Building a new feature is fun! 😢

This week, I have been thinking a lot about what I do well and what I do poorly.

I know that building new features is fun. I see this in clients and other founders: we get stuck in build mode and assume it is forward progress. More and more, I think build mode is lateral progress. We think it moves us forward, but it’s a sideways movement. The problem is that some of us do not see sales, execution, and outreach as progress.

I think about this as two separate monkeys. I call it my two-monkey problem.

Bear with me.

So, I have a mental image of two monkeys sitting on a branch in a tree, with a huge bundle of ripe bananas above them. One monkey climbs up the tree and can barely pull off one banana, but he eats it. The other monkey looks at it and says, I want all the bananas. So instead of climbing up and getting his single banana, he climbs down to the ground and makes a tool. He gets a sharp rock and shapes it.

I’m the monkey who climbed down.

The monkey who climbed down convinces himself that leaving the bananas was important, and that getting really good at making a tool was equally important. But then, before he climbs back up to get a banana, he has to make a pouch for his tools. So he can climb and drop the tool. Then he realizes he needs a backup tool to get more bananas. Then he may decide to get more bananas in the future if he teaches a class on tool-making to other monkeys.

If you look up in the tree, the other monkey got one banana, then went back up an hour later and got another. He has been doing that the whole time. He has been eating bananas the whole time.

That monkey who doesn’t or cannot make a tool is a salesperson.

And the monkey who climbs down the tree stays at the bottom, convinced that someday he will climb to the top and his tools will make him perfect at getting all the bananas, and that all the other monkeys in all the other trees will think how beautiful and smart and wonderful he is for getting all the bananas with his special tools.

I can feel this monkey thinking. The tools are too important. Too attractive. The tools have to be where the value sits. Right?

I like building features too much. And even when the tool is complete, I will happily stop selling, stop doing outreach, and go code another feature, another optimization. It feels too good. I can feel the dopamine flow when I give in. It’s a heady feeling: this next feature is forward progress, this time (I promise.)

I’m not alone in this, but I think there’s a way out.

Don’t tell the monkey to stop making tools. What you tell them is: here is the plan. For every hour of sales, you get five minutes of build time. If you do twice as many sales, you get twice as much build time. You do not take away the build dopamine. You train them to find the dopamine in the other behavior.

This is a very clear problem when I started building fractional tools. I built it, and I figured everyone would see its value. And then it didn’t happen. Features are not valuable. More features do not mean more value.

When I feel the urge to make tools return, I remind myself that sales is a valuable skill to acquire. It might not feel equal, but it is. I have to trust. I have to remind the monkey that balance is important. I remind the monkey that one banana a day adds up to 30 in a month. Even better, I remind you that getting all the bananas in one trip up the tree is a bad idea. What monkey could safely climb down carrying the entire bundle of bananas? (silly little monkey)

Finally, I reminded the monkey that going down the tree to make a tool is moving away from the bananas. Bananas taste good; they pay the mortgage far more effectively than new tools/features do.

Common Problems?

I am 100% sure I am not the only person convincing himself he is doing sales when he is actually sitting at the bottom of the tree making more features. I have seen this almost across the board. Even worse, investors know that if they invest in a CTO or technical founder who cannot sell, they may never be able to get him to sell.

My How - This week, I launched a lead magnet. I compiled all the Zoom transcripts from two years of conversations with solo operators. I distilled the lessons into a 12 email series. Free, of course. One insight a week. I figure who would say no? I then shared it across some founders’ communities.

It worked!

I got 52 signups to the Fractional Playbook, and three converted to try out Fractional Tools. It’s not revenue yet, but it’s part of my monkey-brain re-education plan. I was so pumped when I saw people convert to a trial account on Fractional Tools.

Get the Fractional Playbook — free, one insight a week.

Those little drops of sales dopamine were amazing.