I enjoyed Peter Osborne’s post, Creative Confidence trumps historical indicators of future career success. You can read the entire post here. Peter writes about a concept Bob Sutton, a Stanford d.school (not a typo, d for design) professor proffered, namely that the Stanford d.school teaches creative confidence — “the ability to keep pushing forward, observing the world and the people in it, identifying unmet needs, brainstorming solutions, and trying to develop prototypes that work and failing forward through the disconcerting process.”.
I am a big supporter of the concept of “failing quickly”, but I would add a caveat for most businesses, which is that leaders need a filter for the decisions they make.
For most small companies, there are very real constraints on all resources. Leaders need to stay focused and not get distracted by the shiny stuff. As an EOS Implementer I help my clients discover their core focus, which has two components – a purpose, cause or passion and a niche. Think why you do what you do and what you do better than anyone else.
Since businesses don’t have unlimited resources in terms of money, time and, most importantly, people, it is necessary to apply some logical constraint. Within these constraints “creative confidence” is a wonderful thing. I comment on another interesting idea which relates to this for business in an earlier post – “An Elevator Pitch or a Dumbwaiter Pitch?”. You can find it here.
What are your thoughts? Shotgun or rifle shot?
Photo: Waka Jawaka
