Completions and landings are essential to successful ‘moonshot’ efforts
Moonshots are ambitious, often exploratory projects undertaken without any expectation of near-term profitability or benefit. Investments in these far-reaching endeavors by Google and others in the technology world have led to companies outsideof high-tech aiming high as well.
In mature companies, successful moonshots are often treated like a startup within the larger business. Teams develop their own way of working, often distinct from the broader corporate culture. Operating within this separate environment, teams can identify and produce breakthroughs that would have been unthinkable in the typical business culture.
Landings are mandatory
Greek mythology tells the story of King Sisyphus, whose deceitfulness angered the gods. As punishment, he was condemned to the unending task of rolling an enormous boulder up a steep hill. The boulder always rolled back down before reaching the top. His punishment was an eternity of futile, hopeless labor.
The modern-day parallel may be working on a team that pursues a major initiative with a moving finish line — perpetual “mission creep” — and few or no incremental milestones along the way. When teams stop to assess, celebrate and reset, they learn from their efforts and recognize progress. Endings create a meaningful narrative and context for our work.
Completion points are essential in the pursuit of a moonshot. When you ask people to take on heroic efforts, they must be able to see the finish line and experience progress along the way. Without completion, burnout is inevitable.
A “completion” as defined here isn’t about stopping. It’s about marking the end of a phase, assessing what has happened, recognizing contributions, and moving onward.
The longer the journey, the more segments, breakthroughs and achievements there are to celebrate. Storytellers know that the ending shapes the story. Great leaders understand that where and how they mark completions creates the story arcs for their teams. In your moonshot, consider marking and celebrating these five types of completions:
1. Milestones or points in time
The finish line and time-based milestones create natural points for marking completions. If key milestones have specific dates, amplify their impact by scheduling events to observe them in advance. Put them on the calendar to debrief and celebrate appropriately.
Match the scale of the completion event to the magnitude of the effort. A party is overkill for weekly milestones, but a call or note of acknowledgment may be appropriate. Even if you didn’t meet a milestone, recognize that fact and relaunch the effort toward a next milestone. If a major barrier blocks your progress, turn the milestone completion event into a problem-solving session. If your milestones are few and far between, add markers for other calendar-based completion dates, such asend of year and end of quarter.
2. Breakthroughs or heroic efforts
Take the opportunity to acknowledge and celebrate the work when a team has experienced a breakthrough or completed a heroic effort. For example, you might celebrate when the team signs a partnership or other pivotal deal essential to the project, signs the first large customer or gains positive customer validation. Also, acknowledge the personal breakthroughs that happen as part of a moonshot. If a team event isn’t appropriate, take the individual to lunch or recognize their breakthrough at a meeting.
3. Completions created out of thin air
Sometimes a team engages on a long-haul project with no immediate end in sight. Good leaders recognize when spirits wane and find ways to install completions. Bill, the president of the largest telecommunications company in the Midwest, was leading a yearlong project to reduce the company’s churn rate. The project started with a single, monolithic goal: to drive the churn rate to less than 5 percent. Bill realized that by breaking the effort into smaller chunks, he could maintain momentum and enthusiasm for the project.
Four months into the project, Bill realized that every executive staff meeting was consumed by analyzing the churn numbers. The executives had become obsessed with churn and were neglecting critical issues in the business. He called a company meeting and announced that the company had completed an invented “Phase One,” which he called the “Design and Proof-of-Concept Phase.” He enumerated the accomplishments and acknowledged the contributions of key team members. He then announced Phase Two, focusing on several key indicators that contributed to churn. This simple reframe of the project ignited creativity and participation at all levels, and injected the project with much-needed momentum.
4. Resets
Completion is an excellent way to stop, redirect, and reinitiate efforts to maintain or build enthusiasm for a project that is experiencing turbulence. Transform a missed milestone into a reset by declaring, “That was Phase One, and it’s behind us. Let’s move on to Phase Two.” Take the time to acknowledge and set a course to maintain motivation and demonstrate respect for the effort already expended.
Teams that neglect the reset step may experience a lingering feeling of failure. When you initiate a “reset completion,” include:
- What went well
- What you have learned
- How you will apply what you have learned
5. Closures, big and small
Declaring a planning phase or decision cycle as complete signals people to move on. This strategy is particularly valuable when some people aren’t ready to let go. One CEO we know uses the strategy of calling completions very effectively in meetings and discussions. When a team works together to arrive at a solution through discussion, or when he makes a definitive decision about how to proceed, he will then ask, “OK, is that now complete?” When everyone agrees, the atmosphere shifts in the room. The issue goes from being under consideration to being done, and the discussion then moves on.
Capturing the effect
During scheduled events to mark completions, ask team members and participants to reflect on and share examples of the changes they have noticed in themselves and others. Use the following questions to start people thinking in this direction:
- What changes have you noticed in the way that you work here since we started the moonshot?
- Has this project had a personal impact on you?
- Can you identify any breakthroughs that we have achieved since working on this?
- Have you noticed a significant shift in how you work with other team members?
- Has someone else on the team demonstrated new capabilities or strengths?
- What opportunities are now possible since undertaking this project?
The longer the journey, the more stories there are to capture and moments to celebrate. Completions are vital to the success of your moonshot. By marking completions you boost fuel reserves and keep the team motivated and on course.
This article is excerpted from “The Moonshot Effect: Disrupting Business As Usual.” Copyright ©2016 Lisa Goldman and Kate Purmal. All rights reserved. It is reprinted by permission of Wynnefield Business Press.
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