Driven to Your Greatness with Salim Ismail - The Entrepreneurland Podcast, Episode 5

Pitchology

Steve sat down with friend Salim Ismail, the author of Exponential Organizations and its sequel, Exponential Organizations 2.0: The New Playbook for 10x Growth and Impact, to discuss the ins and outs of Entrepreneurial drive.

Highlights from this Episode:

Your Life’s Work may require money, but it’s never about money. It’s bigger than that. It’s usually visceral, or at your core of being, that is a challenge or opportunity to have a massive impact on both you (the entrepreneur) and many others. In most cases, it becomes your legacy because it’s so beneficial.

For EIs, often the drive of the entrepreneur is more alluring than the company itself—we buy the drive, not the company.

Efficiency and predictability aren’t enough anymore. Salim explains how the old paradigm of a sustainable organization used to be based on efficiency and predictability. Now, he says that organizations need to be architected for agility, flexibility, adaptability, and speed to truly succeed in today’s market.

Evolve to wisdom. Salim and I speak about the thrill of momentum we feel when we have a new idea, or even see a new avenue in the direction of our Life’s Work.

Know your highest and best use for the organization. Sometimes the CEO and president role isn’t where the entrepreneur needs to be forever. This can be a scary feeling for entrepreneurs, so they mess it up so they can find meaning.

Learn how to harness your drive beneficially for everybody. It doesn’t matter how good your ideas are if you’re constantly shifting the purpose of your organization. If you’re repurposing your talent to new roles too often, no one will ever be able to master their position. This will lead to eye-rolling and frustration from your team, or worse—A-players leaving the organization.

Consider creating an internal research and development team as an explorer. You can create an R&D team that serves that explorative purpose without stressing out your existing business or pulling your nucleus team off their jobs.

Your ideal space may be at the edge. Salim discusses how the entrepreneur/founder may be happiest existing more at the edges of the company— where they can dabble with new ideas without being a destabilizing force—then at the helm.

Being an “arsonist” can give you the illusion of purpose. They’re intentionally (or subconsciously) messing things up so they can have the opportunity to step in as the hero again. Learn to discern when you’re just looking to mess things up for the thrill of it.

Arson can be a reaction to metamorphosis. Often, when people start lighting their own fires to put out, it stems from the fact that the business has matured to a place where it is no longer dependent on the entrepreneur. This can be a scary feeling for entrepreneurs, so they mess it up so they can find meaning.

The luge can be a good thing. The thing about a luge is there’s no getting off. To accomplish big projects, you may need to have a “leave the world behind” mindset so you can focus intensely on the project at hand. When you’re in a luge, you’re accountable for results and deadlines. When you know how to harness the power of a luge, you can use it to create periods of commitment and intense focus so you can create BIG things.

Connect with Steve and Salim:

Steve Distante - https://stevedistante.com

Salim Ismail - https://salimismail.com