I'd like to correct that to: put the past behind you, learn from it, live in the present, but think about the future.
If there's one thing I've learned from my experience starting up Blendz it has been the magic of thinking ahead to:
2. Validate our learning
3. Increase our productivity
Moreover, and this is something I learned by reading The Lean Startup, thinking ahead allows you to validate your learning. Think about it like this. Suppose you conducted a bio experiment, but you wrote down no hypothesis. I'm guessing that what probably happened was that you weren't sure of what you were looking at when you first saw the data you collected. You didn't no whether your data proved a relationship or not, because you hadn't anticipated a hypothesis, thus, your data was nothing more than raw data.
In the business world, it works pretty much the same way:
Finally, thinking ahead has allowed us to have a culture that is more vibrant of productivity, but we're still working on it. During one of our weekly Monday meetings, where each team shares their successes and failures of the week, one of the recurring topics of discussion was that people didn't feel productive. They felt like they could do more, but they didn't know how, and thats where Pedro and I where (and I believe still are) constantly failing. Although we have a visible list of the projects that we have to get done--and their due dates--we don't tend to think past what needs to get done for that week. By not doing so, we unconsciously give ourselves and the team longer times to accomplish tasks which don't need as much time to accomplish. And although we may not realize it at times, without setting long term goals or visions, we not only decrease our productivity but we we steer away from our ultimate goal.
So my mission for the next few weeks, especially after today's second prototype (where we will be selling 300 smoothies!), is to think ahead. To anticipate. To foresee. It has definitely been challenging, especially because I'm used to organizing myself on a weekly basis and the business requires organizing ourselves at a much larger scale, but I think doing so will give our business a much firmer sense of direction. It's time to experience the magic of thinking ahead!