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Simple can be harder than complex. You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end, because once you get there, you can move mountains.
Mission Drag
Every business I've ever walked into has the same disease. Doesn't matter the size, doesn't matter the industry. Drag.
Here's what I mean. You didn't start out this complicated. Somewhere between hire number one and today, you bolted a system on here, built a workaround there, added a person just to shuttle information between two departments that should already be talking to each other. None of that was dumb. It's just what happens when a business grows. But at some point, all that stuff you added to help you started slowing you down instead.
I call that Mission Drag.
It's your estimator re-keying numbers a system already has sitting right there. It's your PM waiting two days on a report that should take two minutes. It's the "we've always done it this way" nobody questions because untangling it feels harder than just living with it. Drag never shows up as one big blowup. It shows up as a thousand small ones, and they stack until your team is spending more energy fighting the tech than doing the work it was supposed to help with.
Here's where most guys get it wrong: they think the answer is more technology. Buy the platform, add the tool, get a bigger stack. But bolting more onto a system that's already working against you just adds more drag. I've seen it a hundred times. Sometimes the fix isn't adding something. It's ripping something out.
I do this work with construction, engineering, and the companies that build and maintain the physical world, because they feel this the hardest. They didn't get into this business to become IT experts, they got into it to build things and win bids. And every hour their team spends fighting their own systems is an hour they're not spending on the job that actually pays.
So here's the only question I think matters, on any system, any project, any vendor relationship you've got right now:
Is this consuming your capacity, or expanding it?
That's it. That's the whole filter. If a system passes that test, keep it, invest in it, build on it. If it fails that test, it doesn't matter how much you paid for it or how long you've had it. It's drag, and it's costing you more than the subscription ever will.
The companies that win the next ten years won't be the ones with the most technology. They'll be the ones with the least drag.
Reduce the drag. Create the leverage. Advance the mission.
Until next week,
—Jared
Text Me: 314.806.3912
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