This week's idea
"Action produces information. If you're unsure of what to do, just do anything, even if it's the wrong thing."
Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase, calls it one of his favourite lessons from working with smart people.
So many smart people are stuck in analysis paralysis, debating over headlines, colours, logos, AI etc.
Meanwhile, the market is moving and the result you're waiting for only exists on the other side of just doing the thing.
Useful takeaways
You can't have a feedback loop if there is no momentum.
Waiting for 'perfect conditions' is a fool's errand.
The market will give you all the answers you need, but you need to be in the game.
Where people get this wrong
Some people see inaction as safety.
"We don't have enough information yet" or "We tried that in organisation X and it didn't work" sound responsible. Perhaps even "strategic".
But most of the time, it's comfort dressed up as experience. Dress it up as you want, but the fact is you're not moving and your competition is.
There's a difference between measured risk and paralysis wearing a suit. One is strategy. The other is fear with a Gantt chart attached.
How I’ve applied it
With clients stuck in approval loops or torn between the risky concept and the brand-safe one, I've started injecting a radical sense of urgency to just make a call, either way.
Working in a performance agency helps; we can split test relatively easily without much pushback. But the principle holds regardless. For every week spent in analysis, the competition is moving forward.
Storytime
I once got invited to an innovation workshop for a client of mine, a chocolate brand, you know the one, they've been telling you to take a break since 1957.
I was pretty excited. Finally, a chance to bring what we were seeing on the front lines of advertising into the room where actual product decisions got made.
The room was a good one too. Teams jumbled up across tenure and function, C-suite at the tables, rapid ideation rounds, the works. There was a really good energy at the start of the day and it felt like some key decisions were going to permanently affect the business for the better that day.
Except it didn't. Round after round, everything landed in the same place...another flavour variant or another subtle riff on what a competitor was already doing. This was not innovation, it was more like organised copying (with better catering).
So I thought: "Bugger it, I'll have a crack at something off-piste."
Late in the day, each person was asked to pitch 'their one killer idea' to the room. So I stood up, took a deep breath and pitched a partnership with a protein shake company.
I said:
"What if you could have your treat and your protein hit in one? The supplement category is exploding. The consumer need is real as stock flavours are awful. I know 20 guys who'd buy this in a heartbeat."
The room went quiet, I just needed some tumbleweed to roll by, then a couple of remarks came out:
"Only serious gym goers would want that."
"I'm not sure the consumer would be keen on that." (Obviously speaking for all of mankind)
I awkwardly sat down, feeling like I'd just presented naked. Nodded along to the remainder of ideas/flavours, packed up my stuff, and moved on.
Fast forward roughly fourteen months later, I was doing the groceries and stopped dead in the cereal aisle. A competitor brand, let's just say they're named after a planet, had launched a protein variant in partnership with a supplement company. And there was only 2 tubs left on the shelf. I wish I took a picture.
I actually laughed out loud. I wasn't bitter, but more so because the whole room had looked at that idea and seen risk, and what they'd actually chosen instead is far riskier. In fact, the new flavour they chose on that day was discontinued within 2 years.
Action produces information. Inaction just produces more meetings about why you're falling behind.
Thanks for reading, and see you next week!
Murph