Boiling it down

I recently made a delicious dish for a family dinner – braised beef ribs with pomegranate sauce. Recipe – Braised Flanken With Pomegranate – NY Times.com It was a recipe I’d seen in the New York Times and, since there are enthusiastic beef lovers in my family, I thought I’d try it out.
The recipe seemed simple enough. Sauté various vegetables until caramelized, add pomegranate juice and red wine and reduce the liquid by half. The recipe said the reduction would take about two minutes. I thought they’d made a mistake. How could you reduce that much volume in two minutes? But a few minutes later, I did indeed have a beautifully reduced sauce and proceeded on with the next steps. The final product was tender and savory with a hint of sweetness. The family gobbled it up and took home leftovers.
A few days later, it occurred to me how similar this particular cooking experience was to my job at MMC. As Chief Business Strategist, I spend a lot of time digesting and analyzing research from many different sources. At the end of the research process, I have to boil everything down to an actionable insight and a clear strategy. That’s the point where I get up from my desk, get a glass of water, check how the Dow is doing and see if I have any interesting emails. It’s the moment where I wonder – how am I going to synthesize all of this complex, sometimes conflicting information into a clear recommendation that will be meaningful to a client’s business?
It requires a bit more work than stirring ingredients and watching the liquid evaporate. But that’s the fun of it. You have to discipline yourself to pare everything down. Focus only on what is fresh, meaningful and actionable. At the end the “reduction” is down to the essence – and hopefully there are no leftovers!
I’m not sure cooking is always going to teach me something about strategy. Maybe next time I’ll find inspiration from my next vacation, business meeting, or shopping excursion. I’ll let you know.