. I think again using crypto as the example, a lot of people are doing themselves harm by not paying attention, because a decade ago they "researched" it and found too many holes in the story.

All new industries have holes, because that is what gives the space to grow and innovate. Using the failures of the first combustion engine as an opinion about the future of cars, or the first failed message over the internet to predict the internet itself of the future as a failure, is obviously a poor predictive approach - even though it is based on the "best information available". People tend to think because they have all the data now, they are making the best decision they can, but unless that decision gives room for new data to inform and change opinion, it is likely a poor approach.

From my own experiences surrounding planning and predicting the future, the people who do the best are those who are consistently changing their opinion. However, there is a caveat here, because they are also the ones who get the worst results. The difference is however, that the people who are actually making practical moves on what they know and then, adjusting based on new information tend to do well - but those who are only changing their opinions are doing nothing at all.

A lot of social media activity is based on opinion, not actual activity and it rarely needs to be consistent. This means that a person can feel like they are participating and even feel like they are getting "everything right", while not actually doing anything at all. This leads to feelings of "doing right" without the feedback of good results. There are many people in this position and often, they get bitter about their lives and tend to blame others, as after all - they know they are correct based on what they know.

But what we know is always a limited view of the world, even when we know a lot. There are so many dynamic pieces in play that even if we can predict what will happen tomorrow, all of the movements will trigger events that we don't have visibility on and a year or ten down the track, our initial predictions can look very immature. However, "initial" doesn't mean final position, so if we are continuously feeding in more information and adjusting our activity, we can be consistent in that we are consistently improving our process and therefore on average at least, our likely outcomes.

It isn't an easy process to change, as learning is always some degree of uncomfortable, but continuous improvement is easier than wholesale pivots and for organizations, generally far cheaper. The reason is that a culture of change can constantly move and adjust cheaply, but a culture that doesn't move often, becomes stubborn, arrogant and very quickly, ignorant. Pretty much all of the "too big to fail" failures are due to a lack of insight into the environmental changes taking place, whilst believing that what is done now, is the best way to do it. All centralized systems act like this by design, which is why not one of them has survived to date.

Plan ahead, but know that everything is transitory. It might seem to move slowly like a snail, but that is how the continents have shifted too.

Taraz [ Gen1: Hive ]