Discipline to do the right things

Startups are perhaps the toughest place to have any kind of discipline. Probably, second only to family with kids. Everyday you find yourself in a position where there is always something lying on the table for you to do. It becomes increasingly convenient to start picking those things and processing them. And that’s fine because at the end of the day you are doing everything in the service of your company. Except, there is one problem.

Most of the these predetermined tasks are there to protect the bottom line of your company. Things that had to be done. Startups don’t thrive by protecting their bottom line. They thrive by working more on their top line.

Top line is the work that requires a different type of discipline. The discipline to first figure out “What’s the one thing I can do today that can move the needle for my company”. And then do it. It’s tough because one, you don’t know what exactly you need to do and second, even if you figure it out it’s scary like hell. Because it’s a new thing. It might not work.

Your colleagues/customers may call it total bullshit at the end of the day. But that’s totally fine. Because for one brief moment of time that work is going to lift you up. It might bring you down as well. But if you go up and down enough number of times you start to believe in gravity. And the more you feel the gravity the more risk averse you become.

And the more risks you take, more chances you create for your company to hit the next stage.