Be Exothermic
Raising the temperature of an organization: why high-agency people are infectious
I'm a sucker for a good thermodynamics metaphor.
There's something profound about an idea or phenomenon that taps into core principles of the universe. It suggests a deep truth that might otherwise go unnoticed.
In a recent interview on the Invest Like the Best podcast, Tobi Lütke — Shopify founder and proselytizer of systems thinking — had this to say, on the concept of "Founder Mode":
So just as an example. So what's this founder mode thing?
I think it's a label on top of something that people feel, especially people who have been working in a bunch of different companies. The relentlessness. But here's the way I would put it. I think what happens in most companies is they converge on — let's go with temperature — I think companies run at room temperature because that's their entropic equilibrium of temperature.
That's not a problem if everyone else does it too. So in room temperature, everything is just so. But then there's people who inject heat into businesses. Brilliant product managers, brilliant people in any job do this. They're dissatisfied with status quo. They pump energy.
The best leaders are literally exothermic. They are just like this complete wellspring of heat into the system. Every atom jiggles faster around them. There's no chance for stasis. Nothing is frozen. Over time, however, people mean well, but they fight it.
When I heard this I immediately paused the show to think about this more as I was on my run.
How else could this metaphor be usefully extended?
High-agency people are exothermic. They release heat. They inject energy into an organization.
When you bring in someone that raises the average temperature of your team, they will things into motion. Their energy infects the environment around them, like a hot coal dropped in cold water.
The first law of thermodynamics says that energy cannot be created or destroyed, only conserved or converted from one form to another. When you drop that hot coal into the water, eventually the surrounding cold molecules sap the coal's heat. The water warms, the coal cools, and eventually the system reaches stasis. A little bit warmer, but uniform temperature.
Exotherms elevate the temperature, but also call forth latent energy in the people around them.
Most people are closer to thermostatic (to keep torturing this analogy, we could call them the "isotherms"). They hover around the status quo, maintaining the current equilibrium.
Even though they're quiet, the isotherms have untapped potential. While they naturally gravitate toward comfort and stability, their undeployed potential energy can be influenced toward organizational goals. A high-agency exotherm dropped in their midst rallies them to the cause. The exotherms push the isotherms to get out of their seats and move forward. They catalyze motion, converting potential energy into kinetic energy.
But on the other side are the endotherms. They absorb free energy around them. Someone can jump up excited to push an idea forward, and the endotherm will swallow up that energy. They're the downers, the pessimists. They'll bat down attempts to move, insisting on staying frozen in position, and prevent anything innovative from happening. The one thing they want is for nothing to change. They not only want to maintain status quo, they also can't be marshaled to the cause like the isotherms.
And though it might sound like I'm making the case for a company entirely composed of explosive, high-agency people, the isotherms play an important role as a balancing force in an organization. They're the risk-mitigators – they're influenceable toward positive ends by the exotherms, and they insulate the organization from the drag of the endotherms.
But being exothermic isn't inherently a virtue. Generating energy alone isn't enough to raise the temperature of an org in a useful way: the energy must be goal-aligned.
Not all exotherms propel the organization in the right direction. Some people generate motion in all the wrong ways. I call them "agitators": they're not satisfied with the status quo, but their agitation for change is fundamentally unaligned with the organization's goals — or perhaps at odds with cultural norms or principles. They show up and lobby for change that moves in the wrong direction. Sometimes it's motivated by an simple discontent for the "now" — "I just want things to be different" — an unhappiness with sitting still. And sometimes their agency does pull in a consistent direction, but only a self-interested one. If a person is a "change agent", but also a massive jerk to everyone around them, they're exothermic in one sense (perhaps getting stuff done), and endothermic in another (eroding the organization's culture).
Tobi's thermodynamics metaphor resonates by being grounded in laws of nature.
If you raise the temperature of your organization, and point in the right direction, you can break through the stasis and build something remarkable.
Thank you for reading. If you found this idea thought-provoking, please share with friends, or leave your feedback in the comments.