1. Change Your Frame

Part 1, change your frame. Chapter 1, set a goal so big you think it's impossible. Even today, few business people understand that research to be productive has to be the disorganizer, the creator of a different future and the enemy of today. In most industrial laboratories, defensive research aimed at perpetuating today predominates. Peter Drucker, in the effective executive. Alicia Alt had been working in the credit industry for 20 years since 2004. Primarily, her business was one-on-one coaching, helping people improve their credit scores to achieve their financial goals. What set Alicia apart was her extensive expertise and in-depth knowledge of the credit industry. By 2009, just five years into her career, Alicia began envisioning a software solution that could fill critical gaps in the credit industry, offering consumers an easier, more transparent way to improve their credit and achieve their financial goals. At the time, there was no simple, affordable solution, giving clients a step-by-step plan to reach their financial goals. Whether that goal was buying a home, financing a car, consolidating debt, or lowering interest rates. Instead, the industry relied on about 50,000 expensive credit repair companies that often started by disputing negative items on credit reports. While the sputes might provide a quick boost, they rarely helped clients achieve lasting results or financial success. Most clients were left paying high fees without improving their long-term credit worthiness. Alicia's idea was to create a software solution beginning with the client's specific financial goal, then analyzing their credit report and score to generate a customized action plan. The plan would include step-by-step instructions and vetted resources such as secured credit cards or credit building loans to help them reach their goal. Although a groundbreaking concept, like many innovative ideas, it remained an idea in Alicia's mind for nearly 10 years before she took action. By 2019, after a decade of additional experience and working with thousands of clients, Alicia decided it was time to bring her idea to life. She partnered with a skilled software developer and together they built level-up score. The tool she knew could transform the credit repair process and empower anyone looking to improve their credit and financial situation. Even after building the most innovative credit repair tool in the industry, Alicia was overwhelmed in her coaching business managing day-to-day responsibilities and raising her kids. She was too busy in the grind of maintaining her business and personal life that she had no room to scale level-up score. By early 2024, it smacked her in the face that her busyness was stopping her from advancing in her life. She was stagnating, not scaling. She was below the floor. While talking to a friend, Alicia was asked why she worked so hard. I work hard so that one day I don't have to work so hard. Hearing these words out loud shocked Alicia. She realized she had said the exact same phrase 20 years earlier at the start of her career. Now 20 years in, Alicia was disturbed to find herself still stuck in the same busy rut, but this time was different. She had level-up score and a reliable partner who ensured the software stayed up-to-date with evolving trends, regulations, and demands in the credit and financial industry. Following that pivotal conversation, Alicia committed to promoting level-up score and introducing it to the market. In between coaching calls in her primary business, as well as in the evenings and on weekends, Alicia reached out to the credit repair companies. She personally explained how level-up score worked, provided hands-on walk-throughs to demonstrate its value, and showed how it could streamline their process while delivering better results for their clients. She had a 100% conversion rate. Every time she spoke with someone from a credit repair company, they immediately recognized how level-up score could enhance their services and provide greater value to their clients, and obvious game-changer. Unlike traditional services that offer dispute resolution and little other instruction, level-up score provided tailored action plans for just $3 per output. In addition to the step-by-step plan for the clients, the embedded affiliate resources, such as credit building tools and financial products, created additional revenue streams for credit repair companies. This added value increased client lifetime value, LTV, and generated additional income through affiliate links, making it both affordable for the client and highly profitable for credit repair companies. By the end of March 2024, 10 credit repair companies were actively using level-up score with their clients, generating $200 in monthly revenue to level-up score. Though it wasn't much, Alicia knew she was on to something. At the beginning of quarter-two, 2024, Alicia joined our training program and learned the scaling framework. In the onboarding process, she committed to achieving a seemingly impossible goal within 90 days. Alicia set her impossible goal as having 100 credit repair companies using level-up score by the end of quarter-two. She figured that, although it would be a stretch given her busy schedule, she could find the time to do the 90-100 calls that it would take. Quickly though, Alicia realized her impossible goal wasn't really impossible. Despite it being a big jump, going from 10 to 100 clients in only 90 days, this goal only meant her being a lot busier. On top of everything she was already doing, including her full-time coaching business, she now had the weight of 100 or so cold calls to accomplish. It was painful and mind-numbing to even consider. Alicia's 100-client goal was linear, not impossible. An impossible goal is one you don't know how to reach and one that requires radically new approaches and paths to realize. These goals redefine what your company can be and force you to more powerfully define who you are, what you do, and who you serve. As Alicia learned more of the science of impossible goals and the fact that her future was the primary force shaping her life, she realized her impossible goal of 100 clients in 90 days didn't meet the criteria of seeming impossible. It didn't disrupt and simplify her present. It only made her present more crowded and noisier. Alicia decided to embrace the concept of impossible goals and take a bold step. Instead of aiming for 100 credit repair companies using level-up score by the end of quarter two, 2024, she committed to a thousand credit repair companies using it ten times her original goal. As soon as I changed that goal to a thousand, I knew there was absolutely no way I'd be able to reach it in my current situation. There was no way it was very impossible for me. She told me on a follow-up call a few months after her initial 90 day onboarding process. It was so impossible that my current thinking and approach wouldn't get me there. After setting her 1000 client goal, Alicia sat down and journaled as many possible ways she could think of to make it happen. Admittedly, in her own words, most of my ideas were really bad, like posting in Facebook groups for credit repair companies. But she was trying. One day, while thinking about her impossible goal, a pathway came to her in the form of a question. Why aren't you calling software companies that are already marketing to your market? It suddenly became clear to Alicia that several software companies in the credit industry were already serving the exact audience she wanted for level up score. Companies like Smart Credit and MyFreeScore now provide credit monitoring tools to credit repair businesses and directly to consumers, making them ideal partners to expand level up scores reach. If she wanted to get 1000 credit repair companies using level up score in just 10 weeks, a viable pathway would be partnering with some of these software companies, maybe even just one could get her to 1000 clients. Initially, she was too afraid to call these companies, they're way bigger than me, she thought, they won't want to talk to me. A few days into her fear and hesitation, Alicia was on one of her one-off cold calls with a credit repair company walking them through level up score. The person she spoke to was immediately impressed and committed to integrate level up score into their process. Not only that, he also offered to connect Alicia with a dozen or so contacts at other credit repair companies who he knew would be just as excited about the software. Alicia graciously accepted this man's offer but then told him about her desire to partner with software companies to expand level up scores reached to thousands or even tens of thousands of credit repair companies. The man quickly responded, "I have someone for you," and introduced her to a friend who owned a credit software company called Credit Repair Junkies. Their software was already being used by over 8,000 credit repair companies to manage and improve their client experience. The very next day, Alicia was on the call with the owner of Credit Repair Junkies. At first, he was skeptical, assuming Alicia was trying to sell him something. However, after listening to his needs and learning more about his company, Alicia introduced level up score, not as a competing product, but as a complimentary tool that could be integrated into his software to significantly enhance its value and service. The man's quiet response was, "This is going to be big." Yeah, I know, Alicia humbly replied. With over 8,000 clients, each potentially generating 100 plus outputs per month using level-up score, he immediately saw the potential. Integrating it into his software wouldn't just enhance services for his clients. It could also generate nearly 1 million in monthly recurring revenue for his business. With one conversation, Alicia secured a deal that could scale level-up score from 10 credit repair companies to over 8,000. That partnership opened the door for massive growth and positioned level-up score for industry-wide impact. 10 clients to 8,000 plus in a single conversation through a single partner. Alicia's impossible goal enabled her to filter and find a powerfully scalable pathway. Through that better path, she created more progress and growth in level-up score than if she had spent almost a decade with her previous approach making cold calls. Impossible goals are powerful because they require the most innovative pathways. Dr. Denise Rousseau, a Carnegie Mellon Management Researcher, wrote, "Impossible goals motivate high-performance by mandating creativity and assumption-breaking thinking, where performance expectations are elevated well beyond the limits of past experience, and where previously successful frameworks are questioned, revised, or discarded. Prior experience is often a poor guide for impossible goal achievement, and this shifts the performer's attention away from older routines and assumptions toward novel and creative approaches." Once I had that conversation, Alicia told me, speaking of her call with the owner of credit repair junkies, I had no problem calling anybody. Alicia quickly expanded her reach even further by partnering with another software company with another 8,000 users similar to credit repair junkies. She also caught the attention of the largest credit repair software company, which serves approximately 25,000 users, further positioning level-up score for massive growth in the industry. By the end of 2024, Alicia sold her prior coaching business, which she'd had for over 20 