Today was a good day in a good week. But I’m only realizing now after supper. Strikes me that it often goes that way.
When you are busy, focused and enjoying yourself, almost by definition you stop noticing time pass and stop analyzing what you are doing.
Only looking back now am I surprised at a good patch.
Here’s hoping for more blind, ignorant, closed off, unthinking good patches 😉
The next guest on my podcast has not one but two masters degrees.
I worked with Dan for a couple of years in a corporate, and since then I have always been curious about his LinkedIn bio which reads as follows: “Thinking in curved lines of interdependence rather than straight lines of causality”
I pinned Dan down recently to explain himself. We had a nice long chat which I will release on Friday as the fourth episode in my podcast series.
I just downloaded edge browser for my phone.
I am also moving all my mail and calendar stuff to outlook.
Excel Word and PowerPoint are all work mainstays on my computer.
I am going to Microsoft because I pay for it. The idea is that I will be the customer rather than the product.
Hardware is probably next. Liking the look of windows surface and laptops.
We went on a beautiful hike this morning. You can get an idea of the vibe from the pic below.
When I got back I had a look at my phone: Meeting requests, complaints, fires to put out all over the place from work.
The contrast is jarring. But at least with a software based business it is possible to travel and work at the same time.
I need to practice juggling the two because I’m loving the hikes but I need to pay for it somehow!
How to achieve the mission?
The strategy lays out your approach to achieving a mission.
For example, if your mission is to pass an exam, your strategy should include some studying.
Laying out the right strategy will allow you to incorporate the mission into your life along with all your other commitments.
An important assignment, a mission is focussed.
It works towards the dream and vision you might have, but it is very much grounded in the real world. It is specific. Many missions may achieve a larger dream or a vision.
If my dream is to sell solar power to the world, my first relevant mission might be to become an accredited environmental engineer, or a solar technician.
A mission is an important task and it has a beginning and an end. It is a clarification of what is important and what is not. Do this, don’t do that.
Guided by the vision, a mission zooms in on the day to day stuff that needs to be executed before a dream comes true.
That’s my take.
I have found a useful framework for planning a project. Its origins are mostly from the military. Its application to the business world, and in fact to any dream you may want to fulfil are most useful.
I will be outlining each section and then over the coming days running through what I think each one means practically.
So, the sections/framework:
There is an interesting mix of harder and softer stuff in there. Culture and values being softer in my mind than tactics or strategy.
I’m finding it useful to focus and to plan. Something I can always use help on.
More important is to care about the customer’s point of view, to do the maximum emotional labor possible and to believe that what you do is worth money.
Giving a discount cheapens your work and probably makes the customer think they were hard done by – that they could have actually asked for a bigger discount.
Discounts don’t work.
Chimpwithcans 