Ranjay Gulati

And it comes from research by a University of Michigan professor, Carl Weick.

And he was studying firefighters.

And what he found is that firefighters don't just run into a building.

That's reckless, right?

They're not running into a building.

What they do is they observe the building from outside.

They see how fast the fire is going.

They try to find out, does somebody need to be rescued?

They see if there's anything combustible there.

And they form initial hypotheses.

Then they go into the building.

As soon as they go into the building, they gather more information.

Each step more they go in, they are updating their belief.

It's what we call acting your way into knowing.

Most of us want to know before we act.

That's why we say, let's be deliberate, let's be cautious.

Sometimes there's no way to know without taking action.

So if you're making a big decision, sometimes you break it down into smaller decisions.

And each small step you take, you're taking it in order to learn more.

So sometimes you have to act your way into knowing.