Be a proactive force of proposal
Agilytic is a constantly evolving entrepreneurial project. Growing and improving takes time. Week-on-week, you will not notice a lot of changes. But year-on-year, the differences will be striking.
We all have a responsibility to
- Be proactive in suggesting actions improving what we do or how we do it.
- Ensure we are clear in doing so.
Let’s elaborate on how we suggest you achieve just that.
💬 If you need something, say something
You would be surprised by the level of support you can get from your colleagues; it is probably because we too often hesitate to ask for fear of appearing incompetent or weak.
Asking for something can feel uncomfortable. For example:
- If you feel that you are not equipped or trained to do your job properly
- If you have individual problems that are at risk of impacting your work
- If you are having a tough time interacting with a client
- If you are facing a decision presenting an ethical dilemma
NOT telling us would be a grave lapse of judgment because the consequences of not speaking up will be much more significant than if you do speak up.
That is why you must be clear and transparent about what you need, feel, require, or expect. It is not a luxury; it is a duty.
Don't wait until it is too late to seek your colleagues' help. Most of the time, they'll be willing to help or point you towards the best next step.
You can't always get what you want
On the other hand, expect the occasional "no." While we do our best to satisfy everyone's needs, there will be times when we won't have the resources/time/scope to do things precisely as you envisioned them.
Dealing with the "Nos" with professionalism and maturity, then moving on is an integral part of our vision of "attitude" developed in this book.
🎯 Situation-Target-Proposal
A useful canvas to foster actionable proposals is the Situation-Target-Proposal (or "STP") approach. It goes a little bit like this:
- S = Situation: start with a definition of the problem or issue. Describe clearly the situation using facts, opinions, beliefs, hunches, and feelings. Be transparent about them: don't pass your opinion disguised as a selection of convenient facts. Use the keywords "who, what, why, where, when, and how" to create single sentence descriptions. Do not try to solve the problem at this point; easier said than done because we often want to jump into problem-solving mode.
- T = Target: identify how you would like things to look in the future. The targets are values, hopes, desired outcomes, goals, objectives, or visions of a better state. When identifying the target, you will use phrases like "we will achieve," "ideally," and "I want." Creating a vision of what the problem will look like once it is solved will help you clarify the issues involved in solving the problem.
- P = Proposal: Solving the problem means bridging the gap between S and T. Proposals are actions, approaches, strategies, tasks, methods, and steps. Determine short and long-term steps; ask yourself, what is your action plan? Once you have your list of proposals, you need to prioritize them based on a list of criteria such as cost, ease of implementation, acceptability to your constituents, and the likelihood that the proposal will solve the problem.
STP in practice
Keep it simple
If there is a simple solution, consider it first. Attempting to prepare for every eventuality will bog you down in unnecessary details.
Is "good enough" enough?
Consider whether a "good but not perfect" solution is enough. Does your proposal solve 80% of your problem? Is it cost-effective and easy to implement? Then consider it seriously. Move forward and show you can make progress.
The “martyr document”, a.k.a. the "pièce à casser."
The idea behind the "pièce à casser" is that sharing something that isn't complete but moves a project forward is always better than keeping something to yourself for too long. It is not an invitation to rush or neglect what you’ll share; it is an opportunity to move faster as a group by inviting feedback as soon as it is valuable.
Right to be wrong
We will never penalize you for bad outcomes of experiments, projects, or events if these outcomes were part of a preventable risk or were simply impossible to anticipate.
When completing a project, be it client-facing or internal, we strongly encourage you to conduct a quick, action-driven retrospective. There is an end-of-project checklist ready for you in ClickUp.
Be a solution finder
You will encounter two types of people in your professional life:
- “Problem finders” will gladly enumerate the reasons ideas won’t work, the failed experiments.
- “Solution finders” will focus on turning those (sometimes valid) objections into questions and then into goals.
Always be a solution finder.
When ideas provoke resistance, our first reaction is often to get frustrated and argue. Instead, use the underlying logic to turn this into actions.
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