I have 13 ideas to shape our 2025 together
Probably nothing - or perhaps 13 timeless principles, experiments and the mindset to turn uncertainty into growth this year
Hello to the 2,939 subscribers who read Consulting Intel!
The noise of new year’s resolutions has started to fade and, by now, most of the big promises made on January 1st (“This is my year!”) are quietly settling into the shadows of routine.
Routine can be dangerous if it is directionless.
That is why I believe in anchoring the year not with lofty declarations but with ideas that are timeless, challenging, and worth revisiting daily.
Over the past few weeks I have reflected on the frameworks, philosophies, “mental models” and principles that could act as a compass for navigating both predictable challenges and the inevitable chaos of 2025.
Ideas that solve problems and sharpen the mind.
Ideas that, when practiced, can bring clarity, strength, and better results - not just in business but in life itself.
This year, I am treating my personal growth and professional evolution like an experiment and will use each of the principles I am about to share as a lens through which to test decisions, confront habits and measure outcomes.
Some of these ideas are counterintuitive. Some are hard to implement. All of them are profound and, to me, helpful.
Today, 19 days into 2025, as we ease into the rhythm of the months ahead, I am inviting you to experiment with me.
Here are the 13 ideas I will be exploring in 2025. Let me know which ones resonate with you - or challenge you, because if we are not challenging ourselves, we are probably not growing.
1) The power of compounding
Compounding occurs when small, consistent gains build upon themselves over time, creating exponential growth. This is not limited to money but applies to knowledge, habits, and relationships. The key is consistency and patience, as initial growth feels slow but accelerates dramatically over time.
Albert Einstein reportedly called compounding “the eighth wonder of the world” because those who understand it reap its benefits, while those who do not pay for it (e.g., through debt).
Importantly, compounding also applies negatively: bad habits or poor decisions compound into significant problems over time.
Warren Buffett’s fortune illustrates this perfectly. While Buffett started investing at age 11, the massive bulk of his wealth (over $80 billion) came after his 50th birthday. His disciplined, long-term approach to investing allowed his wealth to snowball over decades. His company, Berkshire Hathaway, is also a compounding machine, reinvesting its profits to acquire additional businesses, further compounding its value.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
This year, I will lean into the power of compounding in two key ways:
Skill-building: I will allocate 20 minutes daily to learning emerging AI technologies and tools relevant to consulting. Over the year, these micro-efforts will compound into a significant competitive edge.
Investments: I will increase my ETF contributions by 10% and resist the temptation to chase short-term gains. Staying disciplined and letting time work for me will grow my portfolio without requiring massive new investments.
2) Incentives drive behavior
Human behavior is shaped by incentives, whether financial, emotional, or social.
When you align incentives with desired outcomes, you create sustainable results. Misaligned incentives can lead to counterproductive behaviors, such as employees prioritizing metrics over meaningful work or customers exploiting loopholes in promotions.
Designing effective incentives requires understanding the motivations of stakeholders and anticipating unintended consequences.
Amazon Prime transformed shopping behavior by incentivizing loyalty through free shipping and exclusive benefits: instead of comparing prices across platforms, customers began defaulting to Amazon.
This behavior increased Amazon’s customer lifetime value (CLV), allowing the company to reinvest in services like faster delivery and better inventory.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
In 2025, I will ensure incentives are aligned with long-term goals in my work and personal life:
Work: I will advocate even more than I have already been doing for fee structures tied to client outcomes rather than just hours billed. This builds trust and aligns both parties toward success.
Family goals: With my daughter, I will use positive reinforcement to encourage good habits, for example, rewarding her when she takes initiative with small responsibilities.
3) Focus on controllables
Worrying about things beyond your control wastes energy and diminishes effectiveness.
Focusing on what you can control - your thoughts, actions, and reactions - gives you the mental clarity to make progress. This idea draws heavily from Stoic philosophy, which emphasizes that external events are neutral, but our perception and response determine their impact.
During the pandemic, some companies like Shopify thrived because they focused on what they could control: scaling e-commerce tools to meet surging demand. Others floundered because they fixated on the macroeconomic uncertainty, paralyzing decision-making.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will actively practice this principle by:
Work: Prioritizing areas where I can have direct impact (e.g., building deep client relationships) rather than dwelling on market trends or industry status that I cannot change.
Health: Instead of worrying about unexpected bad things that could happen, I will focus on building positive health habits like exercising and improving my diet.
4) Feedback loops determine growth
Feedback loops are cycles where output is analyzed, and the insights are fed back into the system to improve future performance.
Fast, clear feedback enables quicker learning and adaptation.
Without effective feedback, progress stalls because errors go uncorrected, and strengths remain underutilized. Negative feedback discourages bad habits, while positive feedback reinforces good ones.
