The Best Laid Plans

There are some who would say, "Why plan? Things change as soon as you step onto the proverbial battlefield." In the months since I last blogged, I have been a bit "shell shocked," to continue the military metaphor, with unexpected and conflicting demands on my time coming at me from several fronts.

So, while I agree that it is generally true that things do not work out as they are planned, I still believe that planning is valuable, for several reasons:

1. Plans help me to visualize what is to be done. According to Stephen Covey, one of the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is to "begin with the end in mind." Planning forces you to define what the end is to be.
2. Plans help me to adjust to changing circumstances. Rather than simply react, I can be proactive in how I respond when things change. Do I adjust the plan? Do I put the plan on hold? Do I persist?
3. Plans help me to stay focused on my priorities. If I haven't planned, then I am likely to overlook someting that I should do. Like everyone else, I have a lot of demands on my time. I want to be intentional, and address the most important things first.
4. Plans help me to be more realistic. My eyes are bigger than my stomach, and my heart is bigger than my brain! There are so many interesting projects and possibilities and worthy pursuits -- and so little time. Planning forces me to take something off, when I take something on.
5. Plans make me a better colleague and friend. If someone asks me for help, I want to give a reliable response as to if and when I am willing and able to do what is asked.

William Ward, the inspirational writer and speaker, identified "four steps to achievement: Plan purposefully. Prepare prayerfully. Proceed positively. Pursue persistently." Proverbs 16:9 tells us, "The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps." I hold these thoughts close.

Lateral Thinking

When talking about the value of lateral thinking for the creativity of leaders, I was reminded how much fun it can be.

From a business perspective, lateral thinking improves problem solving skills, and is a great way to kick-off a planning or problem-solving meeting. The general idea is that verbal and analytical processing tends to occur in your brain's left hemisphere; visual and graphic processing happens on the right. By translating pictures into words or words into pictures, you are brain-shifting (in layman's terms). Cultivating this ability enables you to view a problem or an opportunity in a wider variety of ways than without lateral thinking.

How do you cultivate this ability? One of my favorite ways is to play a form of Pictionary(r), a game that gives you a word or a phrase that you have to get others to guess by using only non-verbal images. So if you are the player who is drawing, you first read the card (left side), and then translate it into images (right side). The audience looks at your scribbles, and tries to verbalize what it is that you are drawing.

As a meeting ice-breaker, it not only gets the brain-shifting circuits working, it tends to energize and relax people at the same time. I will often use terms related to the purpose of the meeting to get people thinking along those lines. For example, if I were facilitating a project planning session, I might have terms such as: project, schedule, scope, and milestone. I start the meeting with the easy one, and draw something like you see in the diagram below.

If that didn't work I might try a chart with a forecasting arrow, to represent another way to "project." If that still did not work, I might try a "sounds like" and draw a dog protecting a house. How would you picture it? How about the others?

Another good exercise for lateral thinking is a rebus puzzle. Here, the idea is to look at the words in the puzzle as a graphical image, to understand the implied word or phrase. For example:

MOON
MIAMI

would elicit the song, "Moon over Miami." The Franklin Institute has a page of fun puzzlers.

No shift -- try it, it's fun.

A New School Year

One of the things I love about my job is that I gain closure when a school year ends, and enjoy anticipation of the new year in the fall.

Tom Peters has said that knowledge workers should "projectize everything." Turn all of your work into projects, i.e., temporary endeavors to create a unique product or service (www.pmi.org). Temporary means only that the work has a start and an end; it does not necessarily mean short-term. A unique product or service is the desired result.

Besides enjoying the anticipation and closure that a school year provides, I find that projectizing myself is very helpful. It keeps me interested in what I am doing, and focused on the desired results. For example, I treat each course I teach as a project, even if I've taught the course before. I find that my classes vary greatly, depending on the engagement of the students, the current events we have for discussion, time of day, etc., so each one is unique.

Another way that projectizing is helpful is to provide a warning system for OVERLOAD. I have developed a sense of how many projects I can juggle at one time: my optimum is two classes, one writing project, two volunteer projects, one home improvement project, and one self improvement project. More than that, then my relationships and home responsibilities suffer.

Since I am teaching three different courses this fall, I know I need to cut back on volunteering (but will probably just let the home project idle!). In the same way, projectizing helped me realize that having five self-improvement projects, four home improvement projects, one class, two volunteer projects and four writing projects for the summer was probably unrealistic.

Finally, I like to projectize because it helps me to avoid becoming overwhelmed. Taking each project and breaking it into work packages or tasks (i.e., creating a work breakdown structure), helps me to better gauge how long the project will take. Then I can make realistic commitments to my students, colleagues, and family. (The dogs don't get it, though -- they are all about, "What have you done for me lately?")

The Power of Planning

As I work on my textbook, I am reminded that the value of many techniques is not in their result, but in the process of using them. For example, using quality function deployment (i.e., QFD or House of Quality) is not really about ending up with a matrix of specifications for statistical process control, but more about creating a common vision and consensus about how to meet customers' requirements.

Project planning is much the same. The process of planning can be team-building and goes a long way to understanding and meeting customers' expectations. It can be especially helpful in identifying interdependencies and clarifying trade-offs for decision-making.

A story that comes to mind that illustrates how project planning can deliver results far beyond a specific timetable is the experience of Connie. She was a summer intern, in between years of a prestigious full time MBA program. Young and bright, she did not have much self confidence, and was assigned a rather daunting task: assuring business continuity for a Fortune 100 company headquartered in the midst of the host city for the Olympics. Company executives were busy running their divisions, preparing for the marketing and operational challenges of the Olympics – and Connie was supposed to get them to make serious contingency plans for a variety of risks that could interrupt their business. She was having a difficult time commanding their attention and gaining their support.

We worked together to develop a project plan to develop a continuity plan (yes, a plan to develop a plan!). The project identified the pieces of information that were needed, who should participate, the specific scenarios to be addressed, and the desired results from the continuity plan. Once this was captured in a professional-looking time line, with a critical path and deadlines, Connie asked for another set of meetings with the division executives. Armed with an understanding of the interdependencies and assumptions that were reflected in the project plan, she approached these meetings with a new sense of confidence. As a result, the executives committed the proper attention and resources to business continuity and the company was well-prepared for the Olympics.

Things often do not go according to plan, but that's not the power of planning. Be clear. Be ready. Be committed. Don't be too busy to plan.