My 8-year-old son came up to me today, a bit puzzled. "Why don’t I get any mail?" he asked, his eyes wide with curiosity. I smiled, not because of the question, but because of the perspective it gave me. Here he was, already wanting to feel like an adult, waiting for his mailbox to fill up with important things. I could’ve said, “You’re just a kid; you don’t need mail yet.” But instead, I saw an opportunity to teach him about patience and the process of growing up.
“Why don’t I get mail?” It’s a simple question, but it’s rooted in something bigger. It’s about responsibility, about feeling like you’re part of something, about wanting to skip steps and get straight to the good stuff. So, I told him, “You’ll get mail when you have more places to deal with, more things to manage.” But that wasn’t the heart of the lesson. The heart of it was this: don’t underestimate yourself, but also, don’t rush the process.
It’s easy to want to leap ahead, to skip the steps that feel like they’re in the way of where you want to be. But skipping steps doesn’t make you grow faster; it often makes you stumble.
This is true in life, and it’s especially true in business. Think about it. How many times have business owners wanted to rush through the process? They want the customers, the success, the recognition — but they forget that every business, like every kid, has to go through its stages. You can't jump from setting up your shop to becoming an industry leader overnight. Each step builds on the last, and if the foundational steps aren’t strong, the whole thing crumbles.
When you're building a business, it's easy to get caught up in chasing the shiny things: more sales, more recognition, more growth. But every successful company has one thing in common — they took the steps. They made sure the first steps were solid before moving on to the next. The emails start coming in, the phone starts ringing, but only when you’ve created a system that works.
It's like Seth Godin's Purple Cow theory. Standing out is great, but you can’t be remarkable by rushing. The remarkable businesses are the ones that build slowly and steadily, creating something real, something worth talking about. They’re the ones that don’t skip steps — they master them.
So, whether it’s my son waiting for his mailbox to fill up or a business owner waiting for their company to take off, the lesson is the same: Don’t skip steps. Build the foundation first. The rest will follow.
Comments