The absolutely hardest problem of any new project is to gain momentum. Unless you're dealing with a preexisting crisis or jumping on a bandwagon, your project has to generate its own momentum. That's no easy task. Any project worth doing will try to change the world in some way, which means that the project has to make changes in the world. As everyone knows, the instinct of all living things to resist change (i.e. homeostasis) creates inertia that keeps projects from moving at all.

The thing about momentum, though, is that it is cumulative. If you can get the project moving at all, and then ''store'' that velocity in some way, you will build momentum. The classical mechanical analogy is a FlyWheel. If you get a FlyWheel spinning even a little bit, its own angular momentum will keep the FlyWheel spinning. Once it's going, you only need to give it small amount of energy to overcome friction. In fact, you only need to add a little more energy to get the FlyWheel to spin faster. If you keep adding a little bit of energy over and over, soon the FlyWheel will be spinning incredibly fast.

And the great thing about momentum is that once you start moving, it's very hard to stop you.

'''Therefore,''' organizationally speaking, don't worry about the big problem you're trying to solve. Worry more about just getting moving. Once you're in motion, it's easy to go faster and faster by pushing just a little harder.

The trick, though, is not putting energy in places where it can't be stored. Sure, you can pick up a ball and throw it across the room, but once it hits the ground, it will quickly come to a halt. To benefit from momentum, you have to store that energy in ''mass'', which organizationally means people and systems. 

* Keep working to get one more person on side. They will help you get the next person on side. The more people you have on your side, the more people will want to be on your side.
* Keep investing in building capacity. It's not enough to go into the world and make a change directly. You have to work on systematizing change so it gets easier and easier.

Remember, though, you only need to do a little bit at a time. Focus on what's taking most of your energy now. Work hard as a team to overcome that problem so it is no longer overwhelmingly a distraction. Then, rinse and repeat with the next problem that is taking most of your energy.

'''But,''' momentum dissipates too. If you ignore a person or a project long enough, it will grind to a halt. New habits of relevant stakeholders will form, and you will have to fight hard to win them back. Always remember to do the minimum to overcome "friction."

'''References'''

Collins, J. (2001) ''Good to great: Why some companies make the leap... and others don't.'' Collins. ISBN:9780066620992
: In ''Good to Great'', Collins (2001) describes the FlyWheel as the overarching pattern about how to get to greatness. Great companies build one slap of the flywheel at a time, building themselves up one step at a time.

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