One of the most important times to slow down and ask questions is when you hear something that concerns you, or you see a reaction that spells potential trouble, or you feel you are running into difficulty. Our experience in business development has convinced us that hitting a red light is failure, so when we see a yellow light, we close our eyes and speed up—hoping we make it through.

If hitting a red light is unavoidable, then we want to hit that red light as soon as possible. Intellectually, we know that; emotionally we resist it. Recognize that failure is making a red light needlessly more expensive (spending a lot more time, money, and company resources to hit the same red light that could have been reached very early in the game). So for yellow lights, slow down and explore.