I am a planner. Always have been. I keep a running checklist of things I need to do and my calendar is always up to date. Planning gives me a sense of control in my life, both at work and at home. I believe that the act of planning itself is inherently good. The thought process of thinking ahead prepares us to react more appropriately to an unexpected future.
But I also know that all plans are flawed. A favorite quote of mine attributed to General Dwight Eisenhower goes, “Planning is essential, but the plan is useless.” Plans are meant to be fluid. Plans are meant to be reevaluated and changed because circumstances never play out exactly as you envisioned they would.
At the end of the day, a plan is really nothing more than an educated guess. Nobody can predict the future. We can always spend more time and energy on developing a plan, but the marginal utility of our planning efforts decrease as we plan further and further out.
Give up on the guesswork. Decide what you’re going to do this week, not this year. Figure out the next most important thing and do that.
Rework
Despite knowing this fact, I still often allocate a disproportionate amount of time and energy into planning for the future. I’m guilty of working tirelessly on a detailed plan because it makes me feel good. I’ve fooled myself more than once into believing that the further out I plan the more control I have over the outcome of my project.
But then reality inevitably strikes. Priorities change, self imposed deadlines are missed, and suddenly my precious plan is worthless. My guesses were all wrong. Should I be surprised?
I should know better than to put excessive time and energy into guessing about a future I can’t control. Detailed planning is an activity appropriate for the short term.
Get clear on what you’re doing this week. Don’t waste time trying to accurately predict the activities of next month. It sounds like common sense. But time and again I have been guilty of placing way too much faith in long term plans that were built upon best-case scenarios, unrealistic expectations, and unattainable deadlines. Not only was it a waste of my time, but it also made me look foolish when my self imposed deadlines were inevitably missed.
We need to be smarter about allocating our time and energy into creating plans with appropriate levels of detail. Let’s admit that long term plans are guesses. Plans extending too far out into the future serve better as a compass, pointing us in the right direction, not as a set of turn by turn directions.
Rather, we should focus on getting the plan right for the immediate future. That’s where the time invested in the details will reap the greatest benefit. We have much more control over our ability to execute a plan for this week. We may still be wrong, but the margin for error is reduced.
Project management is all about breaking big goals into small tasks. The same concept is true when we put together our plans. Spend less time trying to guess the future. Define your milestone objectives, but then focus on the plan to make progress this week.
The real work is what’s being done today – right now. Do you have enough detail in your plan to navigate the next 24 hours? Progress requires disciplined focus on accomplishing the next step, not daydreaming about how we hope to accomplish next month. Maintain a strategy for the future, but plan to execute within a timeframe you can control.
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