How these Three Podcast Episodes Changed my Business Worldview (Part 2)

This is Part 2 of the best podcasts I listened to in the last year. For Part 1 (Tim Ferriss interview with Jim Collins) click here. I spend a lot of time learning and listening to information in the business space - it sometimes helps to learn from other's mistakes and perspectives. My job is to connect the dots, especially how to help entrepreneurs develop an entrepreneurial mindset.

That is one of the reasons I absolutely love this podcast. It is recommended 'listening' for all the entrepreneurs I work with.

The Investors Podcast: The Power of Moments - W/ Dan Heath

I just love the mindset that Dan Heath describes in this podcast. I bought both the Audible book and physical copy of the book "Power of Moments" after this interview with Dan Heath (a very good summary of the book and it really gives you good insights). I have listened to the podcast a few times and use the approach to wow-ing your customer described in the book to develop entrepreneurship programmes.

There were three main insights I took from the podcast:

1) Engineering Moments

One of the main ideas behind the book is that people remember certain moments in an experience more than others.

• When we recall an experience, we tend to remember flagship moments: the peaks, the pits, and the transitions.
• A defining moment is a short experience that is both memorable and meaningful.

Dan Heath explains:

"Psychologists know that we don’t remember experiences start to finish, like a video that we can play back in our heads. Rather we forget most of what happened and hold onto certain key moments. Specifically, we tend to remember two particular moments: (1) the “peak,” which is the best moment in a positive experience; and (2) the ending." ~ Dan Heath

How this has impacted me:

I started thinking about how to create these powerful learning moments in workshops and programmes I develop. When we work with early-stage entrepreneurs, we start off working on their mindsets. We want to move them from risk-averse, failure averse employee/student mindset to an entrepreneurial mindset (where the entrepreneur realises that she makes many assumptions, and needs to rapidly test these assumptions through experiments), where failure is just one try that doesn't work, and learning is the most important goal.

This podcast (and book) has helped me frame main question I am trying to answer: "How might we design a curriculum that creates 'Aha Moments' of deep insight and learning?"

The thinking behind engineering moments is so compelling, my sister even used this approach (after listening to the podcast) in engineering special moments in her wedding.

2) Tripping over the Truth: The P&#p Story

I'm not going to spoil the P&#p story. It is such a goody. It makes you both cringe and grin at the same time. And it has a very solid and memorable lesson - in a weird way, by listening to the story, you 'Trip Over the Truth'.

"They didn’t really “see” the truth until they were made to trip over it. To trip over the truth is to endure an emotional wallop. When you have a sudden realization, one that you didn’t see coming, and one that you know viscerally is right, you’ve tripped over the truth. It’s a defining moment that in an instant can change the way you see the world." ~Dan & Chip Heath

This approach can be used when speaking to customers, teaching, and working with employees (there is a great story in the podcast on how this technique was used to make Azure more user friendly).

I realised that I can tell entrepreneurs about Lean Start-up, Design Thinking and other methods and approaches till my face gets blue. But if I don't design the programmes and engineer moments where they can "Trip Over the Truth", where they have that big Aha Moment to understand a difficult concept, I am wasting their (and my) time. This is the first step in learning, and then they need to start applying and practicing to internalize and understand the principles.

3) Leveling up your Life

In the podcast, Dan speaks about a book called "Level up your Life" (I love the concept, but didn't think the book had enough meat - here is a summary). The basic premise behind 'leveling up' is that you approach any goal the way a video game does. The author Steve Kamb, wanted to learn how to play the fiddle. Normally we look at a goal in a binary way ('0' - you don't know how to play; '1' - you know how to play the fiddle after three years). The book suggests splitting these goals up into levels (to have little wins). Steve created these video game inspired levels for his fiddle learning journey:

• Level 1: Committing to one violin lesson per week for six months
• Level 2: Complete Celtic Fiddle Tunes by Craig Duncan
• Level 3: Learning to play Concerning Hobbits from the Fellowship of the Ring
• Level 4: To sit and play the fiddle for 30 minutes with other musicians
• Level 5: To learn to play the Promentory from The Last of the Mohicans
• Level 6: To sit and play the fiddle for 30 minutes in a pub in Ireland 

What I learned from the concept of 'Leveling up' is the power of small wins. We need to engineer our lives to break it up into different levels and celebrate each moment of progress. In the start-up space the binary version is: "0" - you don't have a business, and "1"- eight years later you have a successful business. There are so many levels in-between, that can be celebrated. It also helps with staying motivated and driven, getting to the next level.

I haven't fully figured out how to bring levels into my work, but I am working on a theory. An early stage of entrepreneurship gamefication. Who knows what is possible?

(For the iTunes link of Power of Moments podcast click here.)

Next week I'll discuss the Master's of Scale podcast.

The other podcasts are:

• Part 1: The Tim Ferriss Show: A Rare Interview with a Reclusive Polymath (Jim Collins)
• Part 2: The Investors Podcast: The Power of Moments - W/ Dan Heath
• Part 3: Masters of Scale by Reid Hoffman: Airbnb's Brian Chesky in Handcrafted

Those are my top picks. Let me know what you think.