I was looking through files on an old laptop this week and came across this document that I wrote 5 years ago (12/3/2015 to be precise). I was surprised by how well this rough framework I created has stood the test of time. In fact, it may become even more relevant as time goes on. It’s something that I believe is better off being shared publicly than being kept private and may help a few people expand their thinking. Enjoy.
99% of the actions you take create a negative repercussion and, in most cases, create multiple repercussions. This is an elemental truth that has been largely unacknowledged or ignored since the beginning of time.
For example, even a simple innocuous act like drinking a glass of water creates a repercussion. Once you drink enough water, one repercussion is having a full bladder, which than requires a solution.
An easy hack to wrap your head around this concept, is to take a step back and observe simple things that you do every day, and then ask yourself “what the repercussions of X?”. What are the repercussions to brushing my teeth? Taking out the trash? Mowing my lawn?
The most surprising aspect about running this thought experiment is realizing just how far the repercussions can extend from a simple action.
It seems that the repercussions of one’s actions contribute to the root causes for the largest problems the world faces. Despite this, most people are unaware of the extent to which this is true, which is actually perfectly natural. When you drink a glass of water, you’re not focused on the repercussions of it, you’re simply trying to solve the problem of your thirst.
This is especially obvious with respect to companies because they are in the business of solving problems and their actions have an effect at a large scale. They facilitate problem solving by creating products or services. In today’s world it is extremely rare for a company to solve the major repercussions that their industry or even their own product directly create.
Even action that provides a solution to a problem will inherently create more and/or new problems.
Problem -> Solution -> Solution creates its own problems -> Repeat
In the old days, the entities that were the root causes of the world’s largest problems consisted of empires, kings & queens, emperors, and royal families.
In present day, the predominant influencers now take the form of large companies, and leaders of said companies. Over the last 100 years, every large problem in the world can be traced back to a large company. Take a step back and look around you, can you name 3 things that are not created by a company? The answer is no. Companies and the products they create permeate our entire life, essentially facilitating the life support that our world runs on. Thus, the problems and repercussions created by companies have a profound impact on the state of the world because their penetration is at such a massive scale.
The good news is that if companies are able to crack the code on solving the problems and repercussions that they themselves cause then the state of the world can drastically improve.
Companies avoidance of the repercussions that their actions cause is what ultimately leads to the biggest problems that this world has ever faced.
If you were to ask a dictator about his actions, what would he say? He would take the stance that he was changing the world for the better and uniting his country. He knows this is not true, and he’s aware that his actions have massive repercussions, but yet he avoids solving them. A dictator is an extreme example, but the concept remains true when anyone is asked about the problems caused by their company or product. They deny it, deflect, blame it on something else, and then only focus on the handful of solutions that their company has provided.
Even though the long-term financial rewards would be much greater if they had the courage to solve the problems & repercussions that they’ve caused.
Companies continue to cause these problems mainly because they make money off the solutions that are creating the problems and it’s what they’ve always done. Their systems are structured around the products that cause these problems and an investment in finding less destructive outcomes does not have a clear ROI, would cost substantial sums of money, and is therefore too risky in their eyes.
What these companies don’t realize is that if they solved these problems, they would make substantially more money than if they kept doing the same thing. This is a very hidden truth that no company fully embodies.
Many companies in the past have attempted to lie to the public about the harm that their company or products cause, but the truth has always revealed itself eventually. The lies these companies tell typically come in the form of elaborate advertising campaigns, statements made by the leaders, or companies taking actions that just-so-happen to occur right after their problems come into the spotlight with the intention not to actually solve the problem but instead to create a smoke screen e.g. Google making heartfelt videos about humanity while they are simultaneously being accused of evil practices, invasive surveillance, and are defendants in multiple anti-trust lawsuits.
