Building second nature

Praise, how are you today? Sincere apologies for not writing to you yesterday.

I got back from Lagos this morning. Opened the door to a scent of cat food—gosh! I'm still working on a solution. Loki is currently playing with the curtain. I think he's gotten comfortable, to an extent. Jordan, on the other hand, continues to explore new spots in the house.

As I landed at the airport today, I looked out the window during the descent; my eye intent on seeing as we entered down into the clouds.

It took us about 10 minutes to land. Obviously, we couldn't take a nosedive considering we were cruising at 289MPH (I think). But somehow, we always seemed to land right on the runway, and the pilots never overrun the distance available.

They've been trained, yes, but it got me thinking. At a point, it'd no longer be their training anymore. They'd just know how and when to land.

I read an article that said it took 21 days of consistency to build a habit. Well, they're wrong. It definitely doesn't take 21 days. I tried it.

Second nature, I've come to see, is technique honed over a long of period of time; time which varies based on you, Praise.

Note, technique, not training.

You can build a logo, sketch an illustration, make a speech, convince a person, woo a girl as easy as ABC without having to think too much about it.

People with second nature for certain skills find it incredibly hard to answer the question, "how do you do it?" It's why I probably give a generic response to the question, "how do I become better?"

It's not that they do not know. They just can't explain it. I told a friend that the difference between a designer earning less than NGN 100,000 and someone who charges NGN 1,000,000 is knowledge, exposure and technique; with technique being the most important.

You can know how to do that stuff. Information is available online. You can build exposure. But having technique is innate—it's learnt and nurtured.

Check this out.

I read Interbrand's white paper on Making the Business Case for Brand Change for the 6th time on the flight today. I was developing a project overview for a new client.

I find that the structure of their Business Case looked very similar to what Kaplan & Norton wrote about in "The Strategy-Focused Organisation".

Knowledge? Check. I knew what those things meant. Exposure? Check. I wasn't thinking brand strategy like most people did. Technique? No check.

Interbrand infused some extra things like Impact Factor, Brand Index, Brand Valuation, Quantitative Touchpoint Analysis, etc. These are techniques to achieving the same thing.

If Interbrand walks into the same room I just left, they'll leave the client perceiving a higher chance of success with them because of the data they can provide. All I'd have probably done was sakamanje them with buzzwords and other case studies.

Technique is why two designers will have the same idea but build different marks with interesting systems.

What's the point of today's letter? I am sharing with you my new perspective for the second half of the year.

The missing ingredient between where you are now and where you want to be is knowledge, exposure and, most importantly, technique.

Today's the second event for God—Future X with students of the Federal University of Technology Akure, my supposed alma mater.

I am really looking forward to people reaching out from the following schools before the end of the year. Make those introductions please.

• University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) * University of Ibadan (UI) * Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU) * University of Lagos (UNILAG) * Lagos State University (LASU) * University of Ilorin (UNILORIN) * Adeyemi College of Education (ACE) * Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba (AAUA) * University of Port Harcourt (UNIPORT) * Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria (ABU) * Federal University of Technology, Owerri (FUTO) * Federal University of Technology, Minna (FUTMINNA)

Wish me luck.

Ciao.

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