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On having a mantra…
In The Art of the Start Guy Kawasaki tells us to “Make Mantra”. I think this is good practice in any endeavor. A simple message that can be conveyed to all parties, is easy to remember and gets to the heart of what you are trying to accomplish, a mantra, should be concise but it should also think big. Try making mantra in your own life. Where I work, we create software to allow employers to attract, select, assess, develop, and reward people. The unofficial mantra I have taken up when designing the interfaces is: “Build better leaders.” On my kickball team (yes, I am a 31 year old man playing a game for grade-schoolers) we could use the phrase: “Never stop running” to describe our aggressive base-running and, in fact, the secret to our success. When training our new puppy my wife and I could use the slogan: “Just make it past year one”. And in politics, the nation’s Democrats could use the mantra: “Fairness and opportunity for all Americans”.
Mantras are a beautiful thing and can be very powerful. I expect every project I work on to have one or I will make one.
This entry was posted by Ben Edwards on Friday, September 8th, 2006 at 4:41 pm and is filed under Agile Processes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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“Never stop running” would be a good mantra for any organization!
Guy
...on September 8th, 2006 at 5:16 pm[…] Take a look at the Great ideas for starting things chapter from the Art of the Start (PDF). It is great stuff - making meaning, making mantra, and especially, the advice you hear from most entrepreneurs, “just start”. There has been a lot to do to get ready for this point: There’s incorporation, drafting operating documents, filing federal tax documents, opening bank accounts, setting up payroll services and accounting systems, purchasing equipment (15.4″ MacBook Pros woohoo), and lining up projects but we don’t let that stuff bog us down.We are outsourcing anything that is not in our core set of competencies, we are going to stay small, and we are going to form lasting relationships with everyone with whom we work. Oh yeah, and we’ll probably get a trio of those sexy Apple iPhone’s when they come out as well. […] ...on January 10th, 2007 at 9:00 pm