See the Good
How to spot potential, reduce risk, and scale upside with the SEE Framework
The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty.
— Winston Churchill
"This will never work," my CEO declared, staring at our proposed compensation overhaul. "I understand we need changes, but this is a bridge too far."
His reaction wasn't surprising. We weren’t just tweaking our incentive structure — we were eliminating renewal incentives altogether, violating two decades of "common sense." Our analysis showed these incentives weren't just inefficient — they were actively harmful. Sales reps were offering unnecessary discounts to pull forward renewals that would have happened anyway, destroying value and damaging customer relationships in the process.
The data was clear, but challenging deeply held beliefs is never easy. Data alone doesn’t inspire change.
Six months later, that "radical" idea had become obvious in hindsight. We saved millions. Customer satisfaction scores rose. Retention improved. And the same executives who defended the old system now wondered why we hadn’t made the change sooner.
What changed wasn’t the data — it was how we saw the problem. Instead of fixating on what might go wrong, we asked what would need to go right. That simple shift — from risk avoidance to opportunity pursuit — became a repeatable approach to every major decision that followed.
It wasn’t just optimism. It was strategy.
Experience is a Double-Edged Sword
Experience is a double-edged sword: it makes you both wise and cynical.
As discussed in The Dangers of Playing It Safe, the formula for delivering superior results is unconventionality and accuracy.
Success has a certain gravitational pull. Successful teams often default to pattern recognition over pattern breaking. Their experience, once their greatest asset, slowly becomes a liability.
Said another way, success breeds skepticism. Anything that deviates from what’s proven is a threat; thus, successful organizations will spend more time debating new ideas than decoupling from outdated norms.
This explains one of the most persistent paradoxes in business: why companies that optimize well often fail to innovate. They listen to their best customers. They refine what works. And in doing so, they miss the weak signals that point to what's next.
That’s where upstarts thrive. Unburdened by legacy beliefs, they see value where others see noise. They don’t need to unlearn. They just need to see the good.
The Blumhouse Model
No one embodies this mindset better than Jason Blum. His company, Blumhouse Productions, has made some of the most profitable films of all time:
Paranormal Activity, his first film, generated $193 million worldwide on a budget of $15 thousand.
Sinister generated $87 million on a budget of $3 million.
Insidious grossed over $99 million on a budget of $1.5 million.
Get Out grossed $255 million on a budget of $4.5 million, not to mention an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.
What’s surprising is Blumhouse’s breakout films were those that every other major studio discarded. Blumhouse was the studio of last resort.
Most of the successful movies we’ve done, no one else wanted to do. Nobody wanted to make The Purge, which was floating around three years. No one wanted to make The Gift, when it was a script called Weirdo. Nobody wanted Paranormal Activity, even after it was finished. Almost all our success stories are like that.
What does Blum see that others miss?
Filmmaking is primarily a numbers game. There’s more supply than you can ever fulfill, so you must thin the herd of spec scripts and rough cuts to find the winners. As a result, movie studio executives rely on their experience of what doesn’t work to filter what comes across their desks.
And that’s the mistake.
Blum wasn’t filtering for flaws. He was spotting the spark — the thing in the script or vision that had potential. Where others saw risk, he saw connection.
The longer you are in the business, the more material comes your way. It becomes easy after a while to get lazy and dismiss everything as garbage. You have to find a way to focus on areas that show promise. Every script is a work in progress — it’s a blueprint for something else.
Seeing the good isn’t enough, though. All creative endeavors carry risk, even the ones with promise. To be truly successful, Blumhouse uses the financial constraints of the budget and contracts to limit the downside.
In big movies, interests are not aligned between those above the line [actors, director, producers, writers] and the financier, because above the line gets paid whether the movie works or not. The financier only makes money if the movie works, and that fundamentally sets up a contentious relationship. What I love about low-budget movies is my interests and the director’s interests and the actors’ interests are aligned. No one makes money unless the movie works, and that informs every creative decision.
In short, Blum started by seeing the good. He then engineered every aspect of the business to capture upside without overexposing downside:
Low-budget production
Profit-sharing instead of big fixed fees
Release decisions based on test screenings
This wasn’t blind optimism or luck. It was calculated risk, with incentives and constraints built in.
A system, not a gamble.
The SEE Framework: A Model for Opportunity-Oriented Leadership
Blum’s approach is more than a Hollywood anomaly — it’s a transferable model that applies just as well to comp overhauls, product bets, GTM shifts, or bold org changes.
S — Spot the Spark
Start by asking: What would make this work? Train your eye to find the signal inside the noise. Most ideas fail not because they’re bad, but because no one sees the good early enough to nurture it.
In our case, we spotted that renewal incentives weren’t driving behavior — they were distorting it. Once we separated that insight from the sacred cows around comp, a new model came into focus.
E — Engineer the Edges
Set boundaries. Use constraints — budget, incentives, scope — to reduce risk and focus creativity. The goal isn’t to eliminate risk. It’s to shape it.
Blum’s low-budget model aligned incentives across the cast, directors, and financiers. Our comp pilot did the same: we launched with one team, clear KPIs, and off-ramps if things didn’t work.
E — Experiment for Exposure
Don’t debate hypotheticals — test and learn. Pilot ideas in low-stakes settings and scale based on what works. This turns vision into evidence.
We didn’t try to convince everyone. We just let results speak. Once early pilots outperformed expectations, adoption followed.
Helping Others SEE
Optimism might not make you successful, but pessimism will ensure you’re not.
- Shane Parrish
Even if you spot the spark, you’ll often need to help others see it too. That means recognizing resistance as a feature, not a bug. Most skepticism comes from experience, not ignorance.
Here’s how to bring others along:
Start with Their Wisdom. Honor the logic behind the current model before proposing a new one.
Build the Bridge. Show how the new approach extends strengths rather than invalidates them.
Make It Safe. Lower the stakes. Pilot. Test. Invite skepticism into the process, not outside of it.
Final Thought
The SEE framework isn’t about blind faith — it’s about structured belief. It’s how you place smarter bets, pursue unconventional upside, and create environments where good ideas can survive long enough to prove themselves.
You don’t need to believe every idea will work. But if you never train yourself — or your team — to SEE the good, you’ll never find the few that change everything.
Spot the spark. Engineer the edges. Experiment for exposure. That’s how optimists win.
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