what my clients engaged with and where they disengaged.It sounds crazy – like a waste of planning time – but it’s true.Īnd I know many business owners that are the same, they set “goals” and make plans but then never look at them again – the difference is that most of them tell themselves a story about goal setting and planning not working, constricting creativity and clashing with their entrepreneurial desire for freedom above all else!įor me the true value of the exercise lies in the planning process – going through the motions in a comprehensive and considered way. If I then decide that is what I really want to “do” then the next step is simple – Step 1: implement the plan. My plan always tells me how I can achieve what I set out to do and my plan gives me the confidence to take action in the knowledge that the desired outcome is achievable. The way I figure it, if you collect together the basic information – the find-outables, the obvious, the controllables, the fixed variables – by doing due diligence and data discovery then you have more of an opportunity to stay present and open, seeing signposts and possibilities as they present themselves.Īs a business owner how often do you get kiboshed or paralysed by “The How” of the matter? I have always liked to know the when’s, where’s, who’s and how’s, as well as the what’s and why’s – the last one being fundamental to my curious nature but probably a little tiresome to my parents …… but why? This, I believe, is why I love a good plan. Ingrained from an early age – timetabling, structure, routine, order, neatness, precision and a certain standard of behavioural excellence (hmmmm – expected but not always delivered, but who could stay mad at that face!). I am still mocked by my family for always needing to put like with like and create lines of order! I imagine I was quite a sight – blond pigtails, red terry toweling pants and most probably red wellies. You would often find me “parading” on the sideline of the parade square on a Sunday as the band played big tunes and the boys looked stern in their Sunday best. So I overdosed on structure and routine from a young age – for the first ten years with military precision witnessing the strict discipline of a military school. (And now you know – nope, they don’t turn the bells off on the last day of term). No, before you think it, I did not grow up in some strange Pavlovian experiment – I have always lived in schools as my parents were both teachers and also either housemastering or headmastering – 18 years bouncing around boarding schools during term-time and then home, to school, during the holidays. I always have – maybe because growing up they were everywhere I lived – a bell literally would go off every 40 minutes.
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