Do not plot the route before...

A week ago, in the breakfast table I asked the kids for business advice.

I told them that I wish to celebrate small wins with my team at Prove. So, how would they suggest I do it?

The came up with a lot of ideas like bringing them a strawberry cake for the morning coffee.

...I doodled every idea down in my journal. The only thing that I noticed later was that none of the ideas suited the situation where we all were quarantined at home. The answers I got were vague given the context I had.

The next day I took out my journal and asked for more advice.

"So now that we have been mostly stuck at home and you've seen me do the video meetings with my team" I explained "how could we celebrate small wins on video?" I asked.

Already the first idea that they gave me was epic. "You should buy party poppers!" they shouted!

So I did!

Few cents a shot and so much fun in every video meet that I've had since!

But why am I telling this story?

Well the thing that I learned from these two mornings was profound. When you ask vague questions, will you get specific of vague answers?

Yup. The results are mostly vague.

With specific questions however, the answers tend to be more specific and context driven too.

The important distinction is that the same thing works with goals too. With a vague goal, you tend get a vague results. With a detailed goal, you get.... yes, you get the drill now!

So if my aim now is to grow the business tenfold, to 10X Prove, is that specific enough to be actionable? What, specifically, should the team start doing? What, specifically, should I focus on today, this week, this month and so on?

With The 10X Journey, the goal is vague I admit. So on the next post, I'll share what it means in more detail!

Meanwhile I invite you to do an exercise too.

Take out a pen and a paper. Write down three goals you might have in your professional or personal life. Then take a look and ask yourself this.

How will I know when I've reached the goal?