What if the Mayans were right about 2012?

Focus on a Few Things

Posted by on Jan 3, 2012 in Focus, Last Year Challenge | 0 comments

Neal Campbell Brands Shows

Before Larry Page consulted with Steve Jobs and took over as CEO of Google, what was Google NOT working on?

Search was the main business, but Google has this policy allowing employees to work on whatever they want for a certain amount of time. The freedom brings a lot of new ideas to Google’s table. If you ask me, it was working just fine for Google, but Larry Page asked Steve Jobs and Steve told Larry to focus.

“We talked a lot about focus … The main thing I stressed was focus. Figure out what Google wants to be when it grows up. It’s all over the map. What are the five products you want to focus on? Get rid of the rest, because they’re dragging you down. They’re turning you into Microsoft. They’re causing you to turn out products that are adequate but not great.”

We’ve seen Google do just that. We’ve seen Google simplify and work on just a few things. They’ve embraced design in addition to engineering. Google products look good for the first time ever.

During the production of GeekBrief.TV, I dreamed about building a podcast network. That was a back-burner dream for two reasons:

  1. We started the show with no experience and it took 16-18 hour days for the first two and a half years to get the show to start looking a little like I initially imagined it. The 10,000 hour rule applied in a very real way. I did the math and right about at the point where I had been working on producing the show for 10,000 hours, it started to get easy. That was a very cool moment.
  2. Our deal with Mevio limited what we were able to do without them. Luria wasn’t fond of Adam Curry, who is one of my heroes. Love for me meant going with her instinct more than mine. She was the one who dealt with them and the business part of the show, so I could spend my time creating. That was cool for me because I got to work on what I loved, but it resulted in a less than smooth relationship with Mevio at times. Luria and I both struggled to understand Mevio focus on Madison Avenue sponsorship deals when we had people begging to advertise on GBTV.
Now, I’m in the middle of nowhere with the need to start somewhere. I’m taking Steve Jobs’ advice to Larry Page to focus on just a few things rather than trying to juggle all that I want to do. I want to build a podcast network, produce Bacon.TV and found The Bacon Museum, write books, teach production to aspiring chefs at the Culinary Institute of America, produce the video version of WTF with Marc Maron, produce video for National Public Radio,work with the Food Network on new media productions, move to L.A. to work with comedians, move to San Francisco or New York to do my idea of the video version of what Mike Arrington did with TechCrunch, write for a sit-com, and my want-to-do list keeps on going!
In my head following the divorce, my brain bounced around with a heartfelt desire to do all these different things. Bringing focus down to just a few starts with this LastYear.TV project. I’m pretending the Mayans are right about 2012 being our last year as inspiration to stop bouncing around wanting to accomplish 50 things.
Maybe I’m wrong about this, but I tend to believe almost everyone has potential success inside. I believe we know what we should be doing to let success out into the wild. Most people don’t do what we know we should be doing. We end up living fine lives that may satisfy enough to keep us going. Having experienced what it’s like to have a dream come somewhat true, I don’t want to settle for a fine life. I want to get back to an amazing life.
There are three things that work together to make a dream come true:
  1. laser focus
  2. hard work and long hours
  3. connection with people who will help
I hope some folks are joining me in 2012 to focus on making a dream happen! It’s going to take hard work and long hours, and I have to overcome my weakest point on that list of three. I’m not great at connecting with people unless there is a screen in between.

 

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