years. Level-up score was making waves in the entire credit repair industry with tens of thousands of credit repair companies using it monthly. Beyond that, Alicia also recognized a new pathway for scaling, partnering with banks and credit unions. One large credit union agreed to implement level-up score and is currently in process of integration through all of their branches. This is facilitating broader adoption within the financial sector. Her objective for the next few years is to scale level-up score so that it becomes a trusted tool used by banks and credit unions across the United States as well as by the majority of credit repair companies. In a single year, level-up score went from sitting on the proverbial shelf to having tens of thousands of users and generating millions in revenue. Alicia's profound growth was made possible because she committed to an impossible goal which she used to filter and find more potent paths and partners. The remainder of this chapter will help you better understand why impossible goals are such a valuable and crucial element of scaling. It will challenge you to elevate your thinking much bigger. The seemingly impossible goal will force you to more aggressively filter your focus and enable you to create the best path you otherwise couldn't have taken. Please refer to the graph in the PDF showing growth over time, clarifying the science and pop science of goal setting. You can expect the future to take a definite form or you can treat it as hastily uncertain. If you treat the future as something definite, it makes sense to understand it in advance and to work to shape it. But if you expect an indefinite future ruled by randomness, you'll give up on trying to master it. Indefinite attitudes to the future explain what's most dysfunctional in our world today. Process Trump's substance, when people lack concrete plans to carry out, they use formal rules to assemble a portfolio of various options. Peter Teal, billionaire entrepreneur and investor, in 0 to 1. Before we go further into the science of scaling, Alicia's story highlights the importance of clarifying the confusing and even controversial subject of goals and goal setting. There's much debate on the subject as well as countless theories and myths. Due to a lack of more foundational understanding, there are four common mistakes people make in regards to goal setting. One, they avoid explicit goal setting altogether. Two, they set low and achievable goals due to fear of failure. Three, they avoid the reality of trade-offs and opportunity costs while pursuing conflicting goals. And four, they pursue and even can succeed in the wrong goals. These common mistakes make it incredibly difficult and unlikely for a company to scale. To the fourth and last point can lead to scaling, but unfortunately the scaling of the wrong thing, which can be just as costly as not scaling at all. In breaking down these four common and ineffective approaches to goals, I will explain the deeper science of psychology and systems dynamics. By so doing, you'll more fully appreciate the unique and distinctive power of committing to the right impossible goal. With the right impossible goal, you'll be unable to simplify both your system and your focus, such that scaling aggressively is the natural byproduct. Mistake number one, avoiding or claiming to avoid goal setting altogether. Because goal setting is a highly complex subject and because there's a lot of emotions associated with pursuing, missing and hitting goals, many have concluded that having no goals at all is the higher and more enlightened way. After the words of the stoic author, Ryan Holiday, from his 2024 blog post entitled, "This is why I don't have goals and what to do instead." I don't have goals. I know that might seem a little crazy, but it's true. I don't fault other people for having goals if that's what motivates you, enjoy. They're just not for me. I'm much more focused on the process. That is to say, I focus on doing the things as opposed to achieving some particular thing. You don't have to end up number one in your class or when everything, every time. In fact, winning is not particularly important. What matters is that you gave everything because anything less is to cheat the gift. The gift of your potential, the gift of the opportunity, the gift of the craft you've been introduced to. The gift of the responsibility entrusted to you. Immerse yourself in the work, in the process, in the daily practices that make up the bulk of your life, forget goals, be process oriented, be internally driven, be every day. Holiday's advice of not having goals is quite common among people who have already reached the mountaintop of their goals. From their vaulted position, their content with where they're at. They also realized that hitting their goals didn't actually make them happy and that happiness is an inside game. And then inappropriately associate unhappiness with the setting and pursuing of goals. Interestingly, two years prior to the quote just mentioned, Holiday wrote in his 2022 book, Discipline is Destiny. If we didn't have ambition, some big goal we are after, how would we know what little things, what distractions to say no to? Though clashing with his more recent musings, this second statement is not only more accurate and effective, but also more truthful. I say truthful, because in reality, it is impossible for a person to not have goals, even holiday. Truth number one, psychologically, everything a person sees and does is based on their goals. All human action is goal driven, even if the goal is simply to relax. This is a fairly cutting edge psychological insight that our actions and decisions are based far more on our future than our past. More directly, our actions and direction, as well as our