Cleaning up after yourself
Five lessons applied to the business world
“Denys, did you vacuum the basement?”
“Yes mom.”
“Are you sure?”
“The hallways and rooms are done.”
“Why is the vacuum cleaner still in the hallway?”
Many such conversations happened within my family. Being the easily distracted person I am, it happened 100’s, probably thousands of times. But eventually I got better at cleaning up, and learned an important lesson.
We hear a lot about cleaning up after ourselves; oil companies cleaning up after pipelines spills, deleting emails, using the good ‘ol pooper scooper when walking the dog. But where does this stem from? Why should we leave the world in an equivalent or better place?
We’ve heard of compound interest, Einstein’s pop culture jealousy, and when mixed with inflation leaves us disappointed that our favorite chocolate bar no longer costs $0.99. So what if we leave a 5% mess after every interaction. Well after 14 or so interactions we have a 100% mess left over, not fun.
What does this mean? Every time you don’t make your bed, respond to an email or fold your clothes, your mess grows. It becomes harder to clean up. We get cluttered, we lose productivity, we get annoyed.
Lesson #1 Clean up after yourself when you have time, your future self will thank you.
“Cleaning up is boring, I don’t have time”
Ah yes standard excuses. Used to make them all the time, now its only sometimes. So what do we do?
Lesson #2 Create processes.
It amazes me how some companies are run. Startups are usually run adhoc, from hiring to selling, to planning company outings. Compared to many larger companies where decisions are made 6 months ahead of time. Neither is a good approach, so what do we do?
First, we need to identify pain points.
Second, we find tools.
Third, we play with lego.
Wait what? Why are we playing with lego!?!?
Because life is lego! We find code modules, blogs, furniture and so much more and put it together into bigger things like programs, reading lists and house décor. So find your legos!
The lego comes in all sorts of shapes in sizes. My personal favorite is the calendar. I can remember random things (like an inside joke from camp 5 years ago, long after everyone forgot it) but dentist appointments are hard to remember. So put it in the calendar. Stay reliable. I cleaned up after myself by checking my availability so that there are no vacuum cleaners in the hall.
“Ok, I’m playing with your metaphorical legos now what?”
Think about what you want to build with them! When I was planning the TU20 cup, lots of things needed to happen. Mentors. Check! Tshirts. Check! Name tags. Uh, is Staples open that morning?
So the calendar and google docs were the lego blocks. The process was simulating how the event would look. Making a checklist. Putting myself in the shoes of users.
This leads us to Lesson #3. Clean up after yourself from many perspectives.
When I was a kid I learned very quickly what was the minimum I could do to satisfy each parent’s standards. Similarly, in school, what was needed to get an A in each class?
Problem is, one person isn’t checking your work as an adult. Constant scrutiny and evaluation. In itself it’s not a problem, there are many opportunities to learn and grow. But, we have to make sure we catch most of our mistakes or at least do our best.
I remember in Grade 8 when I was competing in a science fair. I had worked so hard to academically push myself (Resonance frequencies of buildings is not the first science experiment you think of). At the presentation day it was going well. First judge, super impressed. Second judge, fantastic! Third judge….. your data doesn’t make sense.
Wait what!?
“ I looked over your calculations and your numbers don’t makes sense”
Well then, there went my victory chances. I chose the wrong calculations for my graph. I got a bronze medal for my efforts.
Sometimes, you will get away with a half baked product. But, there will come a time to clean up after yourself. Double check your work. Backup plans. Make it thorough.
People say failing is the best type of learning. Sure but there is a caveat, the experience needs to be worth it.
Would I be smart to fail a university course because I refused to study?
Would I be smart to let an important client leave because I didn’t listen to their concerns?
Would I learn something from leaving cookies in the oven for an hour when the recipe clearly says bake for 20 minutes?
Maybe. But a better way to learn is to push yourself first and learn by fine tuning or rethinking.
I can learn that I don’t know a concept well enough by studying hard and failing. This let’s me develop a better study strategy for the future.
I can learn that some clients want and say different things and learn how to tell. Let’s me become a better account manager.
I can learn that I don’t really like cookies and next time I make pie. This makes me a better baker.
“But…now you are baking and not cleaning up!”
But I am! I’m proactively cleaning up!
Lesson 4 be proactive and not reactive.
Innovation does not happen from reacting. Well maybe it does, but its proactive reaction.
Wait what?
When you create a hypothesis, you don’t flip a coin on your hypothesis (maybe you do, but I would not recommend it). You examine past research. You reason it out. Then you test.
Hypothesize. Measure. Test.
Things go wrong. Your first iteration fails. You go back and narrow down the concerns. Version two is better. Proactively think what might cause failure. The prep might reduce your iterations from 20 to 5, critical for keeping your business going.
This, in my eyes is experience. You are better at predicting outcomes. You see red flags. You know to double (or triple) software project timelines. You are now using a Teflon frying pan rather than scrubbing it afterwards.
Lesson #5, Learn to clean up other’s messes
I learned this very quickly when I was 5. My brother had been annoying me for the past half hour so I punched him to shut him up. And of course his nose began to bleed. So how do I hide the evidence? Well, first distract him so he stopped crying, good. Now to clean up the blood, a towel and hot water. Lastly, erase his memory of this event. Too late, he is upstairs complaining to mom. Well I tried.
You manage a team. You have dependencies. Do everything possible to help them out.
Don’t micro manage. Don’t do anything criminal. But find ways to mend the situation. Refurbish fractured relationships. Create backup plans. And then teach others how to do the same.
So where are we at? We heard many Denys stories, some lessons and some strange analogies.
To wrap it up, I suggest becoming the best vacuum cleaner. Become the Roomba that does it automatically. Become the Dyson that does thoroughly. Or become a Swiffer that changes how we clean up after ourselves.
At the end of the day its delivering results. And no customer wants to walk into a dirty office, so start cleaning.