Famously, Toyota’s lean manufacturing system uses continuous feedback from factory floors to identify inefficiencies and improve workflows. Workers are empowered to pull a cord (the “andon cord”) to stop production and address issues immediately, leading to consistent quality improvements.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will integrate feedback loops in two areas:
Client engagements: I will set a focus with my team to conduct post-mortems after major project milestones, capturing lessons learned and applying them to the next phase.
Personal improvement: Monthly self-reviews will help me assess progress toward key goals, adjusting strategies where needed.
5) Rethink opportunity cost
Opportunity cost is the value of what you give up when choosing one option over another: while the cost is not always obvious, it is always present.
By actively weighing opportunity costs, you can make better decisions that maximize value.
For example, Netflix’s decision to pivot from DVD rentals to streaming had massive opportunity costs (alienating its original customer base and cannibalizing DVD revenue), however the bold shift positioned Netflix as a global leader in streaming, a market vastly larger than DVDs.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
Every time I say “yes” to a project or commitment, I will consider the “no” that comes with it.
Work: Focus only on consulting opportunities that align with my long-term expertise goals, even if it means turning down lucrative but distracting, or “pet”, projects.
Family: Dedicate weekends to quality time with my wife and daughter rather than filling them with low-value tasks.
6) Focus on leading indicators
Leading indicators predict future performance, while lagging indicators only reflect past outcomes. By focusing on leading indicators, you can proactively steer toward success rather than reacting to problems after they occur.
The good part is that identifying and tracking these metrics allows for early course corrections and builds momentum for long-term goals.
In fitness, tracking calorie intake (leading indicator) helps predict weight loss, whereas the number on the scale (lagging indicator) reflects results only after significant time has passed.
Similarly, Salesforce emphasizes tracking daily call volumes and client meetings (leading indicators) to forecast quarterly sales performance.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will define and prioritize leading indicators in both work and personal goals:
Work: I will focus on client engagement metrics (e.g., time spent with key decision-makers, frequency of value-based updates) rather than just tracking revenue targets.
Personal: For health, I will prioritize daily step counts and “zone minutes” (yes, I use a Fitbit), knowing they directly impact long-term well-being and energy levels.
7) Think in probabilities
Thinking in probabilities means assessing decisions based on the likelihood of outcomes rather than relying on absolutes. It forces us to operate through informed decision-making under uncertainty, acknowledging that even good decisions can lead to bad outcomes (and vice versa) due to chance.
This approach also cultivates emotional resilience by focusing on process over outcome.
Professional poker players thrive by thinking in probabilities, not certainties. Annie Duke, a World Series of Poker champion, highlights that even a perfect hand might lose if the odds do not play out in your favor but focusing on the soundness of your strategy ensures long-term success.
Similarly, Jeff Bezos took calculated risks with Amazon Prime, AWS, and Kindle, understanding that some of these initiatives would fail but the probabilities of success outweighed the downsides.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will consciously frame decisions through probabilistic thinking:
Work: In my consulting job, I will focus on portfolios that maximize the probability of success, even if the outcome is not guaranteed. For example, advising bold but well-researched transformations when the upside justifies the risk.
Investments: I will evaluate my stock picks with an eye on long-term probability, resisting the urge to make emotional trades based on short-term losses.
8) The map is not the territory
I should remind myself more often that models, frameworks, and perceptions are simplifications of reality, not reality itself.
While maps and models are useful for navigating complexity, they must be regularly updated to reflect new information because blindly adhering to outdated models can lead to flawed decisions.
For example, Blockbuster failed to adapt its mental model of the video rental business: it believed physical stores would remain central to the customer experience, even as Netflix’s streaming model proved otherwise.
By clinging to an outdated map, Blockbuster lost relevance and ultimately went bankrupt.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
This year, I will challenge assumptions and update my mental models regularly:
Work: I will push my team to treat every client’s problem as unique, avoiding the temptation (which is strong in our job!) to apply cookie-cutter frameworks. I will always ensure that our recommendations are rooted in their specific reality.
Personal: I will continuously evaluate whether my routines, habits and plans (from financial to health) are serving me or need adjustment based on changing priorities or circumstances.
9) The paradox of choice: less is more
An abundance of options often paralyzes our decision-making and reduces satisfaction.
When people have too many choices, they overthink decisions, fear missing out or regret their final choice, while limiting options reduces cognitive load, accelerates decisions and increases happiness (I know this very well because my wife can never pick an item from the menu in less than 15 minutes!)
To clarify the idea, think of what IKEA does to minimize choice fatigue by offering a curated selection of furniture rather than infinite configurations. Their approach simplifies decision-making while still offering variety, ensuring customers feel confident and satisfied.
