Plans are Nothing, Planning is Everything

In a world of uncertainty and opportunity, plans never work out, but planning remains a critical exercise.

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Alex shared excellent advice on career planning, by reminding us that life rarely goes according to plan. Very rarely do we look back to our college years and say “I got here exactly the way I thought I would”. While it is true that long-term roadmaps could be 90% worthless, it could easily be said that 90% of those who make it to business school regularly conduct planning exercises to recalibrate their priorities and direction. So really, it’s less about what you plan to do, but how you are planning to do it.

The “biennial checkin” framework provided in the article at the top does an excellent job of ensuring you are working with the right people (#2), building the right product (#1), and crafting the right pitch (#3 & 4). It also applies the Hedgehog Concept to check the role is what you are good at (#3), passionate about (#1 & 2), and economically valuable (#4). Alongside these guidelines, there are a few mindsets one can utilize to bring themselves where they want to be.

• Be Flexible — oftentimes one could focus too heavily on going from A to Z directly without considering alternative routes. While there are always exceptions, the path towards a desired destination is often littered with detours that add value in bringing you where you end up. Focus on the general direction, but be flexible in allowing different roles and opportunities to get you there.
• Think Long Term — Rome wasn’t built in a day, and “overnight” successes do not occur overnight. We oftentimes can only see what is in front of us, and overlook (or do not have access to) the road a person took to reach their success. And while we all hit various points at various times, there remains a lot of opportunity ahead for anything to happen if stay on-top of our growth.
• Seek Challenges — when comfortable, it can be tempting to sit still and take a passive approach towards situations. If this creates happiness for a person, then that is totally fine. But for those seeking a particular career orientation that haven’t reached their desired destination, then it becomes important to go out of their way to find new challenges and responsibilities.

Ultimately, everything we do, including planning, is a skill that we can work on and improve in. As we learn more, and experience more, we can do a better job of accounting for volatility and variables which could improve the outcome of our plans. And as we learn, our plans will likely update, which will only improve the understanding and satisfaction of our goals.

Planning is everything, the plan is nothing.
— Dwight D. Eisenhower

Applying the Hedgehog Concept

For more on the Hedgehog Concept, please click the above.

Have any thoughts on plans or planning? Feel free to share them in the comments below or to @jonli. Look forward to your feedback!