The First Step Matters More Than All the Certainties
During a recent workshop I facilitated with an executive team, the director admitted with a hint of hesitation:
“I’d like to launch this project, but I’m still waiting for everything to be clear before I get started.”
He was talking about a crucial internal reorganization, one that would shape the future of the company. Behind his words, I recognized a familiar fear: the fear of uncertainty.
That’s when I shared with him a quote from Mike Horn that I particularly love:
“To get moving, you only need 5% of the answers to your questions. The remaining 95% come along the way. Those who wait for 100% of the answers before starting never leave the ground.”
This quote resonated in the room. The silence that followed spoke volumes: everyone on the team knew they had once been paralyzed, waiting for the “perfect” condition before taking action.
In business, we often want to secure everything: the exact budget, the detailed plan, the ideal resources, the validation of every stakeholder… But the truth is, action precedes clarity.
I then invited the team to reflect: What if we took the first step, even a small one, instead of staying stuck?
In another workshop, a group of managers had been postponing the launch of an internal innovation program for months, claiming they “still didn’t have all the answers.” Together, we worked on three key pillars:
Managing uncertainty,
The power of the collective—because alone you’ll never have all the answers, but together you can build them,
The ability to move forward with only a minimum of information.
Three months later, despite ongoing doubts, they launched their first prototype. Not because they suddenly knew everything, but because they had learned to test, adjust, and transform discomfort into learning.
Corporate coaching is not about giving ready-made solutions.
It’s about guiding leaders and teams to:
Dare to move forward with 5% certainty,
Turn discomfort into learning,
Find the confidence to take the first step.
Because in the end, it’s not clarity that leads to action… it’s action that creates clarity.
And you—how many projects are still sitting in your drawers, simply because you’re waiting to have all the answers?
#CorporateCoaching #Leadership #Management #Inspiration #PersonalDevelopment #Mindset #Innovation