motivation and meaning, in the present, are based on our goals. Research shows that we spend huge amounts of our time considering our future and the paths forward we will take. The psychological term for thinking about the future is Prospection. We weigh nearly countless prospects or options for our future, and then generate viable pathways to those prospects. Ultimately, we make decisions about directions we will take and pathways to get there. Of this, the clinical psychologist Dr. Jordan Peterson explained, "All of our perceptions are biased, and they're biased toward our goals. When you look at the world, basically what you see is a pathway forward to a goal that you're pursuing, and then you see the things in the world that will either help you along that pathway or get in your way. Everything else is turned into a relevance. Obviously, when we look at the world, we don't see most of it. We see what's right in front of us, but more specifically, we see a pathway to a goal and things that move us toward that and things that get in the way. Pathways thinking is a person's ability to find or create multiple pathways to a goal. The better a person gets at pathways thinking, the faster their progress. The first step of pathways thinking or strategy is realizing the goal you set determines the pathways you'll take. Pathways thinking relies on an even deeper psychological insight known as selective attention, which is our human ability to mentally filter for the most relevant information while ignoring all other data. Put simply, the quality and clarity of your goal, as well as your commitment to it, shapes both what you see and the actions you take. Mistake number two setting low and a achievable goals due to fear of failure. Psychologically, the future is not an external reality. Instead, the future is a mental tool we use to direct our attention and decisions in the present. Goals then are simply a tool to guide our filtering and decisions here and now. For a goal to be an effective tool, it must be an intense filter. The goal must force you to be far more rigorous and honest with yourself about everything you're currently doing. To restate John Doors' brief and accurate remark, a goal properly set is halfway reached. The reason a goal properly set is halfway reached is because the right goal immediately enables you to bypass the majority of dead ends, distractions, and noise that could otherwise derail you. Moreover, the right goal enables you to filter and find the most effective pathways forward. Returning to Alicia's story, it wasn't until she committed to the goal of getting level up score out there that she began prioritizing it. In early 2024, she began making cold calls and introducing credit repair companies to it. It's important to note that her process was generating exactly the outcome she was committed to, getting level up score out there. It wasn't until she learned the science of impossible goals through the scaling framework that her process radically shifted. In early Q2 of 2024, she decided to 10X her clientele and have 100 clients using level up score within 90 days. She quickly realized that goal lacked the power to transform her process and busyness. So she 10X the goal, pushing it into the boundaries of impossible goal territory. For her to have 1,000 plus clients using level up score within 90 days would require a radically new approach to anything she was then doing or considering. Yet in thinking and operating from the goal, rather than toward the goal, it dawned on her that a viable pathway could be partnering with other software companies that already served thousands of credit repair companies. Within weeks of that insight, level up score was being utilized by thousands of credit repair companies. Not all goals are created equal. The purpose of goals is to filter decisions, remove dead end distractions, and enable you to find the most powerful paths you otherwise couldn't. Low goals then are a bad modeling of the future because they aren't effective filters. Low goals don't enable you to separate the signal from the noise. They don't enable you to find the most effective pathways forward, as Alicia was able to do once she established a seemingly impossible goal and deadline. Truth number two, goals are the driver and shaper of all human systems. Not only do our goals shape our psychology, but our goals are also what shape the systems we build, whether the systems of our business, families and societies, or our own habits and processes. Of this, the Harvard System Scientist, Dr. Danela Meadows, wrote in her classic text, Thinking in Systems, one of the most powerful ways to influence the behavior of a system is through its purpose or goal. That's because the goal is the direction setter of the system, the definer of the discrepancies that require action, the indicator of compliance, failure or success, toward which balancing feedback loops work. Systems, like the three wishes in the traditional fairy tale, have a terrible tendency to produce exactly and only what you ask them to produce. Be careful what you ask them to produce. If the goals are defined inaccurately or incompletely, the system may obediently work to produce a result that is not really intended or wanted. Be especially careful not to confuse effort with result or you will end up with a system that is producing effort not result. A system is simply the organization of efforts and processes toward a specific outcome. The goal is the why and what? The system is the how and who. In order to generate an effective system, you've got to start by specifying the right outcome. If you have several competing outcomes, what you'll have is a complex system going in several different directions. You cannot scale a complex system. If you have