Train Your Entrepreneurial Endurance
If you don’t like the uncertainty of the exercise, you probably won’t like the uncertainty of running a venture
Wait, why do we have to do this?
The other day, my co-founder David Colby Reed and I were facilitating a workshop for entrepreneurs. One of the participants questioned why she should participate in a “stoke” that we were leading.
Stokes are like ice-breakers or warm-up activities, but we also use them in the middle of sessions as kinesthetic palate cleansers, or at the end of sessions to help participants transition their bodies and minds back to a non-workshop steady state.
The participant who pushed back wasn’t sure why she should take part in the activity, which involved eye-contact and hand-clapping with other participants. We often facilitate stokes that get participants out of our usual work habits of sitting and talking. There were no blindfolds, trust falls, or primal screams in this scenario, but in general we do like to push some of the usual norms of what to expect in a classroom or business training session.
This particular exercise required participants to circle up, make eye contact with the person next to them, clap hands at the same time, and then pass the clap around the circle. When the clap got to the participant in question, she froze.
Wait, why do we have to do this?
We explained that she was welcome to sit out the activity, and we also explained that the point was just to get us out of our seats and energized during the after-lunch slump time.
Once she heard the reason why, she agreed to the terms of the stoke and passed the clap on to her partners.
I’m glad the participant asked us why and pushed back. As a facilitator, I don’t expect or need blind obedience. I appreciated the participant’s character, not content to just follow orders from some facilitator she just met a few minutes beforehand. That kind of questioning of authority and flow of a group is an essential trait for entrepreneurs and innovators.
Question the social norms, and don’t just do what other people are doing, especially if you don’t know why they are doing it.
On the other hand, we also use these stokes and games as a kind of diagnostic about risk-taking. In many workplaces and cultures, there are certain norms about “professionalism” and “propriety.”
Work is work, not play. Or so they say.
When we introduce activities that rub up against these norms, the point is to see if individuals and leaders are willing to take a small social risk and play along and let themselves have fun and get lost in the stoke or game.
Wait, why do we have to do this?
These are opportunities to practice our courage and tolerance for uncertainty. If you don’t like looking or feeling ridiculous with a stoke or game in front of your colleagues, do you think you would be ready to take bigger risks such as innovating in ways that challenge the norms and expectations of your company or your industry?
If taking the social risk to play along with a silly stoke is too much, what about the risk of striking out on your own as an entrepreneur?
How do you practice the courage to buck social and organizational norms?
How do you train your entrepreneurial endurance?
