Lo que te trajo aquí, no te llevara allí
Yes that title is in Spanish and no you don’t need to change the settings on your email. It translates to “What brought you here, won’t carry you there.” Marshall Goldsmith popularized this phrase when he wrote a book with a similar title in 2008. It refers to the idea that the things you’ve done to be successful in the past, might not be the things that will make you successful in the future.
In business there are sobering statistics on where companies plateau. Only 4% of all businesses started in the US ever reach $1M in revenue. It is even harder to break through $2M in revenue and only 0.4% of businesses in the US exceed $10M in revenue. Why is that? I believe it comes back to the fact that we must continue to evolve even when we are already successful. In other words, sometimes you have to break some things that aren’t broken. Our friend Charles Fred, the founder of True Space, knows this all too well and has done research to understand the science behind why companies get stuck and what they can do to scale. His five conditions necessary for growth are rooted in a company's ability to constantly learn from what their business is teaching them. At our MIBE Summit next week, he’ll be sharing some of these foundational principles as well as the latest data on what he and his team have found.
On any personal journey, there are also plateaus. Times when growth slows and we see less and less progress. During these times, most of us double down on our efforts and work harder, figuring that we can muscle our way to the next level yet we continue to get similar results. For me this is how I’ve felt over the past year. I’ve been trying to do more of what I’ve always done, but I haven’t seen incremental results. And on top of that, I’ve felt more tired and less fulfilled. Instead of working harder, plateaus should be a critical time to stop, catch our breath and determine the next course of action. To assess the things that have made us successful and how those things may or may NOT serve us in where we want to go.
So my mantra for the year is the title above. I’ve been working on my Spanish and when I force myself to say it in a different language it anchors the concept, prompting me to look at everything differently. It’s time for me to adopt some new habits and drop some previous ones despite the fact that they may have served me well in the past. If I want to get to a new place by this time next year, then I can’t do the same thing I did this year. At Footers, there is a similar energy among our team. At our first leadership meeting of the year, there was excitement and momentum around taking things to the next level. Team members were saying that this is their year to push the boundaries on what has been done before, to test new concepts, and to breakthrough the things that had been holding them back.
Where are you on your journey? Are you happy with your trajectory? Or are you feeling a little stuck? Are you clear on where you want to go? If so, maybe it’s time for you to reflect on what brought you here, because it probably isn’t the path that will carry you there.
