Mind the Momentum ➡️

Welcome to the “The Catalyst,” Kevin Noble’s weekly newsletter about becoming a more effective leader.

If you found this content helpful, please forward this to a friend!

If you’re that cool friend, sign up for the newsletter here 🙂

Hello!

I worked with a gentlemen named John when I joined Ford Motor Company out of college. He was much older, nearing retirement, and had been with Ford his entire life. He and I would talk about exercise as I was noticing my mid-section getting a little bigger; it had grown because I had a job and could finally afford food!

On exercise, his advice to me was that your heart only has so many beats in it, so don’t waste them on exercise.

I’m 90% sure he was joking.

He did work on his weight, but through diet – no exercise.

I’ve been thinking about John because I continue to learn how antifragile the body is; it strengthens with use. The heart doesn’t have a fixed number of beats that get wasted while working out.

My personal fitness goals for 2024 have reinforced this truth for me. In the first two months of the year, I ran very little. Maybe 1-4 miles per month. In March I started doing Zone 2 runs with my wife, which got me back in the swing of things. I ran 53 miles in March and 37 in April.

My body seems to be responding well, with resting heart rate and heart rate variability all improving. My body recovers faster than it did before as well.

Antifragile doesn’t mean invincible, however! There are limits, and sometimes I find them. I haven’t gotten hurt yet, thankfully, but I’ve had my share of aches and pains.

Since we’re in this together – how are your exercise goals going in 2024? Hit me up at heykev@kevinnoble.xyz and let me know!

Kevin

​

PS – My podcast episode with Heather Miller on Balanceness came out last week! Video is below. Link to Spotify. Link to Apple. Check it out!

​

​

PPS – If you’re in Austin on May 18th, come ruck with me. It’s a chance to disconnect from the Internet and get some exercise in. Join me!

​

A Quote

“ The act of judging people in advance will retard their development. If you make a judgment that someone is incapable of doing something such as running a larger organization, will it make sense to teach them those skills or even point out the anticipated deficiencies? Probably not. You’ve already decided they can’t do it. — Ben Horowitz in “The Hard Thing About Hard Things”

​

Three Things

1 – 🐰 Rabbit R1 AI Pin is Not Ready – I shared the Rabbit R1 in a previous newsletter so wanted to follow up now that it’s released. The result? Not good! Turns out AI pins aren’t ready for prime time and most folks should wait for future generations.

2 – 🐦 Guy Built a Wildlife Pond in His Side Yard – It’s really cool to see what happens when you create a good habitat for animals. The pond was small but got a ton of activity from local wildlife; insects, reptiles, amphibians, birds, and mammals. It inspires me to try something similar!

3 – 📒 The Alter Ego Effect – I’ve heard several people recently talk about their fears, doubts, and uncertainties. How they can’t sell themselves or their ideas. In this book Todd Herman, coach of professional athletes and businesspeople, teaches how to use an alter ego to overcome the self doubt that prevents you from doing what you’re capable of.

​

Deeper Dive on Minding the Momentum

Just like in physics, momentum in business is a powerful force. This force can work for you, or work against you.

If you think back to your last physics class, you might recall Newton’s First Law of Motion – it’s the one that says an object at rest will stay at rest, and an object in motion will stay in motion, unless acted upon by an external force.

One last bit of physics for context: Momentum is mass times velocity. A heavy object moving quickly has a lot of momentum. Anything at rest has zero momentum.

For us, the “object” in Newton’s Law is your business or your team, and they’re influenced by these same concepts.

Imagine a team with 200 people. They’re spread across various time zones. There are at least four layers of organizational hierarchy. And they’re idle. They’re an object at rest.

It will take an extraordinary amount of energy for their leader to rally them towards a new purpose! Think of all the town halls, meetings, and mechanisms that will have to be put in place to get these 200 people moving toward a common goal.

Imagine those same 200 people, but they’re already buzzing. They’ve got inertia towards the goal. An obstacle comes up? No problem! They just roll right over it.

Momentum is powerful, and as a leader you need to mind the momentum of your team.

​

Why is momentum important?

There are three main reasons why momentum matters: overcoming obstacles, velocity matters, and because it’s a reflection of health.

1️⃣ Overcome Obstacles – Have you ever played miniature golf, and you hit the ball a little light and it doesn’t make it over a hump? That’s because it didn’t have enough momentum! If your team or business have sufficient momentum, they can get over the obstacles they’ll inevitably face.

2️⃣ Velocity Matters – Velocity matters in business. You want to get to a destination faster than your competition. A team with momentum, one that’s breaking through obstacles, is going to get places faster than one that keeps getting stuck or stopped. That gives you a competitive advantage.

3️⃣ Reflection of Health – A team that can sustain momentum over time is a healthy team. It shows that the business systems are working well. The staff’s inner life is healthy. There’s psychological safety. Conflict gets resolved. Momentum is a good diagnostic; if you don’t have it, what sort of friction is holding you all back?

​

Mass Matters

Momentum has two components; mass and velocity. Mass is half of the equation and something we can think about independently.

Small teams are easy to get started and they act nimbly. However, their “mass” is small, so momentum can’t get very high. That means they’re easily disrupted. Lose a team member, or reach an obstacle greater than their capacity to overcome, and progress can come to a halt.

Large teams take a while to get going, but once they reach a critical mass, they’re really hard to stop. On the positive side, it means large teams are somewhat impervious to the loss of any one person. They’ll keep going through obstacles and headwinds.

The down side of a large team is that they’re really hard to re-direct! If they’re pointed at the wrong goal, or the culture has gotten off, those are not easy things to adjust.

Have the right mass for the problem at hand. If you need to get started quickly, don’t start with 100 people. Start with five. Once you’re confident you’re heading in the right direction, start adding sufficient mass.

