“If we got kicked out and the board brought in a new CEO, what would he do?”
This was the question Andy Grove asked his Intel co-founder Gordon Moore. Moore said that a new CEO would get Intel out of the memory-chip business, so Grove had a logical follow up.
“Why shouldn’t you and I walk out the door, come back and do it ourselves?”
Intel’s memory-chip business was deteriorating, that much was clear. Japanese competitors had spent the 80s eating into their market share. It was a race to the bottom. So, they came back and transformed the memory-chip maker into the leader in microprocessor manufacturing.
It’s a simple exercise but it’s hard to back away from what’s worked and rebuild as something better.
“When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.”
Lao Tzu
We’ve always done it this way speaks to habits and tradition, not innovation and improvement.
This sounds obvious but it’s contrarian thinking. What if Blockbuster had the same conversation Intel did, about streaming? They did talk about it, and they met with Netflix directly. But they didn’t act. They chose not to walk out the door and come back to make the change.
Tiger Woods is the best golfer of all time, and he has continuously reinvented his swing, despite the critics. Why? To walk in the door tomorrow, better.
“People thought it was asinine for me to change my swing after I won the Masters by 12 shots. … Why would you want to change that? Well, I thought I could become better. If I play my best, I’m pretty tough to beat. I’d like to play my best more frequently, and that’s the whole idea. That’s why you make changes. I thought I could become more consistent.”
Tiger Woods, Golf Digest, Jan. 2005
As CEO of yourself, you have an important role to play. You can do the same thing. You can walk out the door and come back changed and ready to make change. If you are willing to trade in “we’ve always done it this way” for “we should do it this way.”
Fear and ego might stop you. Or what Steven Pressfield calls “resistance.”
It could be your company or your golf swing, but more likely it’s the booze, the junk food, the exercise. Those abs you’ve been missing for a decade.
How about the schools, the parks, and the church in your neighborhood?
It can always get better, but we dismiss the work in favor of “we’ve always done it this way.”
“We’ve always don’t it this way” is an excuse. It’s lazy and fearful.
If you were to walk out the door and come back tomorrow, what would you change?
