I once worked with a team that was under a lot of pressure to meet an aggressive timeline. As it often does, the goal felt achievable at first. This optimism is hardly surprising and often the result of how much you don’t know at the start of a project.

As the work starts, everyone starts to learn more about the work. Suddenly, problems begin to emerge, and everyone is wondering where things went wrong. How could we have missed ‘that’ detail when we were starting?

Turn the optimism at the start of a project into realism. Let go of the idea that you know what it’s going to take to succeed. Instead, replace it with the confidence that together you can respond to whatever you learn. After all, it’s all you and your team can ever do.

You’ve got this.