Kyle Tut is a cowboy who wrangles data on the frontiers of web3. The team at Pinata
Entrepreneurship
Significance
Most of us seek peace, love, and significance.
All can be achieved by offering each to others.
Visions, missions, and titles may help guide teams in a shared direction, but linchpins want work that matters and culture outshines even the most thoughtful strategy.
The race to revenue makes it easy to see why we’ve been seduced by surveillance, predictable profit margins, and forced productivity. Too often, the easy metrics borrowed from such compliance are the ones that get measured. This leads to endless meetings geared toward delivering information, avoiding blame, and asserting authority for those in charge. The illusion is that control will lead to predictable results thanks to a maximization of resources. The problem is: humans are not a resource.
Leaders who make a difference welcome tension brewed by those who make a ruckus. We nurture initiative, even when results aren’t perfect, which creates enrollment where enthusiasm is met with consistent action. We keep promises and our sense of abundance fuels intentional permeability that invites people to leave. We create a culture where everyone can be proud of the impact they make. Contributions are appreciated, knowing they would be missed if they were gone and the work is worth doing because it invites each human to sing their own song of significance.
Extra Shot
Are your meetings led by a few people talking and most pretending to pay attention? Perhaps it’s time to get real by inviting the team to lead together.
Personal
Atmospheric
“How’s the weather?”
Who cares! Why do we talk about the weather? When there’s nothing else, the weather offers an early bond between strangers. This is because everyone has experience, and can therefore relate to different atmospheric conditions.
The weather is always changing and may be one of the easiest forms of small talk, but it’s just so boring. We can’t change it, so what does it matter? If you’re catching up with someone you already know, talk of the weather is even more pointless! Besides meaningful topics like climate change, the danger of severe weather, and the impact our environment has on shared activities, I propose we skip all the weather talk.
Next time you’re asked about the weather, breeze past the status quo. Make it rain with thoughtful questions to forecast more compelling bonds that last.
You Don't Need This Podcast
StArtist
Does everyone have a creative spirit?
Siobhan Spain, former director of Mainframe Studios, joins us to talk about the Des Moines StArtist Community and the origin stories of the largest non-profit studio building in the nation. We also discuss how to brew culture from within, First Fridays, exploring new technologies, monthly web3dsm events, artificial intelligence, artists in residencies, and the diffusing value of your brain on art.
Intrapreneurship
Permeability
We don’t have many 40 year careers anymore.
With talent in high demand, but often on the move, abundance can be overshadowed by scarcity when it comes to talent retention. We survey meaningless metrics, count the keystrokes, and try to pay people just enough not to leave. What if instead of trapping talent, we create purposeful jobs in an inclusive environment that gives agency to team members eager to keep a promise?
In his new book, The Song of Significance, Seth Godin argues (among other things) how enrollment can last when we invite people to leave. Instead of fighting to keep people in place, what if we optimize onboarding and welcome turnover, while creating conditions to make this the best job someone has ever had? When people are invited to be a linchpin, they feel significant and the team will be led by those who aren’t just collecting rent for their time.
As Seth talks about in this conversation with Tim Ferris, when we create a gratifying, but more porous environment, listen to stay in-tune with gyration. When departures occur, don’t blame the individual. Consider the conditions that contributed to such a decision and work harder to nurture a performance-based culture that’s made to stay.
Extra Shot
When you dance on the edge of infinity, there’s always enough… because you aren’t taking opportunity from anyone else, you’re creating it. -Seth Godin