The Believability Spectrum for Vision & Strategy
Every idea lands as believed, believable, conceivable, or inconceivable; your openness sets where the lines fall
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 3
- Confidence
- 85%
The brain sorts every incoming idea into believed (already experienced), believable (evidence makes sense), conceivable-but-unbelievable (far-fetched), or inconceivable ('get out of my office'). Those thresholds shift by personality, especially the Big Five trait of openness. Low-openness brains wire abstract ideas to pain systems, so visionary-but-correct ideas trigger a personal negative response mistaken for objective judgment. Self-awareness plus vulnerability lets a team stop mistaking a personal threshold for an objective problem.
Origin
Evan LaPointe / CORE Sciences, built on the Big Five openness trait; he contrasts vulnerability-for-its-own-sake (Brené Brown) with vulnerability justified by its superior alternatives.
Core principles
- 01Believed/believable ideas carry an inbuilt tailwind; unbelievable ideas carry an inbuilt headwind, regardless of whether they are correct
- 02Low openness wires abstract/creative/complex thinking to the brain's pain systems, producing a visceral negative response
- 03The lines between believable and inconceivable shift dramatically from person to person based on lived experience
- 04A team stuck translating inconceivable-but-accurate ideas into believable language loses time to competitors who move to experimentation
How to run it
- 1
Locate your openness threshold
Take a Big Five profile and identify where your believable threshold ends and your inconceivable response begins. Recognize that low openness means visionary ideas will feel agitating, not wrong.
Pro tip Note the 'rings' around your score representing how far you can push before your brain breaks into foreign territory; the first few rings are highly movable.
Watch out Treat a low-openness reading with a growth mentality, not a justification mentality ('I'm right, everyone knows what I mean').
- 2
Separate personal threshold from objective merit
When an idea hits your inconceivable response, ask whether this is a personal problem or an objective problem before arguing against it. Many vision debates activate the inconceivable response with zero self-awareness that it is personal.
Pro tip Some things science already proved (e.g. ROI of good design); if you could disprove them you'd win a Nobel Prize, so stop re-litigating them.
Watch out Activating your inconceivable response as if it were objective can cost months of arguing that sit between you and experimentation.
- 3
Choose vulnerability over hiding or defiance
You have three options with a known weakness: be vulnerable and name it, hide it, or be unapologetic (Tasmanian devil). Say out loud 'this is inconceivable to me because of how my brain works, so I'll trust and ask for translation.'
Pro tip Frame vulnerability by its alternatives: hiding and defiance are ruinous by comparison, which makes vulnerability the rational choice, not just the brave one.
Watch out Trust can be your substitute for agreement, but trust does not require non-participation; still ask for the missing translation.
In the wild
Host Lenny took LaPointe's identity test, scored low on openness, and confirmed that when a designer proposes a big-vision redesign he goes straight into his 'pain cave,' exactly as the trait predicts.
→ Recognizing this as a wiring issue rather than a judgment lets him ask for translation and lean on higher-openness partners instead of blocking.
Common mistakes
Justification mentality
Reading a personality result as proof you are right ('I'm blunt and everyone knows what I really mean') instead of as a growth opportunity keeps you stuck at 0% effort to adapt.
Getting stuck in the translation phase
Teams that spend all their time translating inconceivable-but-accurate ideas into believable ROI language lose customers and employees to competitors who moved to experimentation.
Is it for you?
Best for
Low-openness or highly conscientious operators who feel agitated during vision and strategy conversations
Not ideal for
Pure execution work where no far-from-precedent ideas are on the table
From the transcript
“your brain is going to sort those ideas into believed believable kind of conceivable and inconceivable”
“if you are low in openness your brain essentially has abstract creative intellectual complex thinking wired to the pain systems of the brain”
“vulnerability is kind of the best approach to this”
“I can be vulnerable I can attempt to hide it or I can be Unapologetic those other two options are ruinous compared to vulnerability”
“the team that spends less time translating satisfactory language before they move”
From the episode
Improve strategy, influence, and decision-making by understanding your brain
Evan LaPointe (founder of CORE Sciences)