Here’s something I’ve been up to over the last few months.

In my online rental business, we rent a lot of projectors, and people who rent projectors often want to rent projector screens. Unfortunately projectors screens don’t work well in the online rental business, because existing projector screens don’t ship back and forth without hassles and damage.

This spring my rental staff and I decided to tackle this problem by designing and manufacturing a new type of screen. We were afraid we would not succeed in meeting our design goals of damage-proof, cost-effective, hassle-free shipping and packaging, but we had to try. We went through several prototypes, and encountered more design challenges than we expected. It was great fun, and we succeeded. The result is the AnyWall projector screen. It ships safely and economically in a tube and hangs on any wall.

Now our projector rental customers can get a projector screen rental too.

I think the biggest lesson for me in this project is to start sooner next time. I knew about the need for a couple of years, but I couldn’t envision a design that would work, so I didn’t start. In the end once we committed to the project, we found ways to solve the remaining problems.

I believe in Stephen Covey’s principle “begin with the end in mind”. My short explanation of that principle: clarify the result you want, and act deliberately and consistently toward that result all along the way.

In hindsight, I can see I have tended to operate with a more restrictive principle than that. It’s something like “begin only when the desired result seems fairly certain, and the path from here to there is clear and predictable”. I started with “be deliberate” and unintentionally added “avoid surprises” to my mode of operation.

Because of my undeclared desire to avoid surprises I have often avoided starting down foggy paths. I knew the first few steps to take, but I didn’t know all the steps from here to success. Some examples: not creating a new employee position in my company because I couldn’t predict if it would work out, not seeking outside experts because I didn’t know how to find and evaluate them, or not starting experimental product development because I couldn’t forsee solutions to all of the design challenges. In all cases I knew the desired result, and I knew where to start, but in between was foggy. I was afraid of failure, and of the unknown.

It’s wise to plan ahead using all the information that’s available at the beginning. I think the lesson for me now is that even when a less-than-comfortable amount of information is available at the beginning, I’ll get more of the results I want by starting down the visible part of the path than by waiting for clarity and predictability from here to the destination.

As leaders we all know we need to delegate. Although easier said than done, this is not a new or unfamiliar idea. Lately my executive coach has been pushing me to take delegation further than I have before. I’m becoming aware of a pyramid of delegation something like this:

• Level 1: I train someone else to do an established, routine process that up to now I have been doing myself. I can and do tell them the steps to successful execution of the process from beginning to end. I am tired of doing the process myself, and I’m glad to hand it off. I know the outcome I want, and if the person I delegate it too does it the same way I did it, there’s very little chance of failure or surprise. The goal is to repeat the process quickly and consistently with as little involvement from me as possible. This is about execution.
• Level 2: I put someone else in a position to make decisions and solve common problems. I get updates on how things are going, and I get involved with the sticky issues. I need their consistent attention to the matter, because my attention is divided between many things. I can’t prescribe all the steps in advance, but I do know what the expected outcome is. There will be some surprises, but the outcome is predictable. The goal is to resolve issues and return to normal. This is about monitoring and adjusting.
• Level 3: I challenge someone to solve a new problem, invent something that doesn’t exist yet, or learn something without training. I evaluate results, suggest improvements, and allocate resources for next steps. I need their dedicated time because there are too many opportunities for me to pursue, I need their expertise because they know things I don’t, and I need their creativity because they can look at things from perspectives I would never think of. I can’t tell them what path to take, and I can’t predict the outcome. Failure is likely, both the back-to-the-drawing-board try-again kind, and the not-gonna-work dead-end kind. Surprises are guaranteed. The goal is to create something new. This is about exploration and discovery.
• Level 4: This might be giving someone full authority over an organization or resource based on their character and track record, and providing only the broadest of objectives (grow the company, use this for good in the world). I need the whole package of their responsibility, leadership, expertise, and ambition. Success and failure are in play on a grander scale. Surprises are expected, but I don’t need to react to most of them. The goal is to maximize potential, both of the person and the resource. This is about stewardship. It strikes me that we are all given Level 4 authority over our own lives.

In my own leadership, I’m starting to stretch into Level 3, and I find it scary at first, like the top of the first hill on a roller coaster. Then it becomes thrilling, like the part of the roller coaster when I realize we’re not going to crash, and we’re moving fast.

For most of my small-business leadership career I have operated like this. I’ll call it the “seek and destroy” strategy.

1. Mull over options for the next business project or goal, and choose one.
2. Focus my energy and activity single-mindedly on reaching that goal ASAP.
3. Work hard. Drill down. Reach it. Celebrate.
4. Once I feel almost caught up and my stress level is reasonably low, repeat from step 1.

This approach is simple and proactive, but it’s slow, and it doesn’t scale well as organizational size and delegation increase. I’m moving toward operating like this. I’ll call it the “goals timeline” strategy.

1. Mull over options for the next business project or goal, and choose several.
2. Focus my energy temporarily on planning for each goal. Delegate necessary activity to others.
3. Check status on multiple delegated projects, celebrate goals reached, and do more planning for the future, all in the same day.
4. Build and maintain this timeline of future goals, in various stages of planning or completion, even when current stresses are high.

I find this goals timeline strategy challenging in a way that the seek and destroy strategy was not. It requires emotional multitasking. For example, I might be very excited about a product development project I have just decided is a go, but delegate it to someone else, and having no actionable tasks on that project, need to set my excitement aside and take up something else.

That same day, I might need to spend time worrying about sales projections for 6 months from now, and use those anxious feelings as motivation to add some marketing goals to the timeline.

Still thinking over those challenging possibilities, it might be time to celebrate the completion of a previously-delegated project with the person responsible for it. At that moment I need to re-locate the excitement I had about that project a few months ago, when I first decided it had big potential and should be launched.

The challenge is juggling emotional states. The payoff is an organization that moves forward faster.

Seth Godin is one my of my favorite authors. He’s a relentless voice for thinking and acting differently, and I value that.

Today he posted about making big plans and I couldn’t agree more.