Hustle culture trains us that the solution to lagging metrics, under-performance, and downward trends is to just do more. Posting on Facebook once a day? Post 3. Recording a video a week? Make it 5.
But longer hours, more effort, and working harder doesn’t fix a bad strategy.
This is why having an overall vision is important. Where are we going? Does what I’m doing lead me to that vision? It is okay to take a different route, to change, to take one step back to later take 3 steps forward.
Hard work doesn’t fix a bad strategy | Transcript
This transcript was created automatically using speech-to-text and lightly edited by a human. Some errors may still exist.
We’re all aware of the idea of the sunk costs fallacy, which is something that you put a lot of time and effort your team, your companies put a lot of time and effort maybe spent a lot of money in executing, building developing, and being able to take it out and change it for something else is a serious uphill battle. Because there’s so many people in the organization that say, we’ve already put a lot of time and effort and money into this, instead of replacing it, let’s just keep maintaining it.
And I want to expand that idea a little bit, because it’s not just about the money and time, because along with sunk cost comes this idea that if we just worked harder, if I increased the amount of time that I’m putting into it, if I just really bared down, we just all came together and gave up our lunches worked over time came in on the weekends, if I brought an extra person from a different team, this thing is just gonna work. And it has to because we already put all this time and energy and money into this.
And I want to say that a bad strategy, no matter how much time and money, how much how much work you put into it, how much how much harder, no matter how hard you double down on that strategy, still a bad strategy. And that doesn’t mean that this strategy was bad. In the very beginning, it just could have, over time changed into something different. This is definitely something that happened pre-pandemic, right. In the before times, we had a strategy, then came this global event. And we needed to change our strategy to better match what’s happening. And the companies and the teams and the people who’ve decided to just wait it out. And for things to go back to normal, or back to the way that they were has missed a serious length of time in executing a new strategy, because they were just so committed to that old strategy.
What if we just work harder? What if instead of one Facebook post today, we do three Facebook posts today, what if instead of one ad, we do five ads, what up instead of social media ads, we also do Google ads, just doubled down on the existing strategy work harder with it, thinking that that hard work is going to then turn into more success or better success, or going back to the success that you had.
But that’s not always the case, the world changes, we change our customers change, working harder on a bad strategy is still just bad strategy. And there’s nothing wrong with taking one step back in order to go two steps forward, or even more forward in the future. Because you took the moment to look at what’s happening, assess what needs to be done, and refactor the strategy to then be able to do that. That’s why it’s really, really important to have that overall vision on what it is that you want, we are going here, the path may have changed, but we’re still heading in the right direction, instead of committing to just a path. And if the vision has, if that path is now going off in the wrong direction, you are now just driving away, you’re not getting any closer to what that vision is. Instead, you just so committed to the route, that you’re just going to go wherever that route is taking you.
And it’s okay to take a moment and think about taking one step back. That way you can go forward again later. But we get so locked into this strategy took so much time took so much effort back when it was created, and felt like it was the right thing and is still going to be the right thing. I know I suffer from this all the time, I see trends and impressions or engagement or in open rates. And I think, oh man that going down what happens instead of just sending one email, I’m gonna send two emails now that way my total opens will stay up where they were my total Facebook impressions in Facebook ads, if my impressions are going down for you know, I’ll just run a second ad that way my my impressions will be back to where they were. But it’s still not a valid strategy anymore. I need to re-evaluate what it is that I’m doing. In order to be able to get to where I’m going, I might need to take a different route might need to drive down a different road.
This is like if you’re supposed to be baking cakes, but now you’re suddenly out of an ingredient. You don’t just keep baking cakes without that ingredient, right? Because if you make one and it’s bad because you don’t you don’t have the right ingredient. If you make 10 it’s gonna be the same thing. If you make 50 it’s gonna be the same thing. You can’t just keep baking. You have two choices. One is you go to to the store and you go buy that ingredient, if your goal is to bake cakes, so now you need to go to the store, and you need to go get that ingredient. Or you need to change what you’re baking, if the goal is to just bake, if you just want to bake, you need to change with what ingredients you do have that will you start making something that’s edible. In no time is the solution to just double down on baking cakes. And eventually, maybe even though you’re missing that ingredient its going to come out being a cake. Because hard work with while missing steps information or going down the wrong path is still the wrong path. That strategy, still a bad strategy, you need to take a step back and think about what’s happening. And you think about how you need to change in order to adapt to what the new world is.
So that’s what I got this time. I’d love to hear your comments on this. Leave a comment, wherever you’re watching this down below and let me know, how is your strategy in 2021 panning out? Is it going to be the same strategy that you’re going to have in 2022? And beyond? Do you need to refactor that? Or are you already stuck in the loop that you just tried to make your existing one work by working harder on it, because all you’re doing is wasting hours at that point. So that’s what I got. I’d love to hear your feedback on this. Leave a comment wherever you’re watching this. I’ll see you next time.