Aim Unreasonably High

The experts tell us we're more likely to succeed when we set reasonable goals. That's how, they say, we lose weight, learn a new language, or build a new habit. After all, we can't go from sedentary to climbing K2, right?

But there are a few problems with reasonable goals.

For one, they don't require us to stretch. Reasonable goals work because they ask us to tweak what we’re doing and be satisfied with incremental progress. But that’s not nearly enough to help us do anything truly important or transformational.

For that, we need to get well beyond reasonable. We need goals that force us to take a new look at what we’re doing now, what resources are available, what allies are out there, and what obstacles are in our way. It’s a lousy metaphor, but unreasonable goals cast us in a completely different movie.

And if you’re thinking with other people, reasonable goals make for boring, unproductive meetings. You have to aim big to wake people up and activate their imaginations. Daniel Burnham, the architect behind the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago, said in the sexist language of his time: "Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood."

Here's what I mean by unreasonable goals. Don't feed more people; eradicate hunger altogether. Don’t increase participation in a recycling program; stop the use of plastics. Don't lessen suffering; help victims live extraordinary lives.

You may say this is irresponsible. It’s not. Irresponsible is remaining stuck in a rut and being satisfied with incremental progress when people’s lives are in the balance.

When I had a post there, the University of Southern California had the largest school of social work in the world. And it wasn't particularly close. It had students from nearly every state and produced way more than its share of the country's social workers. For the school of social work, recruiting more students — or virtually any reasonable goal — would have produced negligible results.

So we aimed higher, way higher. We tried to figure out how we might make social workers as hot a commodity on the job market as MBAs. Of course that was presumptuous. After all, who were we to try and change what the world thought of social workers?

But thinking like that led us to create the world's first doctorate in social innovation, which has produced hundreds of graduates doing vitally important work.

Just Start Running

There's a phenomenon called the Bannister Effect. It's named after the first guy who ran a mile in under four minutes. Before he did it in 1954, nobody could do it. After he did it, runners all over the world could do it. So what changed? It wasn't their shoes, their diets, or their training. It was their belief — if Bannister could do it, it was doable.

We are conditioned to wait for permission, to wait for someone to tell us it's okay to be brilliant, to take risks, or to disrupt the status quo. But here’s the big secret: There's nobody there to give us permission.

The world, our institutions, and even our markets are more anarchic than we think and are held together largely by everyone's willingness to play along. Even in the most structured, rule-bound environments, there's no one with the authority to decide who gets to have a breakthrough or change the game. There's no magic moment when the stars align and the Universe says, "Go ahead and disrupt." The opportunity is always there.

Some years ago, I decided to improve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. No one asked me to do it. In fact, nobody at the UN had any idea who I was. But I saw a need and decided to try and fill it.

I could have tried to find a person somewhere in that massive bureaucracy to give me permission. But there isn't anybody like that. And if there were, that person would probably be so committed to the status quo that they'd be unwilling to let me.

It's better not to ask. Just go.