This past week, I received a note very similar to the one below:
I wish I didn't get emails like this every week, or even every day. Yet it happens.
And I wish I didn't send emails like this every week, or even every day. Yet it happens.
I've been called out recently by clients, my board, and friends for doing this.
Usually, the note I get back is something like:
Ha! AI. Pat, this doesn't sound like you.
Or silence with a kind follow-up later. A request for more authenticity.
ONE IDEA I’M SITTING WITH
In college, I studied interpersonal communications. When I switched to this major from business, my parents thought I would never make a decent living. What am I going to do with a degree that studies how humans engage with one another?
Something absolutely drilled into our heads was the SMCR model for communication. When humans communicate, there is always a sender, message, channel, and receiver.
Sender → Message → Channel → Receiver
The channel is the medium our messages travel through. And when there's static in the channel, the receiver doesn't get the message the sender intended. Think of your internet cutting in and out on a Zoom call. The words are right. The message still doesn't land.
Here's what I've been realizing.
AI has become static in the channel.
Our emails sound too perfect.
Our follow-up notes to calls are too rigid.
Our own communication style isn't showing up.
And when that happens, the message we intended never quite reaches the receiver. The channel is getting in the way of what we hope people receive.
We all feel it when it happens to us. It makes our spidey senses go up. And it prevents us from fully hearing or understanding the messages sent to us.
Early in my life, I was obsessed with being authentic, probably to a fault.
I read the book Leading with a Limp from the psychologist Dan Allender. It set the tone for how I would lead. Authentic leaders are trusted more, allowing companies to "move at the speed of trust" (a quote that comes from the aptly named book The Speed of Trust).
Over time, due to a variety of circumstances, what was once a genuine desire to be authentic, and actions that followed, has eroded.
Our businesses needed us to be strong.
Our employees wanted to know the direction they were going.
Our boards were (appropriately) pushing us.
Our families were looking for clarity and reassurance.
And while most of you reading this would consider yourselves authentic, in practice we continue to feel the pull into less authenticity and more projected strength.
For many of us, this shows up in the messages we send.
We believe that in order for our messages to be received, they must be perfect.
They must look strong.
They must include all of the information we desire to share.
Because doing that will protect us, or help us move faster, or get more done. Which can be self-protection, as we tell ourselves that doing more and doing more perfectly is the best way to run our businesses and lives.
Lately, I'm reminding myself that my messages don't have to be perfect.
That my messages don't have to go through Claude.
They don't have to perfectly recap a call.
I am writing to humans and receiving messages from humans. Grace can and should be extended to others in the daily online interactions where most of us live. And we can and should extend that same grace to ourselves.
We aren't perfect, and we all know that.
We shouldn't expect our messages to be either.
With love and trust,
Pat
TWO QUESTIONS I’M ASKING
Who is funding venture accelerators, studios, and funds in the AI era?
We are hosting our first Venture Summit, bringing together the capital partners who invest directly in venture accelerators, studios, and hubs. I want to make sure we capture the full breadth of who should be in the room, and I'm afraid we're missing a group or type of funder. If you know someone who funds venture organizations, or you are one, I'd love to hear who you think belongs in that room.
How in the world do I prepare myself for a daughter entering middle school?
(For those outside the States, this is what you might call secondary or intermediate school.) I want to be a good, thoughtful parent in this next era of parenting. And I feel unprepared. Would love any thoughts.
THREE THINGS I’M READING
1) I remember when my friend Martin taught me how to drive his 2002 Honda Civic with a stick shift in a parking lot in Newark, Delaware. Looks like this is about to be a lost skill.
3) In the United States, new business applications have grown dramatically over the last five years. Census data shows the rise has been driven by startups not likely to hire workers. It's also something that could cause massive social issues, as new startups were the biggest driver of net new job creation through the early 2000s.
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