Betting on the Future

We have the past and all the confused writing of history. Constantly unfolding rewrites as we learn more and understand better what happened and why. We have the present and all the chaos of the happening now reality. What does it mean? Do I understand all the pieces before me. How will they all or each affect me? What do I do with the present? What choices are optimum; which not?

And then we have the future. What will be. What can be. What ought to be.

We cannot change the past. It was what it was. [Some would say it is what it is! But then that is using the present tense for a past happening.]

We are the present and will do whatever it is we do in this moment. We can be more aware of our surroundings and understand them more fully, or we can be lazy and just wade through the chaos of now. Once happened, however, it is past and cannot be changed.

The future, though, is blank canvas on which to create desirable outcomes. It is the home for possible.

That motivates me. We know from past and present what is wrong and undesirable. What we do desire is possible if we plan for it and work toward fulfilling the dream. That is what ‘future’ is. It holds such promise! We can imagine many ‘what ifs’ and outcomes better than todays. Creativity is not only possible, it is pulling us forward to a new horizon we can effect.

I have been a strategic planner for many decades. The process is fairly consistent over most applications. We work from the general to the specific. We keep it simple and broad at the beginning of the process. That calls forth other elements that flow logically forward. Each step calls forth more details and that is when the details are most important. The general or broad is the focus on who we are, what we are and why we are. What is our mission for being? Not a catalog of what we do, but the why we do what we do.

The next step is the vision or dream of the long distant future. If our mission is successful, what will we look like 10 or 15 years from now? How would we be described then? Would the outcomes be as we dream them to be? You see, that’s the future we are working for. That is what is pulling us forward.

Now, how do we measure current health of the organization? Do we have the resources to perform as we hope? How do we know if we are succeeding in the short term? Or are we failing and need to repair our abilities in order to continue on our journey? What are those measurables?

From there we consider an inventory of our positives and negatives, internally, the ones we can control. Then the positives and negatives in our environment or surroundings. What could we adopt or defend against, you know, the opportunities and the threats.

The inventory is a reality check. It asks us to be realistic, to better understand what we have going for ourselves, and what we need to overcome.

Identifying the critical factors that are or will block our success is the next step. A short list of the most important factors is all that is needed. Maybe 6 or 10 items. Most may be related to one another. If so, group them.

Now consider which are the most important two. Focus on them. Imagine them successfully managed in time. write a measurable goal statement for the top two factors. What action is needed, what is the measurable result, and by what date will it be accomplished? That’s the goal statement. Below it, tick off the items from the inventory list of positives and negatives. These are the areas that will need inclusion in the goal if success is desired.

Once these two (or three) goals are identified, detailed work is employed to create the action plans – what needs doing, by whom and by what date – to truly bring the goal to fruition.

That’s planning. That’s strategic planning. It does not start with the end product and work backward. It starts with the primary value of who and what we are, what we do, and why we do it. That is the focus. Then the dream. The rest is used to make that dream happen.

If the dream is undefined, there is no plan. There are only unrelated details that will frustrate and block progress toward the desired outcome.

So many people get this wrong. They go about planning in reverse and then wonder why results are poor.

Now you know why.

December 30, 2020