Burning Ships Not Bridges

"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.” ~Douglas Adams

By: Martin Grunburg

It's great to be back in the saddle and while this is NOT the official kick-off of Season 4 (Habits 2 Goals Podcast), it is my effort to get you caught up and share at least one of the great lessons I recently experienced.

Admittedly, you're gonna have to be a little patient (it takes a while to set the table here) but coincidentally patience is a component part of this lessons anyway! ; )

Today, I share a bit about my long-standing partnership (23+ yrs) and it's official separation... all good, mostly. The fact is we'd been partners (3 of us) longer than most marriages exist and with our company's recent win of a prime contract award (defense) AND, given that they are in the neighborhood of 70 years old an exist strategy presented itself.

How and why this may relate to you.

Entrepreneurs (people in general) love to cling to motto's, slogans, trite and not so trite sayings, that guide and drive them and their decision making.

For instance, "Hire slow and fire fast." Almost every entrepreneur will tell you that is a MUST. Another is "Never settle!" or another, "revenue is vanity and profit is sanity."

All good stuff right? MOST of the time. Sometimes though, from my experience, I've witnessed a lot of challenge created from clinging to hard-set ideas and notions like these as though they are set in stone.

We've talked about it here many of times, dichotomous thinking can be very dangerous and ultimately creates a lot of friction, struggle and can even make one feel as though they are running in circles.

Let's use the above as examples; hard to argue with "profit is sanity and revenue is vanity". That's one of my favorites! EXCEPT -take Jeff Bezos and Amazon. I believe (at least for a day anyway, he just became the richest man in the world and for the most part his philosophy for Amazon was contrarian to that focused primary on revenue with little emphasis on profits.

Or, how about, "Never settle!" Sounds pretty amazing right? Imagine a life of never settling. Well, the last time I heard that advice it was from a guy who's now divorced and you can bet he "settled" in court.

What about "hire slow and fire fast". Nobody's ever complained that they fired someone too quickly, right? Again - most of the time this is credible and worthy advice. However, I can tell you I made one of my best hires in about 30 minutes over a beer.

So, what's the point?

BE OPEN-MINDED and do NOT RUSH if you do not have to. Don't cling to trite slogans for the sake of trying to simplify things for yourself and make your life easy... question your bias to lean into such decisions!

When it is not necessary to make a decision, it is necessary not to make a decision. ~Lord Falkland

In today's episode, I review my challenge/struggle to follow one great and romantic motto entrepreneurs love! "Burn the ships!"
Yet, incredibly, unbeknown to me there was another powerful motto directly competing with that philosophy. You can hear about it on the podcast site or download it in iTunes.

Harvard 80 year Happiness Study! (I reference)

 Slight correction I relate a great line from MASTERY a fantastic book by Robert Greene, the actual line is, "the greatest impediment to your creativity is your own impatience."

Enjoy!

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