The Downside to Intentionality - Short #255
HVAC School - For Techs, By Techs
Bryan Orr
4.9 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 2 September 2025
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this business and building-oriented short podcast episode, Bryan discusses the limitations and downsides of intentionality. He also talks about the differences between people who act, think, and work quickly and those who are a bit slower, more detailed, and more methodical; there are upsides and downsides to both.
People often talk about being intentional, but those intentions have little impact on the world unless they lead to action. Intentionality feels productive, but it doesn't make a difference unless the execution piece is also there. Likewise, skills come from action, not aspiration. Books and podcasts are tools that support efforts to improve, but you can't improve skills without practicing.
There is also the career paradox: we expect people, especially kids, to know what they want to do when they grow up. Their answers aren't backed by any real-life experience. People do the same as adults; we expect them to know what they truly want to do when they haven't necessarily been challenged (or physically made something real or fixed something with their hands). In many of these cases, opportunism and trying new things out, even if it means messing up or being criticized, are more important than intentionality.
It helps to think of opportunism in terms of "hat" decisions, "hairstyle" decisions, and "tattoo" decisions. "Hat" decisions are things you can try out without consequences; be opportunistic. "Hairstyle" decisions have longer-lasting effects and require a bit more intentionality, but it's still good to make some of these decisions. "Tattoo" decisions have lasting effects and require intentionality.
Intentionality is most useful when we have the experience already; act first and reflect later.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Ooh, this is the HVAC school podcast. I'm Brian, and this podcast is going to be a little |
| 0:11.5 | different, even the last one, which was about some business stuff, some building stuff. |
| 0:18.2 | This is an extension of that basic conversation, but I don't know how you all are going to take this one. I don't know how you're going to take it. I'm going to say some things that go against some commonly held beliefs. So I'm open to your feedback on it. But before we do that, before we dive into it, I should say, let's hear from our great sponsors. Navak at navakglobal.com. |
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| 1:21.0 | Carrier and carrier.com. |
| 1:24.9 | All right. So those of you who know me, like actually know me to any degree or have read my book |
| 1:30.0 | unconformed or have gone to the symposium or know my family, you know that I am not the most |
| 1:36.3 | detailed organized person in the world. I think I tend to make it work, but it's not always my |
| 1:40.8 | strength. And I'm not advocating for people to be like me. I really like Danny Connman's book, Thinking Fast and Slow, where it talks about this, different systems for thinking. People who are really fast thinkers and people who are more processed, they process more slowly. And if you've interacted with people who are fast thinkers, they're fun sometimes, but they're also really annoying because they have a hard time getting into the details and actually making the real plan. And I can be that way sometimes for sure. And then if you know some |
| 2:04.4 | people who are really methodical, sometimes they can drive you crazy because things take forever, seemingly, |
| 2:09.1 | but in the end, they often have good results. I'm not talking about one of those being better than the |
| 2:14.3 | other. They're just better at different things. I'm going to talk a |
| 2:18.0 | little bit more generally about this idea of intentionality and where it has its limits and can |
| 2:24.2 | actually be a crutch. So I decided to talk about this. I was overhearing two guys at church |
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