Much is made these days of living in the moment, or going with the flow, isn’t it?
As someone who narrowly cheated death, I can certainly see the merit in such an approach to life. However my experiences have also taught me the enormous value of having my ‘what’s next?’ firmly in my back pocket.
How are things going for you? Are your ideas, plans and targets panning out for you? If they are, great and well done to you – I assume you have also got your ‘what next?’ in sight, driving you forward?
If they’re not, then commiserations – however, I trust you are adapting your plans and also have your ‘what next?’ ready to launch when appropriate.
I learnt when recovering from my injuries that it’s no good just considering the one path to follow. It may be the primary target for now, however you have to give space to thinking of the ‘what next?’.
Take a moment to consider the COVID pandemic (which, as I could vouch for over Christmas, doesn’t go away)…as individuals, a Government and, indeed, the world as a whole, we were thinking on our feet, firefighting a tsunami of terrifying problems and not really knowing what would happen next.
All the talk now, both reflective and predictive, is about a lack of preparedness. As a country, certainly, we were not ready to tackle a global pandemic. There were so many aspects of it that had clearly never been entertained in tabletop exercises and systems and processes fell over very quickly as they were engulfed by the sheer enormity of what struck.
But equally quick was the race to devise and roll out a vaccine – it was abundantly clear that would be the vital ‘what’s next?’ as communities struggled with lockdowns.
And a standout throwaway line I recall from the reams written about daily developments was that the initial contribution from the infamous JVT (who can forget him, Deputy Chief Medical Officer Professor Jonathan Van Tam,) was nothing about the make-up of the vaccine itself but rather the need to stockpile freezers.
The ‘what’s next?’ of a world class vaccine would be useless without the means in which to store it effectively.
In life/business, what next doesn’t need to be acted on straight away but identifying what it is, what it may look like and where the resources are going to come from to act when needed are vital.
If you don’t, then you may well achieve your current goal but then find yourself on the backfoot with moving forward.
Back to the pandemic and the successful businesses were those who learned to flex at a time when the world as they knew it was shutting down in front of their eyes. I, for one, realised early on my set-up was lean enough to adapt as I saw job security start to slide
You may well be rich enough, large enough to have several lines running at the same time however, if you are the driving force behind them, you need to concentrate on embedding one at a time (think Elon Musk).
What next doesn’t need to be huge or make a million. It just needs to be there as part of your planning.
I carry a small notebook around in my handbag as ideas often strike me out of the blue. Sometimes, when I sit down to consider them, they are rubbish and simply get thrown away. Often times there is a grain of something that then leads on to something else, then something else etc until a ‘what next?’ suddenly snaps into focus.
I honestly believe that the era of ‘where will you be in five years?’ question in job interviews seems dead in the water – not least because most people’s answers will presumably be working from home!
Nevertheless, we all still need goals, something to keep us driving forward.
The pandemic will retreat further into our past and before long we will be leading staff who didn’t experience furlough and the idea of something for nothing Government handouts – our destiny will be increasingly back in our own hands so let’s be prepared.
What is your what next?
I’m pushing on with Plan A but I’ve always got Plan B, C & D ready to action.