multiple competing goals, you have a complex system that won't scale. If you have the wrong goal or an unclear goal, then your system will produce either the wrong outcome or an undesirable outcome. The purpose of establishing an effective and powerful goal is that it immediately simplifies both your focus and your system. If you want to scale, you must have a clear focus and a simple system that effectively produces the desired result. Mistake number three, avoiding the reality of trade-offs and the opportunity cost while pursuing conflicting goals. This is the state of most businesses and organizations. They're radically unclear on what they're actually trying to accomplish and are unwilling to let go of lesser goals in service of higher ones. The author Robert Brought wrote, "We are kept from our goal, not by obstacles, but by a clear path to a lesser goal." When you set an impossible goal, it forces you to reckon with your conflicting and lesser goals. For example, one early reader of this book, a successful entrepreneur in real estate told me that after reading the science of scaling, he clarified his impossible goal. It was owning a huge number of rental properties in a particular category within three years. I asked him, "With a goal that big, how much growth does that reflect on your current trajectory?" "That's about 10 to 20 years of growth on my current path," he replied. I then asked, "Do you see a pathway to get there in three years?" "I think so," he replied, "but I'd have to get really good at getting funding." He then said, "I really want to do a podcast. I think that might be a viable pathway to hitting my goal." I pushed back, "Tell me more. In what way do you think having a podcast can get you the funding you need for such an aggressive and massive goal? Are you sure that's a viable pathway or is that a lesser goal you're not sure you can let go of?" "Uh, I'm not sure. I think the podcast would more be for people who are already in my network as a way for me to build trust," he said, unsure. "I'm not telling you what you should or shouldn't do," I continued. "I'm just wanting you to be very honest and rigorous with yourself. With an impossible goal at the level you've stated, you can't justify weak pathways or distractions. You embrace decision rather than stall it." I could see that he was really thinking about it. "Look," I said, "you have to ask yourself. Do you really want the 10,000 units within three years or do you want the podcast? You probably can't have both unless you can absolutely say the podcast is essential to that goal." He wasn't yet ready to make that decision. Whenever you see a person or business doing many different things, what you see is a complex system that lacks the ability to scale in a meaningful direction. The deeper thing you see is a person or group without clarity of purpose and unwilling to truly define their purpose and objective. In order to create a simple system that can scale, you've got to establish a singular and specific goal or frame. Truth number three, committing to a seemingly impossible goal forces you to redefine who you are, simplify your focus and become the best at what you do. An impossible goal is so high or urgent that almost nothing you're currently doing is relevant and therefore falls below the floor. It's a singular goal that forces out all ineffective pathways and processes. It forces a higher degree of honesty and transparency in all that you do. It forces you to first simplify and then focus solely on the paths and partners that have efficacy to the higher goal. April Graves is a great example of this. April is a high-end photographer and owner of Light Dawn Studios. Before applying the skilling framework, her average large-wall art pieces went for approximately $8,000. In early 2024, April wanted to differentiate herself further from the thousands of other photographers in her market. She began exploring different art forms and how she could combine those in a mixed media format with her photography. Oil painting really stood out to her and she decided to study and develop her skills there. In Q4 of 2024, April joined our training program and learned the skilling framework. Before joining, she had successfully signed two oil painted photography commissions. While an exciting achievement, this was a very small percentage of her business at the time. April decided to set the goal of raising her average commission from $8,000 to $10,000, but then quickly realized this linear goal wasn't strong enough to change her system in process. So she raised the goal of having the average commission of her business be $15,000 before the end of 2024, within 90 days. At the time, this felt impossible to her. The immediate effect of setting this single impossible goal was, in April's own words, I had far more clarity and peace. The byproduct of the goal was that she could no longer do the dozens of different photography forms and sizes she offered. At that price point, she could no longer cater to a wide variety of clients. She felt she could only sell one concept, her new oil painted photographs. Thus, the new goal forced her to simplify her business model and stop offering her many previous product offerings. The same day she set that goal, April secured her first $15,000 commission within two months, over 50% of her life. revenue was oil-painted photography. She was no longer offering her former concepts, as she explained to me in a follow-up interview. I have spent much of my professional career seeking ways to improve both my art and my business skills, attending conferences in my industry, along with consuming book after book and eventually hiring a coach. The coach I had encouraged me and my team to set goals for each genre of photography that we worked within. At