All my life, I know this. But I have troubles knowing exactly what I want. But that is it — time and time again, I have been proven that in life, all you need is to know exactly what you want, and then ask for it.
Omg, suddenly the insight I have 2 weeks ago now makes sense in the professional context. It only did in the personal context then.
My insight is that nothing in the world matters. I’ve been trying to figure out what the “rules of the game” is in the universe. I wanted to be an observer and allow the “natural state” of the world to exist. But the natural state does not exist.
What does that mean? For instance, I would hire people based on their passions and interests, instead of knowing what I exactly want and hiring for that role. While it is necessary in a start up to have generalists, we are moving to hiring more specialists so I cannot be a passive observer anymore.
What have I learnt?
The world has no natural state. We are part of the system and we are the states. Nothing is natural, it is what it needs to be. We decide how the system changes and moves because we are states that can do that.
So how is this applicable?
Know exactly what you want. Ask for it.
In a weird way, think like a man. For better or worse, I was calling into my feminine side to have more empathy with interviews, allowing the team to take its own initiative. After all, they are so brilliant! Turns out, that doesn’t work if they are not guided, at least in the initial stages.
So now, I know exactly what I want — in terms of hiring, output from the team, how we optimise our internal processes, etc. THEN ask for it.
Life is just that simple. Know exactly what you want. Then ask for it. And you will get it. Surprisingly, I learnt that people (internal team or not) are more interested in having a targeted starting point than everything being up to them to decide. It is a fine balance between entrepreneurship and directed mentorship. You need both.
The most challenging part is of course, knowing exactly what you want. Lots of people don’t know what they want. I would consider myself +1 sigma of knowing, but there are still plenty that I don’t. Every day, I know a little more. And get better at explaining that, turning it into an ask.
Baby steps. We’ll get there.
Love,
L