A perfect example of the Repercussion Cycle at work is Tesla. On one hand Tesla is crushing it and tackling the problems in their industry head on, while on the other hand, they’re creating large repercussions of their own along the way. Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk has gone on a worldwide marketing campaign to promote Tesla’s electric cars, talk about the destruction that is caused by gasoline powered cars, and talk about how he stands for the greater good. The result from these efforts is that so far Tesla is in great shape, their cars are all selling out, Elon & Tesla have a loyal cult following, and the company is growing. People have supported the mission of Tesla so much that when Elon told investors that profit is not the main objective, the stock went up. Tesla is only 12 years old and its cars are currently outselling its competitor’s cars in each cars respective category, competitors that have a very large and longstanding global presence such as BMW, Mercedes, Ford, and GM.
Yes, they did provide a solution to the problem of direct CO2 emissions from cars. HOWEVER, they are still following along the Repercussion Cycle, instead of solving it.
Tesla Repercussions:
- Pollution
Over 63% of the American electric grid runs on fossil fuels. Some states in America, such as Michigan, have an electric grid that consists of 80% fossil fuels.
As more electric cars are created, the dependency on this polluting electric grid increases, which in turn makes it more challenging to change the electric grid to clean energy.
So electric cars do not actually reduce the total pollution output, they may actually increase it.
2. Batteries
What are the repercussions for mining and manufacturing the elements that are used for creating these large batteries for each individual electric car?
What are the repercussions for disposing these enormous batteries?
Batteries are known to be terrible for the environment, but Tesla is building several Giga-factories to produce enormous sums of batteries anyways.
Avoidance at play
Elon has been quoted as wanting everything to run on electricity. This is not ideal. A world that’s run entirely on electricity will astronomically amplify all repercussions that their products create if the electric grid and battery disposal practices don’t improve.
Advice for Tesla:
A. Solve the battery production and battery disposal issues.
B. Encourage the electric grid to be reconfigured into reliable energy sources, such as nuclear. As someone who lives in one of the 40+ states that doesn’t have sunshine or wind all year around, solar and wind are useless. And if you’re a proponent of conserving solar energy in battery storage during the winter, please see solution A above.
With all this being said, keep in mind that Tesla is significantly better than 99% of companies that exist today. But even Tesla produces their own set of significant repercussions that can create large global problems in the future.
So, if Tesla, a company that is better than most, can cause these big problems on a massive scale, imagine what every other lesser company is capable of…
The key to conquering the Repercussion Cycle is to tackle the problems that your own company creates, instead of avoiding them.
Hypothetical examples of tackling the Repercussion Cycle:
Cigarette companies
Cigarette companies were, and still are, maliciously criticized for the effects of their tobacco, and rightfully so.
If a cigarette company, such as Marlboro, would have created a line of cigarettes that were substantially healthier, toxin-free, and safer, Marlboro would have positioned themselves miles ahead of every single other tobacco company on the planet. But instead, they tried to sweep it under the rug and decades later have one of the world’s worst public perceptions.
Internet privacy
A smart move by an internet company would be to provide their customers with insight into the data that they are collecting about their customers. If a company, such as Apple, implemented this for all their products and did not lie about it and actually enforced it, they would be able to market themselves as a safer company and also be able to go on the offensive against their competitors who are not taking such actions, which would undoubtedly improve their revenues, market share, and brand image, while more importantly creating a solution to a big problem in their industry that will hopefully evolve into even better solutions.
McDonald's
McDonald's brand image has been trashed because of their low quality and unhealthy foods. There is no good reason for why they don’t serve healthy food. What are they afraid of? Ruining their image of serving people shit and killing millions of people through the effects of their product?
McDonald's should sell healthy foods side-by-side with their shit food, with the nutrition facts displayed proudly. This would result in them being the only fast food restaurant to serve healthy food, salvage their weakened brand image, and give them a substantial competitive advantage over their competition, who does not serve healthy food.
Solving the Repercussion Cycle is a continuous journey. It’s not an overnight solution. Running a company is incredibly hard, no company is perfect, and life is unforgiving.
The importance of understanding the Repercussion Cycle is not to eliminate every single repercussion, this is impossible. The importance lies in the act of actually tackling the repercussions of your actions and working on solutions for them, instead of avoiding them.
It’s clear that companies who can wrangle in their Repercussion Cycle will perform at a high level and be loved by their customers. And rightly so.
