2023 career trends 📈- Hitting revenue targets in 2023 🎯- 2023 sera-t-elle l'année du doute ? 🤔

2023 will present unique opportunities for those who can stomach a little extra stress

Dec 11, 2022

Episode #92. Hey Sunday reader 👋🏼

This Sunday, The Timestamp comes again with your weekly dose of summaries from the articles, books, or podcasts you may have missed in tech & culture.

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Unusual car in Paris / Credit: @gilles_chetelat

#1. 2023 Career trends

Nick deWilde picked 12 trends after he asked experts from the Tech community how they see 2023 unfolding when it comes to career trends. I am just picking my top4 takeaways so that you can read The Jungle Gym published on Dec 4th.

1- Back to reality. Jack Raines, Publisher of Young Money » Now that market conditions are so uncertain and the outlook is painted in dark grey, a lot of people realize how trading deals is difficult, and how making profits is hard. Entrepreneurship is hard and the reality is hitting hard on those who forgot all that. We are now figuring out how "a lot of people developed unrealistic expectations about making money, building companies, and the nature of work."

2- Coaching becomes the rule. Sean Linehan, Co-Founder & CEO of Exec » “We have gone through a decade of under-training an entire decade of engineers, PMs, senior execs & CEOs in Silicon Valley. As a result, many companies don't have the ability to execute in an environment where interest rates aren’t zero.”
– Chamath Palihapitiya (on the All-in Podcast)

To navigate these challenging circumstances, more people will start to embrace professional coaching as a critical resource for performance. The best coaches for this occasion are those who have lived through the market crash of the early 00ies. In the coming year, leaders at all levels will come to recognize coaching as the secret weapon for their success.

3- Return of the recession psychology. Nat Eliason, Publisher of Infinite Play » "Recessions change people’s appetite for risk. Investors get more conservative. Entrepreneurs play it safer." "All this means that the next few years will present unique opportunities for those who can stomach a little extra stress during this more conservative period."

4- Selective vulnerability. Liz Fosslien, Author and Expert on Emotions at Work » "Selective vulnerability means finding the right balance between sharing, which earns trust, and oversharing, which destroys it. This is not easy. No one wants to work for a robot. But people don't want to work for a feelings firehose either."

#2. Hitting revenue targets in 2023

Honest truth, I have not watched this entire video but I enjoyed the start of this interview with Sahil Mansuri CEO of Bravado, the world’s largest online sales community. You can watch the full interview from Lenny’s podcast published on Dec 4. I am sharing here a few takeaways that will give you some motivation to get more.

2023 is obviously full of uncertainty. Business predictions have become a precious art. As a consequence, what founders should change in the coming year knowing the conditions of the market and how things are turbulent? 2 hints:

Nobody wants to be unreasonably conservative during hard times, this is our decision to identify clear milestones.
Time to focus and refocus on the retention of your existing customers.

"Cold prospecting goes down in favor of cross-selling and upselling your existing customer base because it's hard to break into new accounts when companies have budget freezes and hiring freezes and layoffs, and everyone is watching really closely the capital outflow of their business."

Here is the hard and blunt truth about companies NOT hitting targets:

76% of companies did not hit their Q3 targets in 2022 (That's up from 59% in Q2 and 51% in Q1).
More than >80% of companies will most likely NOT reach their targets in Q4 2022.

That is most likely what and how you should look at your forecasts going into 2023:

Forecast conservatively and set at least quarterly milestones to witness how you are trending towards your annual goal. If above > deploy more effort, if below > revise your cost structure accordingly. The sooner the better.
Align sales incentives with NRR targets ie. Put in place kickers when a renewal is signed and value highly when NRR >100%.

#3. 2023, l’année du doute?

Tous les podcasts de la serie “Charles Pepin: Une philosophie pratique” ne sont pas forcément à écouter mais cet épisode sur le doute intitulé Nos doutes: Freins ou tremplins? publié en Dec 21 résonne particulièrement bien alors que 2023 s’annonce comme une année plus incertaine que jamais dans ce siècle.

Nietzsche « ce n’est pas le doute qui rend fou mais la certitude »

Ce post va t il être réussi? Je ne sais pas. Ce podcast va t il vous plaire? Je ne sais pas. Lirez vous The Timestamp jusqu’ici? Je ne sais pas.

Je ne sais pas. Descartes affirmait que "l'irrésolution est le pire des maux". Ce doute qui nous empêche de trancher, de prendre une décision. Souvenons nous que Descartes est justement le penseur du ‘doute méthodique’; la construction (de soi) à partir du doute, et de la remise en question, devient un moteur. Ne faut-il faut pas apprendre à douter pour réussir?

Quand on y réfléchit bien, les gens qui doutent sont peut être les plus intelligents; la certitude n’est finalement qu’un déni du réel, une forme d’arrogance humaine devant l’incontrolable.

Une décision n’est pas vraiment la même chose qu’un choix. La véritable confiance ne veut pas dire etre sur de soi mais y aller avec son doute ce qui différencie la decision du choix. Decider c'est donc y aller avant de savoir. C’est un peu une ode à la liberté d'action humaine. Je doute donc j’agis.

Ne faut il pas finalement se réjouir de tant d’incertitude à quelques jours d’aborder 2023?

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