The New Year is a Time for Vision Making
Each year, a few days before New Year’s Eve, I head off to my mountain retreat in Big Bear Lake, Calif., to recharge my batteries. It’s a great opportunity to spend time with the family and prepare for the onslaught of the coming year.
It’s also a good time to give thought to the vision you have for your business and life over the next year.
It’s hard to hit a target you’re not aiming at. The new year is a great time to think about some of your plans and goals for the next 12 months (and beyond). Even if all you have is a couple days, take the time every January to slow down and do some “vision making” for your business. Remember that a successful businessperson needs to work “on” the business as well as “in” the business. Work “on” your business this month by creating your vision for 2009.
Happy New Year!
Ivan
“A New Years resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other”.
More great advice from Ivan. I think everyone is guilty about this once in a while. You really do have to make some time to think about goals.
As a BNI Executive Director, one of my goals is to have a dentist and a manicurist in the same chapter- I want to see if they fight “tooth and nail”.
Shawn McCarthy
More sage advice from Dr. Misner. As Yogi might have said: “If you don’t know where you are going, you won’t get there (or something like that).”
Because of the economy we have many people in our BNI chapter that are really hurting. It is difficult to refer business that is not there. Because of these extreme conditions is it time for our chapter to refocus? The easy and obvious answer is to preach the same line i.e. Refer, Refer, Refer! But we literally have companies facing bankruptcy. Without undue drama, our chapter could be getting smaller as companies disappear. I am the education coordinator. Should I stand up and speak the truth or is it better to put on the happy face and ignore the proverbial “pregnant elephant” in the room?
It is my firm belief that everyone plans whether they admit it or not. Some plan to grow and some plan to fail. Those that take the time to reflect on where they want to be and when they want to be there; create managable goals. Those that look at the big picture as a disaster plan too…….but that is to complain and are fear based in motivation. Why because they can not see the forest for the trees.
It is time to be Yoda and not Darth Vader
Happy New Year Dr. Misner and all you great networkers,
My favorite place to reflect, plan, and dream is a long walk on the beaches of Volusia County (Daytona) Florida. Since I seldom get there with all the family chores, I have to settle for a good walk around my subdivision.
I take everything I am doing apart mentally and try to put it back together in a better order. I do this to make sure that I am still leaning my ladder against the right building. If you can set money worries aside, it is actually an exciting time to watch as things unfold.
It is still survival of the fitest and this requires the ability to adapt and change where and when necessary. As my beloved CPA admonishes business owners, “Don’t you dare close it down as long as there is the potential for an imcome stream. Where the hell do you think you are going to get hired?”
There is still money being spent. We all just need to position ourselves in its path.
Keep at it,
Tom Doiron
Atlanta
John, Thanks for the posting but, we’ll have to agree to disagree. I think your comments are very interesting. They are exactly the thing that I’ve been writing about relating to focusing on opportunities instead of focusing on what is not working.
This blog posting was about creating our vision for the year and the direction you take it is about how bad things are. I get it – things are tough for many people.
However, if we want to succeed in tough economic times we must be looking for opportunities instead of focusing mostly on the problems. Only by getting back to the basics of our individual businesses and improving our personal networks will we start to turn around the impact of a recession on our business. I am absolutely positive that taking an article about vision and turning it into a discussion about how bad things are in the business world will NOT improve anything.
Looking for opportunities, focusing on how we can improve, looking to build our networks and creating our vision for how we are going to do these things – that is how we will beat a recession. Don’t “ignore the elephant in the room” and more importantly, don’t let it dictate what pro-active actions you can take to deal with the problem. Focusing on problems never works. Focusing on solutions are what works!
My adivce is – that as an Educational Coordinator in BNI help give members hope by giving them ideas, suggestions, and knowledge on how to look for solutions. They know there are problems. We all know there are problems. That knowledge won’t help us. Building our networks will.
Take these suggestions to heart. I am meeting people every day that are doing well when their competition is not. The biggest difference I see between the two is the problem-focus vs. the solutions-focus. I chose solutions.
I’ve written several blogs on this topic. See the last one here:
http://networking.entrepreneur.com/2008/10/09/i-refuse-to-participate-in-a-recession-now-more-than-ever/
Great message Ivan! So a lot of my goals are wrapped around your goals this year, as I am blessed to be heading up the new technology project for BNI, http://www.bniconnect.com. As my friend Reed Morgan says, the grass is always greenest where you water it. BNI is focused on the future of the organization – how can we help our members build their networks not only wide, but DEEP. As you said to me recently, old Chinese proverb? the best time to plant the oak tree was 25 years ago, the next best time is now. Thank you for planting that tree 24 years ago, and thank you for planting another one this year! To our success!