Planning is for Suckers

 “Are  you freaking kidding me!?” This phrase has been one that I’ve  verbalized a lot over the last couple of months. If I ever make it onto  “The Real Housewives” it might even become by tagline.

Starting  a business is the greatest adventure I’ve ever been on. I never could  have imagined the rollercoaster ride that I would experience in my first  year in a start-up. The peaks have been indescribable; exhilarating,  delicious, and incredibly gratifying, and the valleys have brought on  more sleepless nights than I care to share. Forming Spiirall required  hundreds of hours of planning. We researched and dreamed, and then we  schemed and we brainstormed. We planned strategy, budgets, and  technology; and then we planned for processes and for our talent  approach.

 AND  THEN WE ACTUALLY LAUNCHED. Looking back, I almost have to laugh out  loud at the difference in what we planned versus what has actually  transpired.

Many  of you are closing in on the end of your “busy season” and like me, you  probably had solid plans for how your season would go. Chances are  those plans were made months ago and likely didn’t include a plan B (or  C, D,E if required) to address the disruptors of your perfectly laid out  plans like staffing changes, client delays, scope changes, illness, or  technology issues. It’s likely that at some point over the last several  months you’ve asked yourself, “Why is this so hard!?!?” Many others ask,  “When will this cycle ever change!?!?” Honest answer, it won’t.

In  time you will probably get better at anticipating and preparing for  changes and that will certainly reduce some anxiety and yield more  effective results, but the reality is that our work is dynamic and is  dependent upon multiple variables outside our direct influence. The  faster we embrace plan changes and focus more on goal achievement and  less on whether it followed our original plan, the faster we can  celebrate the success of what we accomplished! You are only a sucker if  you keep planning, and expect that maybe next time, it will finally go  as you thought it would.

 The  secret to surviving the merry-go-round of planning, starting over and  then planning again is to look for the magic that happens in between. In  my experience, most of the really good stuff is realized as an outcome  from the unexpected. My proudest moments as a leader have been born out  of our most stressful times. Are you struggling to see the magic? Ask  yourself the following questions:

•   What did I learn? 
•   What did I teach? 
•   Who did you see rise to a new level of performance in the chaos?  
•   What process improvements will you enact to be better next time? 
•   What relationships are stronger today than they were before the plan had to change?

I’m  a sucker, I admit it. I’ll still engage in planning with the same  optimism I always bring. But I’ve learned to get agile and creative when  we need to change course, and I’ll be there in those moments, looking  for the magic that always comes.

Stay boundless,

Danielle