Your Richly Imagined Future (Part One)
Robert M. Gignac
Taynac
& Associates
54
Crawford Rose Drive
Aurora,
Ontario
L4G
4R4
(905)
841-0837
rgignac@taynac.com
I was thinking about the concept of the
‘future’, how quickly we are moving toward it, and the fact that our future is
out there on the horizon. But where is
the horizon. A quick search of the Internet told me the horizon is 5 kilometers
away if you are 6 feet tall. But that didn’t satisfy my curiosity, it only
served to create larger questions: How do we expand our personal horizons,
goals, and have an impact on people around us? How do we expand our sphere of
influence? I want to share with you 4 steps (two in this issue, two in the
next) that I think we can use to create this expansion.
Step One - Our Current Reality
We have a fetish about our current reality,
with far too many people living by the motto: “Give me data or give me death”.
We were taught in Management 101 that if you can't measure it - you couldn’t
manage it. Every time we get the opportunity we measure something. It seems to
be a little known fact that the most important things in life are not
measurable. There are people I know (mostly male) that if asked by their spouse
“How much do you love me?” - would answer 7.4 and then wonder why they left
upset because they were down .48 from last month.
The problem? We are supposed to think about
tomorrow, but we get stuck in yesterday. Then we perpetuate it, because we keep
going over and over yesterday. We do it all the time - people will gladly tell
you about the great winter storm of '87. Move on! I’m not immune to this,
sometimes I do the same thing - I look at seminar my evaluation forms - 79
responses, 77 thought it was great - 2 people thought I was an idiot, and I lie
awake that night wondering what I did wrong. I missed the good data to focus on
the bad.
Here is an important point - where does all
of our data come from? Data comes from yesterday - there is no data tomorrow.
Granted, we have our forecasts and projections, we have hopes and dreams, but
we have no data about tomorrow. Tomorrow from today's perspective is an act of
faith. Since there is no data tomorrow, we spend our time looking at
yesterday’s data. Unfortunately, the more we look at yesterday - the more we
duplicate it.
On a personal level, many of us continue to
go over and over our own lives, we remember conflicts of 5-10-15 years ago and
can't get by them. Wayne Dyer's book ‘Your Sacred Self’ contained an important
phrase for me - “You can't have a different past. Your past was perfect to get
you where you are”. It’s what he didn’t say that was important. He didn’t say
your past was perfect, just that it was perfect to get you where you are, once
you realize that let it go and move on. Now, I'm not saying ignore the past,
and the fact and figures, that would be foolish. But, once you have the facts,
understand you them, and you have it clear - move on, let it go…
Step Two - Your Richly Imagined Future
People often talk about the future using
terms such as Mission Statement, Vision, Values, etc. I like the phrase ‘Richly
Imagined Future’; I think it is more imaginative and paints a better picture
than ‘mission statement’. Many I have spoken with have told me anytime they
hear the word mission statement; they pretty much want to be physically ill.
Most are carefully worded, corporate feel-good statements that do nothing to
represent a mission or vision. How many times have you seen this on a corporate
wall?
“Our mission is to become the number one
supplier in our chosen marketplace….”
Big deal! I hope it didn’t take too many
committee meetings to dream that up. Is there actually somebody out there
making one up that says, “We’d like to be the number three supplier”? If people
don't prefer you to the other organization you won’t be in business very long.
So what kind of “Richly Imagined Future” can we talk about - let me give you an
example…
I was doing some training work with a
medical products company, and I was asked to speak at their annual sales
conference. Those of you in involved in sales will identify with this. With a
motivated sales team in the room, the president stood at the podium and said,
“Our mission for the year 2002 is to hit 150 million in sales!” That generated
huge applause, plenty of whooping and hollering. I was speaking after her, what
was I going to say? I spoke about creating a ‘Richly Imagined Future’ for
themselves on a personal level, then I asked them the following: “Based on the
average consumption of your products, by your average consumer, how many lives
would you positively impact in the year 2002 if you hit your sales target?”
They looked puzzled. Then someone offered up the number 5,000. I asked them to
try this out: “Our mission for the year 2002 is to positively impact 5,000
human lives”. Which one would you get up for in the morning? Brag to your
grandkids about? Can you see the difference?
If our ‘Richly Imagined Future’ doesn't
focus on the service aspect, doing things for people that make us happy and
proud to be in business - then I wonder if we are doing the right thing.
Certainly we all want our businesses to make money, don’t get me wrong, I’m not
against that at all. I’m a big fan of making money. But our purpose and ‘Richly
Imagined Future’ should be about service, and inspiring others, not just about
dollars and cents. Your vision, your imagined future should be a picture so
clear and vivid that you can carry it with you mentally.
Step One - Current reality: know it,
understand it, once you have it clear - let it go, that was the past. Step Two
- Your Richly Imagined Future: Creating a picture for yourself, providing value
and service to others. Do that well and the money will follow.
In the next issue we’ll explore Step Three -
Disruption, and Step Four- Making Choices. Our ability to deal with these with
the next two items will be the key to creating ‘Your Richly Imagined Future’
Copyright 2001 - Taynac & Associates