adjustments are not only ok, but expected.
by bill reeb
this sounds like an odd comment to make given the importance i have assigned to identifying your desires and creating plans and tactics to achieve them. but we aren’t focusing on desire in this step, but rather the work needed to achieve your desires.
more: from martial arts to business: 5 steps of evolution | learn to work ‘better’ instead of ‘harder’ | be realistic regarding expectations | a clear direction provides you a sanity check | refining desire | roadblocks from people with good intentions
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desires and plans change, or we need to be flexible enough to allow them to change as we gain more knowledge, skills or experience as we do the work. in other words, you want to leverage the wisdom you gain from doing the work.
when we start out attempting to achieve our various objectives, understand that “we don’t know what we don’t know.” and because planning is the first step in this process, it is easy to see why creating a plan when we don’t know very much can easily produce the need for change along the way. people often find comfort in having a plan, and this causes them to put on blinders, continuing to carry out the identified tactics, regardless of the changes going on around them. when plans or tactics are set in stone, they can not only shift from being a strength to a weakness, but can actually become worse than having no plan at all.
consider the example of a sailboat going from destination a to b. let’s say island c is closer but a little less desirable, which is why the original plan was to head toward island b. now assume you have set sail for island b and are more than halfway there. out of nowhere comes a coast guard alert that a terrible unexpected storm is rolling in fast; a storm that would make it impossible to navigate, could damage the boat and even jeopardize lives. clearly, this storm wasn’t part of the plan or expected. you are closer to island b than returning to island a, but island c is significantly closer than either. so, given this scenario, locking into island b as your destination would be a bad choice, especially because island c is much closer and safer. as new information is unveiled, especially when it is significant (like in this weather scenario), your current plan and tactics should be revisited and course corrections made to take advantage, or minimize the damage, of what the new circumstances may bring. remember:
plans are a great sanity check. they help you decide whether the considered course alteration will support achieving your plan, or whether the desire or plan needs to be revised because of the importance of the course alteration.
sometimes overachievers confuse planning with reaching the top or the pinnacle. in other words, we make planning about achieving something, like ascending to the top of el yunque or reaching island b, because that is what we decided to do. in reality, getting to island b or the top of el yunque was probably more of a tactic in the overall plan to “have fun, get some exercise, enjoy the outdoors,” and so on.
don’t get too committed to your plans or tactics as they need to remain flexible. even though island c was not the preferred destination, given the weather circumstances outlined, it quickly became the best tactic to reach the broader goal of enjoying the day.
taking this scenario a step further, while enjoying the day was the original broader goal when you set sail, my guess is that it quickly lost priority to an even greater desire to remain safe. the change in course direction to island c is a perfect example of how time, new information, greater insight and the like can instantly motivate you to reprioritize your desire. as you can see, locking into your plan can be dangerous.
as i think about inappropriately locking into my plans, i remember the first software product i started designing and writing for my own use and resale. it was a point of sale system for my ladies’ clothing stores. the software created was basic, but so was our business. this was more than 30 years ago and there was not much on the market that was economically reasonable, especially for a small business like ours. we then opened our second ladies’ clothing store, and soon after, bought a franchise called software city out of teaneck, new jersey. among the three businesses, we had a number of needs that were not being addressed by our simple program, so it was time to rewrite it.
by this time, i had a partner who was a brilliant programmer. so, we established the goal of designing and developing a point of sale system that would not only handle our three stores, but every one of my retail clients’ operations too. we locked into our plan to create the most versatile point of sale system we could imagine and no matter how complex it became, or how much time it took to add all of the features we could envision, we were going to get this done right. we made it so flexible and robust that it became too complicated to set up and use.
during our four-year prolonged development approach, many other software products were released in the market that were vertical in nature, catering only to specific types of businesses instead of trying to respond to everyone in retail like we were trying to do. to make a long story short, we ended up selling this product to one of our clients for use in their 100 stores. the market opportunity for our point of sale system had severely diminished because we had locked into our original plan. we were going to get to island b no matter what storms were brewing, regardless of the resources it was requiring, or how much risk we were going to encounter. the good news is that we did learn our lesson from this, although we were pretty beaten up by it.
the next product we developed was an e-learning viewer (professional automated self study, or pass) that helped convert text materials quickly into self-study courseware. when we took on this project, based on what we learned from our point of sale product development experience, we decided to build releases of the product in six-month intervals or less. with this approach, we got the product to market very quickly, received timely feedback that helped make the offering more desirable, and we started making money right away. this was a far more successful approach because our plans took less time to execute and we modified those plans instantly with the marketplace feedback we got earlier and often.
there are two messages here.
- the first is that sometimes your desire includes everything you can dream of in one giant step, which might take a decade or more to achieve. while you absolutely want to keep the grandiose in mind, think about setting milestones along the way with shorter horizons for completion and reassessment. this way, you can test out whether the changes you are making are really moving you closer to what is important to you. with each milestone you pass, you also gain perspective as to whether what you thought you wanted is what you actually want.
- second, make the planning process about responding quickly and leveraging what you learn along the way, and know that changes to your desire, plan, plan tactics, timelines and expectations are not only okay, but expected.
regarding my objectives, where am i locking into my desire, plan, plan tactics, timeline or expectations that are positioning me to work harder rather than better? how can i keep at the top of mind my broader desire so that i don’t get overly committed to a plan or a tactic within that plan?