One day you wake up and realize that it’s time to look at your surroundings…and decide that you’re being strangled just a bit, day by day, until all at once you can’t breathe.
So what do you do when you get to that point? You either succumb, or you disrupt.
Notice, I didn’t say change. Why? Because change can’t occur until you first decide to disrupt. Once you disrupt, then you have something to change.
You don’t innovate by conforming.
You don’t become exceptional by being like everyone else.
You can’t be fearless when you’re actually afraid.
If you surround yourself with incompetent people, you will eventually become one of them.
Agility is unattainable for monoliths. Companies that truly want to innovate and change “bring in agitators from the outside to push thinking and creativity“. Those that don’t use such words as slogans and catch phrases.
So what to do? I think Seth Godin has the answer. You see it’s not about “changing” others. It’s about disrupting yourself. That’s where it begins. Godin’s words of wisdom serve to both counsel and underscore the internal disruption that’s needed.
Dig yourself a hole.
Make big promises.
Burn your boats.
Set yourself up in a place where you have few options and the stakes are high.
Focused energy and serious intent will push you to do your best work.
You have nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. (Better than the alternative).
I’ve made myself some really big promises. I’m more focused and energized than I’ve ever been. My best work is surely on the horizon and I only play at the high stakes table. The hole has been dug and the smoke is rising from the burning boat. I’m not running and I’m way too big to hide.
I can’t look back and wonder why it took so long. That’s wasted energy. I just decided, finally, that I know what I can achieve. I know that I’m not like them.
So it appears the disruption has begun.
