Not everything can. We used to have a great test to see if our code could survive. We pulled the network cable. That’s, no other fancy actions, just pure and simple, we pulled the cord to see what good our app would be if we yanked out the cord that powered everything. And better yet, we plugged it back in to see how it came back to life (if it did). You will suffer blips…
It is an uphill battle. It will require phone calls and waiting for people to answer. It will require presentations and banging your head against the wall. It will require repeating yourself over and over again. It will take patience. It will time. It won’t happen overnight. But you will get there… and maybe you’ll bring some others there with you.
I go to the mailbox and there is more flyers than mail crammed into that tiny little mailbox. My mail gets scrunched up because of these flyers. Because they are being so scrunched up, sometimes they are ripped and not worth reading. 80% of these flyers don’t get opened – the only decision I make is whether I should keep them for camping to start fires with or recycle them. So where is their value?…
Did your new initiative break? Did it not go as expected? Was the team unhappy with what you tried to do that didn’t work? Did it blow up in your face? Good – that’s the idea, your leading should break at some point. If it’s not breaking, it means you’re not working on it, and if you’re not working on it, it means you’re not trying to get better, it means you’re coasting. And if…
When things break, you can do any of the following; Get mad that it broke. Complain that it broke. Run around screaming that someone broke it. Schedule a meeting to discuss that it broke. Argue about the level of brokenness within it. Or, you can get to fixing.