Tech is Like Sports - Good is the Enemy of Great

It pains me to admit this, but my beloved Nittany Lions are content with being just good if it takes the risk of being really bad off the table. It's not even their fault, the incentives are structured that way.  We lost in frustrating fashion last night against the #1 team in the country.  The players never gave up and we were in it until the end. But I don’t believe we are ready to really compete with best.

Penn State has another double digit win season under its belt, beating up on mediocre opponents while losing to the best teams.  We’ll host a playoff game and maybe we can even win a game in a White Out situation. We obviously can't be Oregon or OSU. And I don't care what Alabama or Clemson’s record is, I still don’t want either of them rolling into Happy Valley.

A 10 win season equals revenue. They might not win a natty, but they will be profitable. If they swing for the fences and miss, they might end up with a .500 team. That means less revenue, less profit, less job security. Why would an AD swing for the fences and risk striking out when they can keep being just good enough?

One of my favorite real estate sayings is, “Scared money don’t make money.”  It's true in sports and it's true in work. I'm more of a swing for the fences kind of guy because I'd rather try to be great and fail than to settle for just good.

I strike out. A lot. I've made a lot of mistakes building technology. But even when something doesn't pan out like I expected, I learn lessons that help me be better the next time around. 

In 2023, we built an amazing broker tool that nearly cost us our sanity. We stumbled a lot while building it, but we learned more in 6 months of BrokerBurst than we would have learned in two years of traditional development.  We get to apply those lessons when we completely overhaul the borrower experience next year.

If I had settled for good enough, or tried to play it safe, or needed a carefully defined ROI for every last penny, I never would have moved forward. The Penn State approach might have been safer, but we couldn't have ended up with something special. And we wouldn't be aspiring to greatness next year. We would be settling for a 10 win season but wouldn't be playing for the national championship.

Does the incentive system reward swinging for the fences? Or playing it safe? No one gets fired for the deal they didn't do or the tech they didn't implement or the 10 win season. Have I created an incentive system within my own companies that rewards dreaming big or playing it safe? Do I want us to be great or just good enough?

I've decided technology is a lot like sports - scared money don’t make money.  

Or, like the Real Boss loves to say, "Good is the enemy of great."