Page 47 - Sorry, We're Not Hiring Any Visionaries Today

CHAPTER 6
improvise solutions, promote alternatives, negotiate shortcuts, brainstorm possibilities, and options, generate slogans, defy the odds, and ad-lib stories and presentations.
MICHAEL: That’s all me. Do you realize that?
ANDREW: Oh yes, it’s completely opposite to what I would do. MICHAEL: I scored a 10; you got a 1. So that’s where we’re most different.
ANDREW: I agree. It’s interesting because it seems so counterintuitive to me that the way to deal with uncertainty is to create more uncertainty. Innovation, by its nature, is uncertain. When dealing with risk, you try to mitigate it. So, for example, experts say you should have a business plan, but I know you would never do a business plan.
Innovation does not have to be uncertain. It is all in the HOW.
MICHAEL: I have never done a business plan. So, unpack this with me. Talk to me. Create a sense of urgency. So, what does that mean? Like, start panicking? No. It’s like, let’s go. You know how I told you that when I pick up my skate- board, and I just go and start skating, I don’t care where I’m going; I just skate. I don’t care about the little pebbles. I know I’m gonna fall, but I’ll survive.
To me, what this speaks to, is the essence of what’s wrong with a lot of what I see out there. It means that just because you are a visionary doesn’t mean you’re an entrepreneur. And just because you’re an entrepreneur, it doesn’t mean you’re a visionary. I am still wrestling with this concept.
I’m firing on all cylinders of my mind constantly with ideas and new ap- proaches. I’m forcing myself to see things that most people wouldn’t want to see. I’m talking to strangers. Sometimes I’m putting myself in very precarious positions. I’m talking to weirdos. I am fascinated by the unknown. I embrace the new. I am captivated by any new idea. The extremes draw me in. Does this sound like something you’d like to do?
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