Gentle Reminders

Don't Get Railroaded by Thoughts

Letting thoughts run wild can be effective in brainstorming to come up with creative ideas, but then post-brainstorm choices must always be made to go down a particular path, subject to further brainstorms as new information is received along the path.

All feedback and symptoms of distress are clues to evaluate progress along the path.

We can get railroaded by the excessively obsessive thoughts of others or ourselves if our pursuit along the path is so single minded that we ignore feedback and symptoms and get trapped by blind pursuit.

Or we can get railroaded by diversionary or distracting thoughts if we are paralyzed by fears and doubts associated with risks of what might happen or if for any other reason we procrastinate progress.

The best course is a blend of focus, determination, awareness, and assessment.

Look and Listen Well and Ask the Right Questions

Just in the asking, answers will come.

Further probing inquiry will help reveal more insights.

Explore. Analyze. Evaluate. Diagnose root cause of effect.

Doing this front end mental work correctly, logically, with common sense, does much to make vital follow through action more likely and more fruitful.

Observing and evaluating the state of things consists of critique and analysis, required to ever deliberately bring about any improvement.

Assessments may be either positive or negative.

If positive, we commend, complement, praise, support, or merely comply, and then move on to other observations.

Negative assessments have more complex outcomes.

If we can see that there is something we can do about it, we have the choice to improve things.

If we are impacted, but see little we can do about it, we either simply observe and ignore, or we complain in some way.

When we are more severely impacted and at least seemingly constrained by circumstances beyond our control, we can experience varied degrees of frustration.

Frustration can be an indicator of opportunity for creative problem solving or innovation.

We can on our own or in concert with others figure out something we actually can do constructively about the situation. In so doing, we find a need and fill it. This is entrepreneurial endeavor at its most basic.

When we find no solution, we have the choice of either persisting or setting the matter aside to give attention to something else that we can do something about.

Not Business As Usual, But....

When cycles are down, when times are tough, business as usual or status quo is still always subject to change, adaptation, improvement.

When sales activity diminishes as customers cut back, and cash flow declines, trading either stops or terms of exchange adjust to make a transaction.

When companies as customers still need services, and companies as suppliers still need business, but neither can afford what the other normally wants, customary trading stops, unless price and terms and nature of the product and/or service is creatively modified to permit more, new transactions of mutual benefit.

Bonuses paid even though bonus goals are not met is destructive if it is really true. The mockery of being rewarded for poorer performance is devastating to the integrity of the organization. A worthy leader will not be so self serving. Things can easily go wrong in spite of best efforts, but totally objective performance bonuses justly paid have the exemplary power of integrity that subjective political payoffs do not.

People don't have to be rich to be greedy, but higher profile leaders by prominence set examples for good or ill. Those who follow the rule that "he who has the gold, rules" wreak havoc on an organization. "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" yields the power of integrity for the benefit of all concerned. Those more concerned about themselves than "all concerned" feed the worst natural inclinations in others, adding fuel to foster the corrosive effects of class warfare.