the time, I had many different types of portrait options and sizes, from fairy-tell sessions that encompassed fairies, angels, aviators, princesses, and unicorns, to family sessions, headshots, and high school seniors. By setting goals for each session type, I was essentially saying that I would charge X dollars for this type and Y dollars for the next. I was spreading myself in my team thin and optimizing for many goals. For instance, I had an annual goal to photograph 20 fairy sessions. I also had prospecting goals, such as 100 portrait sessions. I had a goal for each aspect of the business. By changing to optimize for one goal, the $15,000 average sell with a mixed media piece at the core of the sale, I no longer have to set my numbers based on session type. That one goal simplified everything in my business. In simplifying her business model from dozens of products to one, April reframed her business and far more clearly redefined herself in what she offered. Rather than a photographer, it was more accurate to define herself as an artist, and she quickly began to be seen that way by others, even highly reputable artists in her Chicago area. During that interview, I asked April how changing her goal improved her process. She replied, "My process improved dramatically. It felt so much more authentic. I've been able to be a lot more thoughtful about who I work with. I'm far clear about what I'm offering and why it's unique and special. I was confusing people with too many options. I'm able to go so much deeper into the process with those I work with, and I simply enjoy what I'm creating a lot more. Charging the higher fee really pushes my creativity and the standards of my work, and I've gotten so much better at what I do in just two months. It's not even comparable." By setting a much higher goal, one that she initially felt impossible. April reframed who she was and what she did in a much clearer and more specialized way. She became far more defined in her work, and she could more clearly say, "We do this, not we do these 20 things." If you're doing several competing things, you're undefined. If you're undefined, you have a complex system that can't scale. If you have a complex system that can't scale, your work is far from world-class. In Seth Goden's book The Dip, Goden explains the importance of becoming the best in the world at what you do. The returns are 10 times or more for being number one versus being number 10 in most domains. Goden explains. To be the best in the world, you've got to eliminate all the noise in your life, what Goden calls dead ends. You stop optimizing dead ends that shouldn't exist, and instead, you go through the dip of mastering what will make you the best in the world at what you do. See the illustration on complex versus simple systems in the PDF. Mistake number four, pursuing and even hitting the wrong goal. Optimizing for the wrong things is just as ineffective as optimizing for many things and may even be more destructive. Given that our psychological reality, as well as the systems we create are based on our goals, it's vital that we select the right goal. If you have too many competing goals, you'll have a complex system that can't meaningfully scale, but will instead stagnate. If you choose the wrong goal, you'll scale in the wrong direction. A prime example of the latter is Steve Ballmer, who was CEO of Microsoft from 2000 to 2014. Despite having much of the technology in-house, they would eventually become the iPhone. Ballmer optimized Microsoft for increasing shareholder value. He did this by defending and prioritizing their Windows products. In 2007, when the iPhone came out, Ballmer even laughed, stating, "There is no chance the iPhone is going to get any significant market share, no chance." He succeeded in his aim, increasing annual revenues from 25 to 70 billion dollars, as well as increasing net income by 215 percent to 23 billion dollars. Yet it's been noted even by himself that he was likely optimizing for the wrong thing, and that despite succeeding in his aim, it likely cost Microsoft 5x to 10x what they could have gained. The market value of Microsoft dropped from $600 billion in 2000 to $350 billion in 2014. Under Ballmer's leadership, the overall value of the company stagnated as the company failed to make key shifts in mobile computing. In 2014, after Ballmer stepped down, Satya Nadella became CEO. Nadella shifted Microsoft's focus back to growth, focusing on cloud computing, AI and service-based subscriptions. By leading in these markets, Microsoft's market value has nearly 10x, now valued at over $2 trillion. Key point, choose the right metric to optimize for, or even if you succeed in your aim, it will have been a very costly success. Please refer to the market summary image for Microsoft from 2000 to 2014 in the PDF. Truth number four, committing fully to the right impossible goal leads to the most innovative processes and the highest form of leadership. Bringing this conversation full circle, we will detail some insights from Josh Wateskin, a globally recognized chess prodigy and learning expert. During a conversation with Dr. Andrew Huberman about the neuroscience of performance, Josh shared his regret in confusing many people about this subject. As he stated, one of the things I feel badly about is, when I wrote the art of learning, I spoke a lot about process and outcome and it had a big impact in the chess world. Then what happened was there were generations of parents who had young kid chess players who would go to compete and their parents would say it doesn't matter if you win or lose, all that matters is the process. Wateskin then explained both the contradiction of this, all that matters is the process and the confusion it generated. It was a contradiction