Category: book

Is there a way to share your opinion so that it gets accepted?

NO.

That’s it. 
There are times when it’s because you don’t know how to communicate that your opinion doesn’t get accepted, but the key thing many people don’t get about it is that _you will still get rejected_.

There’s no way around it. There are times when your opinion isn’t useful, isn’t requested nor it can be understood and you cannot change that.

There are times when you will share your opinion using your best work, your best intentions because you care so much about a project, a person, whatever and it will still get rejected.

Your job is to learn when it’s a right time to share your views and in case the answer is “NO”, accept that.

Because if you aren’t able to accept the fact that your help isn’t required, that your solution won’t be the chosen one, then it’s your ego talking, not you.

One man once said to me: Nothing is more definitive than a temporary solution.

He was damn right.
Our internal narrative says “We’ll cope with this temporary solution and then we’ll fix it”.
But we won’t fix it.

I’ve _never_ saw a different story. The times when we decide to change a “temporary” solution are so rare that this old saying rings true.
What to do about it? Don’t call it temporary, and go for the good solution.
Because, another great man said, you spend the same amount of time developing a bad and a good solution, so better go with the good one.

You have a product, you want more sales (or start sales).
What do you do?

1. Pay for advertising
2. Ask friends to share the link on facebook
3. Ask coworkers to share the link on facebook
4. Do a website for your product

What if none of these really matters? (well, maybe number 1 in case of well established products).

Want sales? The question is not “How can I get more”, the question is “Why am I not getting enough of them?”

And the answer, 9 out of 10, is: Something’s wrong with the  claims, with how you sell it, with what you say and we don’t know why.

Hard to fix right? But there’s an old job that’s the perfect example of how to get the right sale pitch for your product.
It’s a job that doesn’t require you to ask friends to share a link to a website, because that doesn’t drive sales.

What drives sales is: Selling.

So what do you do? You start selling it to real people in real life.
_And you record the audio of each sale_.

The first 10 sales will be pure garbage, but once you adjust your pitch you’ll see some reactions and hopefully more sales.
Once you are confident of the pitch, once you can sell it confidently, _then_ and only then it’s time to do a website, advertising, whatever (no asking to share link, please. A product worth sharing gets shared. Your friend john won’t earn you any sale).

After all the hardest part in selling, is selling.
There’s no workaround, but you can MVP it by selling _first_ in real life, then in the medium of your choice.

What’s the first reaction when you’re not able to manage a sea or a pool and you’re drowning in it?

You move frantically your hands and try to shout “Help me”. 
It one of the few moments  in life when ego and our social status doesn’t get in the way.

In near-death situations we tend to get back to our roots, to ignore whatever status we have. To do what’s needed to survive.

In the usual life, though, we don’t.
We avoid asking for help because it might mine our status, it’ll make us look weak, fragile.

We think that, by doing it by ourselves, we’ll be greater, have more impact, have more money, be more important.
Except that it’s not.

We’re that guy drowning in a pool. In some cases the guy can get out by himself, but in most of the cases he dies.

We’re slowly dying to protect our status, missing out the opportunity to improve, build something greater than us, something we might not be able to do by ourselves.

Ask for help, you’ll see that it’ll benefits you and your work.

If you’ve never run in your life, would it be possible to run a marathon tomorrow?
Of course not. 

Would it be possible in one week? Nope.
What if you’d have 1 year? Maybe.
3 Years? Yes.

But how can you get to run a marathon in 3 years?
You have to prepare, maybe not each day, but frequently and consistently.
You have to plan, to define the many small steps in between.

The first months you’ll be able to run 10 minutes. A marathon in those days will feel like you’re trying to do the impossible.
But if you keep working, if you keep training, after a few months those 10 minutes will become 20 minutes, a kilometer, 2 kilometers.
The distance till the end will slowly become smaller.

What if you slack? That time won’t become smaller.
And the thing is: it’s not about a marathon. It’s about doing things.

Learning to sing, learn a new language, learn to discuss, learn to be kind.
All of these activities are like learning a marathon. They require time and _most of all_ they require consistency.

They require you to show up and do your thing each and every day for a long time.
They require you to not give up, to continue even if it seems too far, out of your reach.

And if you do trust that the end is gonna come, that you’ll get to that goal one step at a time, then you’ll get to the finish line.

Because consistency trumps everything. It trumps talent, it trumps fortune.
Consistency is the key to do, learn, and improve.
The only way to keep doing things is to be rigid about it. To do it nonetheless. Rain or shine, good or bad day.

Because each misstep will take you away from the goal, from the result and will make the goal impossible to achieve even though it was possible in the first place.