​

How do you influence velocity of a team?

Velocity is the other half of our momentum equation The universe of things that have a positive influence on velocity are so vast that I can’t cover them all. I’ll focus on five of my favorite ideas below:

1 – Don’t Add Value Unless Necessary
2 – Punctuate Milestones
3 – Remove Blockers
4 – Use “Yes, And”
5 – Say No, and Focus

​

Don’t Add Value Unless Necessary

This is a counterintuitive idea to a lot of leaders; don’t add value unless it’s really necessary. I was first introduced to it by Marshall Goldsmith in “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There”.

Have you ever had your own leader get on your field and try to “add value” by putting their own spin on whatever you were working on? How did that make you feel?

Did you leave that meeting energized to go bring their vision to life, or was your enthusiasm diminished?

This has definitely happened to me. Since the boss’ ideas weren’t my own, it took me a while to even figure out what they meant! That’s time lost. And once I figured them out, it still felt awkward to execute on that other vision. I mean, was I still able to pivot when something didn’t work, or did I now need to go back and check with the leader? Again, that’s time lost. Velocity slows.

Don’t do this to your team.

I’m now much more aware of when I do this to other people. Not perfect of course, but mindful. I try to only do this when I feel like the tradeoff is worth it. Is the value I can add from my history, experience, and perspective worth the loss in intrinsic motivation and velocity? A lot of times the answer is no!

For example, I was working with a group of data scientists on an operational problem. I’d done the work before and knew how I would approach it. Rather than tell the team how I’d do it, I asked questions instead. How would you solve it? How would you address this issue? Where do you want to start?

The answers helped awaken agency in the team. They left the meeting driven by their own curiosity and drive to solve the problem as opposed to leaving with a task list I’d provided. Their overall project velocity will be higher even if they make mistakes and hit dead ends along the way.

​

Punctuate Milestones

“Disagree and commit” is a common saying, but something teams get wrong is not punctuating their milestones. Even if everyone is on board with the idea of committing despite disagreement, it’s not always clear when and how decisions are made.

Someone might be engaging the rest of their team in debate, but the rest of the team has already moved on. Instead of being able to execute with gusto, they have to come back and engage the debater. Since teams are making decisions all the time, this lack of punctuation means there are little pockets of inadvertent friction happening.

Make your decision-making methodology clear and transparent. Be clear when the time to debate is happening, and when it is over.

Document decisions for the rest of the team. This can be as small as sending a decision alert message in Slack, or as robust as multi-page report outlining all the context behind the decision. Use whatever method is appropriate for your team’s culture and the magnitude of the decision.

The important part is making the debate time clear, and then the decision point clear, for everyone on the team so they can commit.

​

Remove Blockers

Since an object in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by an external force, one of the best things leaders can do for momentum is to remove those external forces!

Instead of getting inside the work with the team, stay outside the work and ask them what’s getting in their way of working. It’s like being the system architect of the work environment so that it’s more productive for those trying to move projects forward.

Are there cross-departmental coordination issues you can improve? Are there skill gaps you can close through hiring or adjustment? Are there any drama signals you need to investigate?

Find out what’s working against your team and make it easier for them.

​

Use “Yes, And”

This is an improv comedy idea that works really well in team dialogue. In improv you have to keep the flow (momentum) of the show going forward. If an actor makes a suggestion, and another actor says, “no, we can’t do that because…” the show grinds to a halt.

And yet you see the “no, because” behavior all the time in business meetings! Listen for it this week. Listen for “no.” Watch what happens to the meeting momentum after.

The next time you’re tempted to say “no” in a meeting and explain why you’re right, try instead for an “and” option. Maybe, “and, what if we tried…” Keep the momentum moving, but tweak the direction of the conversation, as opposed to stopping and trying to restart it.

​

Say No, and Focus

Every project, every task, every thing you say yes to is a drag. Each one is a kite on the back of the team. Enough of those and velocity effectively comes to a stop.

Be mindful of sending requests to a team whose momentum you want to protect. Even if it feels like an innocuous ask and the team gets back to you quickly, you’ve inserted drag.

And be really mindful of adding further scope and project load to a team. You’re tying a kite to them.

Focus on what’s important, let the team get to the next destination, and then consider a new project. You can run faster with one kite on your back than two.

Bringing it all Together

Momentum in business is a powerful force. This force can work for you, or work against you.

Minding momentum is important because it allows you to overcome obstacles, get to a destination faster than your competition, and it reflects on the health of the team.

Small teams are nimble, but they can be easily disrupted. Large teams are harder to disrupt – and also harder to redirect!

How do you influence the velocity of a team in a positive direction? We covered five ideas:

1 – Don’t Add Value Unless Necessary
2 – Punctuate Milestones
3 – Remove Blockers
4 – Use “Yes, And”
5 – Say No, and Focus

Mind the momentum of your team and you’ll soon find yourself moving faster – and feeling better about it!

​

Call to Action

There’s lots you could do with today’s information, but there are two areas of awareness you could start with: adding value that robs motivation, and using “yes, and.”

When you’re working with your team this week and feel that intake of breath to share a thought, pause for a moment. What are you about to say? Are you trying to add value to someone else’s idea? If it’s something they need to execute on, verify that the tradeoff between the new value and the loss of motivation will be worth it.

For the second idea, notice when you’re about to say “no.” Or, watch recordings of yourself and see if you can find “no” in your transcript. Use that awareness to try to tweak the direction of the conversation by using a “yes, and” instead.

Let me know how this works for you! I always love hearing stories about putting ideas into practice. Email me at heykev@kevinnoble.xyz and let me know your story.

Thanks,
Kevin

​