(source: Nassef Mohsen Ali)
One of my favorite get-to-know-you questions is, “What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?”
This question is one of the easiest ways to invite people to open up and think big. The responses have yet to disappoint, ranging from “full-time landscape photographer” to “write a series of fantasy books” and “rob a bank.” Like many people, I, too, catch myself dreaming big—not “rob a bank” big, but big nonetheless, but what’s preventing us from pursuing these lofty goals?
The hardest part is starting. We typically envision a perfect scenario allowing us to pursue our dreams. If someone wanted to start a business, they might think they needed to get their MBA first. They might confess to their friends how that’s the one thing holding them back. This isn’t just applicable to ambitious goals. How many college graduates delay getting real-world experience (i.e., starting a career) by immediately returning to school to earn a master’s? It’s not until they graduate with their M.A. and start working that they realize it either wasn’t necessary for their career goals, or they specialized in the wrong subject—something they could have avoided had they first tried to figure out if working in this field was actually for them. That’s why starting is so important. It forces us to start learning from experience as we progress through our ambitious endeavors. Many of the points emphasized in this article are drawn from the principles of James Clear’s Atomic Habits, a must-read for anyone pursuing self-betterment, professionally or otherwise.
What’s the difference between starting and saying you’re going to start?
There’s a difference between starting and saying you’re going to start. For example, I’ve talked about starting a leadership blog for the last few years. I spent countless hours planning, asking myself, “What will be my niche? How will I structure my blog posts?” While asking these questions is a natural part of the process, I realized that I wasn’t moving any closer to achieving my goals by spending most of my energy in the planning stage. What I needed was a mindset shift. Instead of waiting for the best circumstances to come to fruition, I switched gears and began imagining what my minimum viable product (MVP) could look like. Coined by Frank Robinson back in 2001, a minimum viable product is essentially the most barebones version of a working product. Once launched, it will incorporate customer feedback as it evolves through multiple development iterations.
My website didn’t have to be perfect, but it did need a clean layout where I could document my different projects, such as my leadership blog. My writing style didn’t have to match that of an experienced writer publishing columns every week. Sure, I could’ve spent more time and energy reading about starting a blog and how to structure my writing, but experience is the best teacher. For now, I need to be able to articulate my thoughts clearly in my writing. My niche didn’t have to be fully formed. In fact, until I started writing and posting regularly, it would’ve been nearly impossible to pinpoint my leadership niche. I had to reject perfectionism and embrace learning on the fly.
The Compounding Nature of Starting
James Clear details the compounding nature of building good habits in Atomic Habits. Though they might seem small on a granular scale, they compound and lead to more significant changes over time. The best part about starting is you can share your work, get feedback, and improve as you go along—and that’s precisely what I’m doing with my blog. If I had to guess, my website would undergo multiple more changes within the next six months. As I continue writing about different leadership topics, I’ll probably find some topics I gravitate to more. My writing style will (hopefully) improve as I publish more posts. Even if the changes are minor with each post, my writing could be unrecognizable in a few years.
I love discussing career prospects with friends. Whenever grad school comes up, I recommend holding off until they’ve got 3-5 years of experience in the field they’re hoping to pursue. Am I trying to damper their dreams and discourage them from aiming higher? No, I’ve witnessed what happens when decisions are made to avoid “getting started.” I’d instead encourage them to make better-informed decisions. It’s easy to rationalize going back to school because we feel like we’re making progress, but if we don’t have experience working in a field, we cannot discern if it will align with our long-term career goals. We’re better positioned to decide for our future by waiting a few years. We know what type of work we like and, more importantly, what we can’t stand. So before one of my friends spends tens of thousands of dollars on an M.A. in nonprofit management, only to discover that they would like to get paid for a living, I recommend taking an entry-level position and going from there.
What’s the minimum viable product of your dreams?
To be clear, I’m not saying we should be reckless and avoid research and planning at all costs. In fact, some of my best friends are planners. There’s a time for planning, and there’s a time for executing. Setting aside time at the start to gain a foundational understanding of whatever area we’re pursuing is beneficial. It can serve as a quick primer and give us some direction. However, most of our time should be spent executing. The easiest way to execute is by embarking on a minimum viable product. If you have a business idea, start small and expand your business model as you gain experience. Maybe you need to pivot to a different business model or venture altogether. Experience will help you get there faster and more efficiently than books, which will mostly confine you to the theoretical application.
The next time you have a goal, take a step back and assess what’s preventing you from getting started. I believed everything needed to be perfect before I could start sharing my insights on leadership. While I found some benefit in formulating a plan, admittedly, I spent too much time in the weeds. It got to the point where I was actively preventing myself from achieving my goals. At the end of the day, I realized I needed a minimum viable product, and only then could I set myself up for success.