“Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.” – Napoleon Bonaparte
I’ve been fortunate to have many opportunities over the years to help leaders and their organizations plan for their future. Developing strategies, coming up with new ideas, thinking about future customers and products and markets and people and everything that goes with it. It’s not only meaningful work, it’s also incredibly energizing.
What’s less energizing is what too often happens after all of that strategizing and brainstorming. Nothing. Nothing happens. Extraordinarily talented groups of people who work extremely hard and are passionate about what they do leave those kinds of events and go back to doing what they were doing before, and no real change happens.
Why is that? Why do organizations repeatedly spend time and money and energy thinking about and planning for their futures, and then go back to business as usual? Why use all those resources if you’re just going to do what you’ve been doing?
The number one reason is fear. Fear of making a mistake, fear of looking stupid, fear of trying an idea that other people won’t understand or will criticize you for, fear of lots of things. It’s safer for us to continue doing what we’re doing than to take a step into the unknown.
We do the same things in our own lives. We dream and brainstorm and ponder and come up with all sorts of wonderful lives we’d like to lead. Then we go on leading the exact same life we’re already leading now. And while it’s possible that all that dreaming does eventually impact our path, in most cases, it’s just dreaming, and nothing comes of it.
Don’t do that. Don’t think about the future, and what it could be, and what it needs to be, and then go back to what you were doing. Don’t hesitate to do what you know in your gut is right. Don’t hold back from making changes that need to be made because you’re afraid others will disagree with or criticize you.
Whether it’s in your life or in your role as a leader, you have the right and the responsibility to do what you think is best. You have the right and the responsibility to make the changes that you think need to be made so that the future is everything it can and should be.
There are too many people and organizations that are stuck in dream-but-don’t-do mode. Make time for serious thought and deliberation. Then get busy making change.
