Scooter Lessons for Leaders

Are you looking at the obstacles or the gaps?

Recently, I learnt to ride a scooter.

Along the way you get no shortage of life-preserving guidance. But one bit’s particularly salient:

“The bike will go where you’re looking.”

So as you zigzag along a line of traffic cones, it’s not the cones you look at, but the gaps between them. If you look at the cone, you’ll hit it.

When you’re out on the street, the ‘cones’ have sharper edges, and they often move about. Out there, risk is all around you. From the traffic to the road surface to the pedestrians.

And you need to be mighty aware of all of it. But to negotiate it safely, you’re not focused on the people or the potholes.

You need to be looking at the gaps. At the smooth bits in the road. At the furthest spot around the corner (not the corner itself).

As a leader, your business will go where you’re looking too. So are your eyes fixed on the obstacles in your way? Or are you looking at the gaps that will steer you past them?

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