because it was dishonest. Of course, the outcome mattered. These were kids at elite chess tournaments. If it didn't matter, then why do all the training and why compete at all? From Wateskin's perspective, the parents actually cared so much that they feared the effects of pushing their own desires for success on their children. For the kids, the confusion came from the fact that in order to compete at the absolute highest level, they had to fully commit themselves to winning. Wateskin shared his true feelings on the subject. Yes, the process matters a lot, but he feared many people get overly attached to a particular method or identity. He further explained, "If we don't care about the results, the process doesn't work. It's by being all in to something bigger that your process becomes both effective and sometimes even innovative." The research on impossible goals is clear. For an impossible or even challenging goal to be effective, it must be outcome or performance-based as opposed to learning or process-based. It is by fully committing and trying to solve a tangible goal, such as putting a man on the moon or running a four-minute mile that an individual or organization can both develop and realize the best process. Not only do impossible goals lead to the best process, but they also create the best teamwork. As Stephen Kerr, former Chief Learning Officer at General Electric and Goldman Sachs stated, "If done right, a stretch target gets your people to perform in ways they never imagined possible. It's a goal that, by definition, you don't know how to reach. You might, for instance, ask people to cut costs by half or reduce product development time from years to months in order to find dramatically new ways of doing business." Concluding this section on clarifying the science of goals, human perception and behavior are driven by goals. Human systems and their outcomes are driven by goals. The quality of our process and results comes down to the quality of our goals and our level of commitment to them. If you have conflicting and competing goals, you'll have a complex system that can't scale. If you're trying to justify too many competing priorities, you're not facing the hard truth that you're operating below the floor. If you have the wrong goal, you'll scale in the wrong direction. When you have the right impossible goal, it will simplify your focus and enable you to bypass the noise and distractions that would slow your growth. Conclusion. Playing to win versus playing to play. The heart of strategy is the answer to two fundamental questions. Where will you play and how will you win there? Ag. Laffley, former CEO of PNG, in playing to win how strategy really works. In 2004, investor and entrepreneur Nick Cacunis and his wife went to dinner at Trio an upscale restaurant 30 minutes outside of Chicago. Nick was very informed and interested in the restaurant industry and loved going to really good restaurants. Though Trio was already established as an award-winning and excellent restaurant, Nick was shocked by the food being presented to him that night. It was elegant, beautiful, delicious. Some of the best and most inspiring food he'd experienced and it wasn't what he was expecting. from Trio. What's going on?" Nick asked his waiter, speaking of the radically high and innovative level of the food being served. "We've got this kid from the French laundry and he's blowing our minds." As Nick explains it, speaking literally, not figuratively, Trio was just the best restaurant in the world at that time and nobody knew it. That night, as he often did, Grant Acquits, the young executive chef, went out to greet some of the patrons. When he got to their table and asked Nick and his wife, "How was everything?" Nick replied, "If you ever want to open a restaurant of your own, I would like to help you." Grant had grown up in Michigan making basic dishes in his parents' diners. He had an increased interest in adding flair and uniqueness to the dishes, but was told, "Food should be cheap and fast." Wanting to take his food to different places, he enrolled at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York. After culinary school, Grant worked for a time at Charlie Trotters, one of the top restaurants in the United States. He didn't like the hostile and backstabbing environment at Trotters, so he got a job at the French laundry in California, a three Michelin star restaurant, and among the top in the United States. Though he loved and learned an enormous amount from Thomas Keller, the chef at the French laundry, over the next few years, it became clear to Grant that he needed to move on again. He really wanted to push the creative boundaries of food and was finding that his expression was limited. That's when Grant moved to Trio, where he was the executive chef. Grant took it from an already award-winning restaurant to something special, getting rare awards. That's when he met Nick. Four days after meeting in Trio, Nick got an email from Grant at 5.30 a.m. saying, "If you're serious, I'd like to talk to you about this." Nick woke up his wife and said, "We're going to build a restaurant with Grant." While googling potential logos for the restaurant, Grant came across the Alineas symbol, and as he looked up the meaning, it was perfect for the experience he wanted to create, a new train of thought. They decided to call the restaurant Alinea. The whole philosophy of the restaurant would be, "This is new, and it's new, and it's new again." The goal would be shocking and surprising the guests at every turn, from how they entered the restaurant to every element of the experience. Though Nick was a businessman and investor, admittedly, he didn't envision Alineas potential. He saw in Grant rare talent and ability, but assumed their