But there is another principle at work that we will share with you because it has a lot to do with the projects we promote here on the Steese Review, specifically the bicycle events at the moment.
A lesson we have learned is that there is no guarantee of a successful outcome in anything we undertake, if we define "outcome" as what is normally called the goal of the effort. For example, most people would define the goal of the 2014 Steese Summer Solstice Bicycle Gran Fondo as having several participants taking part in the event. That didn't happen. So was the event a failure? If that was the measure, then it was a failure. But while we failed to get even a single participant, we learned quite a bit about what we have to do, and we are better prepared to try again next year.
And we learned it is worth trying again next year knowing more about doing it than we did last year.
There are many examples of the value of "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again." Like, "If you don't get out on the field and drop the ball a few times, you will never be a baseball player." But there is even another value in trying, and that is learning what we can and cannot do. All things are not possible to all. And we have a saying for that as well, "Don't beat your head against a brick wall."
We could have learned that it is not worth trying the bicycle gran fondo again.
That, we would suggest, is the true measure of the worth of our effort: Was the effort worth what we learned from it? If it was, then no matter any other outcome, we benefited.
Which brings up another point, and that is to not commit more time, effort, or resources to a start up project than it is worth to learn it can't be done by us. And, of course, conversely, that will also let us know if it can be done.
The beauty of this approach is that we are continually learning and benefiting from what we learn.
Out of this comes a rule of thumb for group undertakings. Are those who will benefit the most from the project contributing their fair share to the effort to produce the project? If they aren't from our point of view, then the disparity has to be resolved in order to go forward; however, others may not share our point of view of their benefit ...
But if it were simple then anyone could do anything. And that is not going to happen, is it?