You are the leaders who are going to shape the future. Or be defeated by it. You can shape the future and see the results of your work in a short timespan. You don’t have to wait years and years to see the change you started, finally take place. You live in a world moving fast and you have the chance to see the change you want to bring happen as fast. How lucky you are.
You can shape the future and see the results of your work in a short timespan
But with this privilege comes a responsibility. You have to learn to be attuned to the changing world. Yes, the greatest leaders of today can define a future that goes beyond any imagination, any reasonable forecast of just few years ago. Yet they do it by letting go of all the assumptions and beliefs they hold about the current world. They observe and learn. Observe what is going on around them, and learn from it. They let go of their preconceived ideas and they listen.
Crave for real life feedback to your most outlandish ideas
The most effective leaders go even further. They experiment with the present and with the future. They are not afraid of making mistakes, they crave for real life feedback to their most outlandish ideas. And they have the humble attitude to learn from the feedback, be it positive or – most often– negative. A failed experiment is not a failure, it is a success if we can learn from it. Successful leaders are on the continuous lookout for learning.
A failed experiment is not a failure, it is a success if you can learn from it
You can define the future. Yet most likely it will not be the future that you envisioned in the first place. You will have had the inner strength to let go of your beliefs when they were proven wrong by reality. And learned from reality instead, to create a future beyond imagination.
I work with CEOs, philanthropists, startup founders and great organisations to impact Ocean Sustainability and Decarbonisation at scale. If you want to 10x your impact on Ocean Sustainability and Decarbonisation get in touch on: leonardo@startupwharf.com
Photo by Enzo Tommasi on Unsplash
Originally posted on Steemit, the blockchain-based platform for content creation. Re-posted on LinkedIn a couple of years ago. But it’s always relevant!