A Learning a Day

I was in a hurry recently. I was wearing contact lenses and figured I’d take my glasses along. So I quickly folded my frame and put it on my T-shirt on my neck.

As I moved quickly, the glasses almost fell off.

But I caught them. Close call. And a sign from the universe?

A few minutes later, they fell off again as I bent down to do something. This time, I wasn’t so lucky and just stepped on them.

That hurt. Sentiment aside, they’ve been a great companion over the past 3 years. I’m hopeful the optometrist will be able to get things back in order.

And of course all this hassle was completely avoidable.

2 reflections –

(1) I should have taken the hint when they nearly fell the first time. After all, if you don’t have the time to do it right now, do you expect to have the time to do it right later?

(2) Hurry is often all about speed, not velocity. The minute I shaved from not getting a spectacle case was never going to be consequential.

It is always better to focus on making progress in the right direction. Most things aren’t worth over optimizing.

Sitzfleisch: The stamina to resist the temptation of responding to these short-term influences.

This was legendary investor Howard Marks’ advice for investors in this market. The entire interview is worth reading in full. He makes 3 points –

(1) We’ve all experienced an extended era of low interest rates that distorts behavior.

(2) Things are not going back any time soon. Expect inflation in the 2-4% rates and expect higher interest rates. All the Fed can do is attempt to avoid stagflation – low growth and high interest rates.

(3) Take the long term view. Summon Sitzfleisch.

“Life is not about how fast you run or how high you climb, but how well you bounce.” | Vivian Komori

This made me chuckle… and resonated.

#bounce-back-ability

A GM at Union Square Café made the following speech to a new team.

“I’m excited to be here; I believe in and love this restaurant with all my heart. I’m also clear about what my job is, which is to what’s best for the restaurant, not to do what’s best for any of you. More often than not, what’s best for the restaurant will include doing what’s best for you. But the only way I can take care of all of you as individuals is by always putting the restaurant first.”

It is a great message and one that holds true in any position of leadership. The best way to take care of the team is to put the team first.

Someone I respect and like shared some feedback with me the other day. She did 3 things at once –

(1) Described the situation as she saw it (objective)

(2) Shared how she felt (subjective but without judgment involved)

(3) And asked what she could have done to have avoided that sort of situation (did not assign blame, assumed good intent, and just focused on a constructive response)

We had a great conversation following that exchange. We both took away lessons (though I admittedly took away 90% of them) and walked away with an even stronger relationship.

It was an experience that role modeled constructiveness for me – a playbook if you will. I hope to follow her lead the next time I have such an opportunity.

One way to measure the success of a day is to look at the priorities you started with and see how you did relative to them.

The other is to only do so in relation to a melded list of priorities that emerged over the course of the day.

The challenge with prioritization isn’t in sticking with a list that we came up with at one point of time. It is the relentless focus on identifying what “the main thing” is at any given moment and creating the space to keep the main thing the main thing.

I had a leadership failure recently where I fell well short of my own expectations.

As I reflected on it, I realized that the root of the problem was the absence of systems that matched my stated (or spoken) priorities.

“Show me your schedule and I’ll show you your priorities” is definitely true.

“Show me your systems/habits and I’ll show you your priorities” is perhaps even more useful.

(1) Praise the behavior, not the person.

(2) Praise in public, criticize in private.

(3) Praise with emotion. Criticize without emotion.

Bran asked – “Can a man be brave if he’s still afraid?”

“That is the only time a man can be brave”, replied Ned Stark.

A good friend shared this. It resonated.

Always take the time to deeply understand the system – this could be the organization or the process – you work on or with.

Too often, when we get into a new system or begin working with one, we’re keen to just “dig in” and get going. It takes deliberate effort to make sure we’re keeping our eyes open to the way things are, the reason things are the way they are, and the levers we have to create the outcomes we seek.

It takes deep thinking to understand this. It is easy to shortchange the process.

And yet, if we seek to be effective, it is the most important thing we do.