venture would be a one-year thing, as most restaurants don't make it much further. Yet, in his words, it became evident to me that it was more important than I thought it was. For several months before opening, they acquired a location for Alinea and began the interior design. Grant selected a top-tier staff and worked on the innovative menu they'd begin with. Before opening, he told his staff, "Everybody just needs to believe the fact that we're about to open the best restaurant in the country, and anything less will be a failure." A week later, they opened. The first night, the most important food critics in the country sat in the dining room, in Grant's words, "On Night One." They got three pages in the New York Times two days after they opened. The top food critic in the world called Grant and said, "We've selected you for the top restaurant in the country." Alinea also jumped into the top 50 restaurants in the entire world. All of this almost immediately upon opening. This wasn't an accident. They weren't just testing the waters. Grant came out swinging from the beginning. His intention and commitment were clear. They were operating from the beginning as the best restaurant in the country. Anything less would be a failure as he stated. The goal shapes the process. Consider Tom Brady. He, unlike the other NFL quarterbacks, was far more committed to winning Super Bowls. Of course, it may be assumed that every quarterback is optimizing for winning Super Bowls, but that's not actually true. Most quarterbacks, when you truly dissect it, are optimizing for other things, whether that be money, fame, personal stats, etc. Maya Angelou famously advised, "When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time." All you have to do is watch what people do to know what they are optimizing for. Their words will often tell you the opposite. Sure, NFL quarterbacks may all love the game, but they aren't playing the same game. Because Brady was committed to winning as many Super Bowls as possible, he filtered and played the game differently from other quarterbacks. His process and system were very different. Despite easily being able to be the highest paid quarterback, he actively chose a much lower salary for himself. He did this to enable his team to invest more in the quality of his offensive line, as well as the backup offensive line. Brady knew that to win Super Bowls in a elite offensive line was key. Yet he also knew that if he, as the quarterback, absorbed a huge percentage of the team's salary cap that they couldn't have a quality backup offensive line as well. He felt that having incredible backups was essential because linemen regularly get injured, and an injured lineman can cost you a game or a season. Additionally, because his goal was to win as many Super Bowls as possible, longevity became a part of his process, far more intensely than perhaps any other quarterback. Brady's health and nutrition regime have become mainstream as they've enabled him to play at an elite level until age 45. He won his seventh Super Bowl with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at age 43. Brady fully focused on one goal, winning Super Bowls. His commitment to such a high goal enabled him to play chess while the other quarterbacks and teams played checkers. His high goal produced an extremely high floor. If you weren't serious about winning, you could go play for another team. There wasn't any messing around with Tom. His goal shaped his process, and his process was fundamentally different from the other NFL quarterbacks who optimized many things that from Tom's frame shouldn't exist. In the Pulitzer Prize-winning book, On Grand Strategy, Dr. John Lewis Gattis explains that theory serves practice, and practice corrects theory. All of us have a theory. That theory is our frame or perception, which is based on our own biases and goals, and directly shapes our decisions and actions. Put simply, your theory or thesis is the future you're actively creating. What you believe, why you believe it, the goals you pursue as a result, and the path and process you take. The power of a better future is that, if you let it, it allows you to look more honestly and critically at what you're now doing. Though what you're now doing may be good, the bigger future invites you to stop, most of that, and focus on something better. Benjamin Franklin famously said, "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." Putting adequate energy into your frame or goal determines everything that occurs downstream. You'll prevent and save yourself from years or decades of wasted energy by committing to a much higher goal, which will immediately free you from all ineffective paths and processes. Of this, Dr. Stephen Covey explained, "It becomes obvious that if we want to make relatively minor changes in our lives, we can perhaps appropriately focus on our attitudes and behaviors. But if we want to make significant quantum change, we need to work on our basic paradigms. We can spend weeks, months, even years laboring, trying to change our attitudes and behaviors and not even begin to approach the phenomenon of change that occurs spontaneously when we see things differently." The goal determines the process, what is signal and what is noise. The more effectively you are at framing your future, the more powerful your process will be in the present. This is scientific fact, and it cannot be denied. Journal prompts and applications. What is the goal shaping everything you're now doing? Looking honestly and critically at your existing business, is your system simple or complex? Do you have multiple competing goals or one singular purpose driving everything you're doing? What impossible goal would enable you to simplify your system and focus in the right way?