Truth Bomb Tuesday: If you only had an hour, you’d be surprised at what you could get done
“You’ve got one hour. Go.”
That’s the beginning of an exercise I do with my students sometimes. It’s called ‘an hour to midnight’.
It’s not particularly complicated. Basically I just give them a task that would normally take several weeks or months, and tell them they have to bang it out in an hour.
But why would you do that? Surely rushing doesn’t help things. And what about the stress you’re putting them under?
Good points. Yes. Good points. But kind of irrelevant.
Because the truth is, for every person I see who got themselves into trouble by rushing in, I see 50 people who are in trouble because they are just stuck in mud.
They can’t decide on a course of action, because there are too many strategies available, and they all have their strengths and weaknesses.
And if they can decide on a strategy, they can’t execute because they’re always looking for more information, or the right time, or the right mood to strike or whatever.
I find myself trying to unstick people much more often than I’m find myself trying to slow people down.
(And even then, if someone rushes in and makes a mistake, they still learned something. They still made some sort of progress. If it didn’t cost them too much money, it was still probably worth it, on balance.)
So the hour to midnight practice is just about getting unstuck.
So I might say someone, pick a strategy. What is it? Is it subdivisions? Is it reno and flips? Is it townhouses? Is it boarding rooms?
You’ve got an hour to make your choice. Go.
I can guarantee it, if they’ve been thinking about it for a while, they probably already have a deep sense of knowing about which strategy is the best fit for their interests and their capacities.
All they need is a push to just make a call and pick one.
(It’s almost always the right choice.)
And if they have a strategy, but haven’t executed a deal yet, I give them six listings from realestate.com.au and tell them to pick one.
There’s no way to do your due diligence properly on six potential deals in an hour. But people are amazed how close you can actually get in that time.
You’ll probably be able to eliminate 4 or them as non-starters.
The point is, if you are forced to put that information into action, you’ll be surprised at just what you can achieve in an hour.
Do that a few times, and suddenly you realise just how much you can actually get done if you just pull the finger out and get started.
And sometimes, this is all the push that people need.
So if you’re feeling a bit stuck, give yourself an hour (you can always find an hour, and just get as much done as you can.
You might surprise yourself.
DB.