Escaping the tunnel can be difficult, because organizational structure resists it. Remember the quote from Mark Okerstrom, the CEO of Expedia: “When we create organizations, we’re doing it to give people focus. We’re essentially giving them a license to be myopic.” Focus is both an enemy and an ally. It can accelerate work and make it more efficient, but it puts blinders on people. (Racehorses wear blinders so they’ll ignore distractions and run faster.) When your emphasis is always forward, forward, forward, you never stop to ask whether you’re going in the right direction.
