Tag: action

Taking Steps Forward Through Ambiguity (6-10-26)

We are now on week 3 of lessons I’ve learned from working in a central role.  Last week was about leadership and power.  This week is about the importance of taking steps forward when you’re mired in ambiguity.

I’ve been in a few central roles in my career.  Generally, these roles are pretty ambiguous.  For example, in my career role I’m supposed to lead innovation and lead us to the future.  Let’s be honest.  I have no idea what that means.  I can’t say with certainty what will happen.  Recently, I’ve been sharing thoughts on what a future agentic insights ecosystem could look like.  If more than 40% of that ends up being true, I’ll consider that a miracle.  All of this complexity and ambiguity can feel overwhelming.  It can stop me from taking action.

Let’s make some connections.  Have you ever felt paralyzed by ambiguity?  It’s easy to get stuck thinking and thinking and overthinking every possible angle and every possible contingency.  While that thinking might make us feel like we are doing something, the truth is that thinking isn’t always the same thing as taking action.

I don’t with certainty the exact coordinates of where we need to go in the future.  I do have a north star though.  I do have things I believe will likely continue to be true.  The value of data will continue to increase in a world of AI.  Getting data AI ready will continue to grow in importance.  Having tools to help get the most of the data will be critical.  As there are more and more tools, being clear on the tool and the problem they solve will be more important than ever. 

I know that if I take action toward solving those problems, I’ll likely be walking in the right direction.  I’m humble enough to know I can always redirect along the way.  Instead of being paralyzed, I’ll keep taking steps and keep taking steps and keep taking steps until we finally get to that future.

The challenge- How will you keep taking steps forward through ambiguity?

By the way, the picture is from a Tough Mudder last year.  I crawl through mud as a hobby, which explains a lot about how weird I am 😉

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Chess and Translating Conceptual Thinking into Action (2-18-26)

Last week we kicked off a series about how my kids play chess and examined how we can change the rules.  This week is about translating conceptual thinking to action.

Cam and I sat down to play chess and he talked me through the different variations in the rules he made up.  We would bring pieces back from the dead, have backstabber pieces where we controlled opponent pieces, and new pieces that would block parts of the board.  As he explained them, I thought to myself that this was all relatively straight forward.  Then, we started playing and Cam crushed me!  It was then I realized that while I might have understood the rules, I was having difficult translating that to action.  It took me several rounds before I began to internalize how I could apply these concepts differently to ultimately win.  

Let’s make some connections.  Have you ever had an experience like this at work?  Maybe it looked like this.  You had a beautiful process diagram, and everything felt like it made sense.  Then, once you started executing the process you realized you were still unsure of how it worked.  Or maybe it looks like this.  You conceptually know how to leverage AI, but once you got to the tools you didn’t really know how to put that into action.  I experience this all the time.  I’ve found that it’s easy to get lost in overthinking.  It’s easy to swirl around frameworks and process maps, talking about them until you feel everything is perfect.  It’s important to do the thinking AND it’s also important to jump in as soon as you can to apply these concepts.  The application is what forces you to turn those ideas into action, because thinking can only get you so far.

The challenge: How will you translate conceptual understanding into action?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry