One of the fascinating things about this life is that we often talk about ideas like “quick wins” that imply we can quickly get going on the easy stuff.
In reality, we typically need to get to the hard stuff first to then get to the easy stuff. At least the easy stuff that counts anyway.
I think of this every time I think about the act of building a team and getting the team going. It takes a good 6 months of consistently choosing the hard stuff – tough conversations, tough decisions, and so on – before things settle and the team begins moving in the direction we want.
And, for what it’s worth, I’m not even sure the easy stuff exists. I think we just get so good at dealing with the hard stuff as a team that we take on the next thing and the thing after with relative ease.
Perhaps that’s the secret. Getting to the hard stuff first makes the hard stuff that follows… easy.