Similarly, Apple thrives on simplicity, with a limited product line that avoids overwhelming its customers.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will reduce complexity in my life by narrowing focus:
Work: Limit the number of ongoing projects and initiatives, and focus on a smaller set of high-impact, high-revenue, high-margin engagements to deliver deeper value.
Personal: Simplify my schedule by prioritizing fewer activities with higher personal and family significance, ensuring my attention is fully present.
10) The boiling frog syndrome: complacency kills
The boiling frog syndrome illustrates how people often fail to notice gradual, harmful changes until it is too late: awareness, reflection, and proactive action are essential to avoid being caught off guard.
This applies to industries, relationships, health, and careers, where slow deterioration is often ignored.
Kodak exemplifies this principle. The company failed to adapt to the rise of digital photography, even though it invented the first digital camera! Complacent in its dominance of film photography, Kodak dismissed digital as a niche market until competitors overtook it and completely destroyed their business.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will actively monitor areas where gradual shifts could be detrimental:
Work: Stay attuned to emerging industry trends (e.g., AI-driven consulting tools) and continually upskill to stay ahead.
Personal: Perform quarterly health and financial reviews to ensure I am addressing small issues and/or missed opportunities before they grow significantly in size.
11) Embrace extremes and avoid the average
I read this short article by Packy McCormick: how beautiful.
Split efforts between two extremes - safety and risk - while avoiding the middle ground because this hedges us against losses while capitalizing on upside opportunities.
The key here is balancing low-risk/stable activities with high-risk/high-reward bets.
Amazon popularly uses such a barbell strategy: when its core business (e-commerce) was stable and low-risk, AWS (Amazon Web Services) represented a high-risk bet on cloud computing. AWS, initially speculative, now generates the majority of Amazon’s profits (incidentally, this is one of the reasons why I believe Jeff Bezos is the most inspiring entrepreneurs of our time, but that’s another story…)
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will adopt the barbell approach across my personal goals and finances:
Personal: This year, I will finalize two things - the publishing of my first book and the start of a podcast - while continuing with my demanding day job.
Investments: Maintain a stable portfolio of ETFs while allocating a small portion to speculative tech stocks.
12) First principles thinking
When I was a Computer Engineering university student, I learnt that the right way to approach problems is to break them down to their most fundamental truths and building solutions from scratch, bypassing assumptions.
You must privilege leveraging your creativity, innovation, clarity and fresh perspectives over incremental improvements.
SpaceX, for example, revolutionized space travel using first principles thinking. Elon Musk questioned the assumption that rockets must be expensive and, by analyzing the cost of raw materials and reusability, he manage to slash launch costs, achieving what many thought impossible.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will apply first principles thinking to complex challenges:
Work: Instead of relying on quick standard consulting playbooks, I will encourage my team to as themselves: “What is the root cause of the client’s problem?” and build tailored solutions around that
Personal: Redefine routines. For instance, instead of following generic productivity systems, I will focus on the fundamental drivers of my effectiveness (energy, focus, and prioritization).
13) Antifragility
Anti-fragility, as coined by my favorite author Nassim Taleb, describes systems that improve when exposed to volatility, stress or disruption.
Unlike resilience (which withstands stress) or fragility (which breaks under stress), anti-fragility grows stronger through challenges. In order for it to work you must embrace uncertainty, taking calculated risks and designing systems to benefit from disorder.
Startups like Airbnb thrived during the 2008 financial crisis by offering an affordable alternative to hotels. The economic downturn created conditions that accelerated their adoption, showcasing how disruption can benefit well-positioned systems.
How I plan to apply it in 2025:
I will seek opportunities in uncertainty:
Work: Position myself and my team as the specialist consultants who thrive in ambiguous projects where clients need direction amid chaos in cost-cutting scenarios (which I believe will be a leitmotif of 2025).
Personal: Adopt habits that improve under stress, such as exercising when overwhelmed to turn anxiety into strength.
Progress is never linear.
Some days we will feel unstoppable, other days we will question everything.
These ideas are not meant to sit on a page but meant to be lived, tested, and even debated. I encourage you to take what resonates, challenge what does not, and share your own insights along the way.
As I always say (and a lot of people challenge me): ideas are almost worthless but execution is everything.
If you have read this far, thanks for being a part of this little corner of the internet.
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Ciao, until next time! 👋
✍ The Management Consultant
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🎯 INTERESTING SH*T
A couple of things I found on the internet that you may like…
This post from
, who writes , is a good perspective on Parkinson’s Law. What do you think?“The things that excite you aren’t random, they’re clues” - great reminder from
in the latest post on her Substack
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Excellent. I sense some OKR principles in there.
Couple of questions:
How will you track it and be held accountable.
If you achieve all this/ do this, what will be the outcome and impact. What’s driving you
This is a really, really, good post - great share.