Hello to 38 subscribers of this newsletter. Last week’s issue received 124 views (third best result ever), and 4 new people signed up.
In this issue
Cathedral Thinking
Some interesting things I read/watched/listened to lately
The holiday season has caught me completely off guard, so for this week's issue, I decided to republish one of my older posts that I wrote before Morning Walk. Hopefully, most of you haven't read that one yet.
📝 Cathedral Thinking
The monument in this photo is called the Königsberg Cathedral. I’m not usually the one who enjoys that kind of architecture or visiting old buildings at all. But during my visit to Königsberg Cathedral this May, something interesting happened.
While my friends went out with the tour group, I stayed on the ground floor and started reading about the building’s history just to pass the time. The construction of the new cathedral began in 1330 and was largely completed by 1380. What struck me the most is that when they decided to erect a new cathedral, they knew it would take about 60–80 years to build.
Now, just try to grasp this number.
Yes, 60–80 years is not that big of a deal in terms of architecture, especially if we are talking about medieval architecture. For instance, the construction of the famous Cologne Cathedral took about 300 years.
But it never occurred to me that behind every project like this, there were real people. People who decided that they wanted this project to be made. People who committed to that project no matter its lengthiness.
– Hey, let’s build this awesome thing, shall we?
– Um… yeah, sure. But.. you know… it would take maybe 80 years to build. Are you sure this is the most important thing to do right now?
– You kidding me!? Absolutely!
– Okay… but, you know… we are like 30 years old now. We probably won’t be even here when it’s done.
– Ummm… so what’s your point? We shouldn’t do this?
– No, no, of course not.
They knew that project was larger than their life. That’s why they had to do it anyway.
A few days before my visit to Königsberg Cathedral, I reviewed my backlog at work, trying to set my team's OKRs for the next quarter. I remembered that almost everything that would take more than six months to implement wouldn't make the cut. My goal-setting was wired to short- or mid-term thinking, mostly because I was scared of committing to anything for much longer.
That evening I discussed it with my friends, asking them if they had ever had a project in their lives that they were willing to commit to for 20 years. They were puzzled, and no one had an answer.
It turns out that there is a term for this, and it’s in fact called “cathedral thinking”:
Cathedral thinking is the practice of envisaging and embarking on projects with time horizons stretching decades and even centuries into the future, just like medieval cathedral builders who began despite knowing they were unlikely to see construction finished within their own lifetimes.
Well. I want more cathedral thinking in my life. Not just thinking of missions and how this product can transform lives in 20 to 30 years but actually not being frightened to death to commit to something for that long.
👓 Things I've been reading/watching/enjoying
Taxes that gorillas pay
Great thread on six strategies that might work for small startups competing with big tech.
If you’re a Startup trying to compete with a Megacorp—the 800-pound Gorilla in the space—you need to understand the tax inherent to being a Gorilla. And then you need to make that tax work against the Gorilla—with your product's positioning & features.
Some crypto x healthcare ideas
I’m learning more and more about health tech and MedTech these days and found this excellent newsletter that covers these topics pretty well. This article is a fun take at guessing how healthcare could leverage crypto technology. Decentralized EMRs, Insurance DAOs, and Drug Picking Models.
What’s your deepest insight about teamwork?
Gibson Biddle (former VP of Product at Netflix) writes about teamwork. Hint: it’s not about getting along with others and building consensus.
Rather than require folks to get along, high-performance teams depend on team members who ask hard questions and actively point out when they disagree with each other.
That’s it for today. Thanks for reading. Until next week 👋🏻