We have all had the dreaded experience of weather, illness, accident, and emergency restructures to our day. While many of these things can be major inconveniences where the rescheduling is a minor annoyance of no initial concern, many times these inconveniences are minor with the rescheduling becoming a huge and frustrating hassle.
Why is this so?
There is no doubt that we, as humans, do not like change. Our primitive minds are still primarily concerned with the conservation of energy and resources, and when we must utilize those to change something we feel doubly inconvenienced. But there are more pressing, seemingly minor issues afoot that actually increase our sense of inconvenience.
For one, many people do not maintain a clear, current, and accurate calendar and task list of commitments. How much more difficult does the person with an incomplete inventory make it on himself to reschedule those commitments when he doesn’t even know what they all are?
At the organizational level, a lack of clarity on mission, vision, and strategic plans also increases the inconvenience associated with re-arranging resources and staff commitments. When we’re not clear on what the organization is working on and who owns what part of that work, it’s nearly impossible to prevent the “bumper car” experience of re-assigning overlapping work.
We balk at the suggestions to maintain clear and current lists of our commitments and then scream in frustration when we don’t have a handle on it all to address emergencies with clarity. There is no substitute for good planning in the good times. The key is to build systems that are simple enough to maintain through the tough times.
Where are your inventories incomplete?
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