Strategic Thinking In Your Home Town – Eg Townsville

Somewhere in the world you woke up today – I woke up in Townsville in Northern Australia.  And then – through a series of unique events today you have now found yourself reading and wondering how strategic thinking applies to you.

And then once you figure out if this article is relevant to you – you may study it and determine what (if any actions) you are will take to make your activities more “strategic”.

In my last article on strategy I asked you to consider and to list all of the important categories of your life.  Eg Health, wealth, relationships, and so on.  Remember it is YOUR list – so you can choose.  Or you might just google something like “life balance” or “wheel of life” and borrow the categories.

Before we continue – what was the point of having a “where you are now”?  Eg I awoke in Townsville, and Townsville is where is am now.   Please just mentally answer the question “what town or city am I in now?”.  Thanks.

Now – because you know you are somewhere specific – by definition you also know that you “are”.  You are aware of being.  Stay with me now,  I promise to not get too off the planet.

Who is responsible for you being right where you are today?

The answer that we are looking for today is “I am”.   I am completely responsible for being here in Townsville today.  I could be anywhere in the world – and because I accept complete responsibility for my life – I can state that I am responsible.

What has this to do with ‘strategy’?  Again – just stay with me for while longer!

Here is your trimtab question.  What is the purpose of you being where you are today?   What categories of your life (remember your list) are your activities today going to improve or maintain?

Today – right where you are – because that is where you have chosen to work (or not work) on WHAT you have chosen to achieve in each of your categories – what are you progressing?

That is “strategy”.  The WHAT you are doing to take you to a preferred, selected outcome.  I like the idea of having to prove in court that you have the WHAT done after you have finished.  ie evidence.  In business this might be “show me the graph, or a bank statement with an number greater than your target, or a new store photo.  The more specific the evidence the easier the next step – the HOW.

Being responsible for our own outcomes is the keystone for power in strategy.

If accepting responsibility for everything in your life is true for you, there is a cost.  That cost is that your key responsibility becomes to choose and design your future.  To choose your preferred outcomes in each of the categories of life.  Because not choosing is stating that things outside of you determine and control your life.

One of my favourite sayings is that if you don’t have a plan, even in Townsville, you WILL become part of someone else’s – and you may not like it.   And you now know that the ‘Plan’ comes AFTER your choices for each category of your life.

If you do not choose and design your life as you want it to be – then your plan will be “whatever“.  And because of this ‘fuzzy thinking’, you will be caught up in an endless stream of opportunity seeking.  You will jump from one to another in any area (category) of your life where you do not have a clear outcome.

Lack of clear outcome means it is impossible to choose steps that will produce that outcome (which does not exist until you choose it).   With this you will probably not finish many of those steps – because you have jumped to the new set.  You will be sucked in the the HOW (which I call TACTICS) – and the vacuum created by having no goal means you will have limited strategic power.

Doing more without choosing the WHAT leads only to overwork, misery, anger, frustration and probably divorce and/or drug abuse.   The answer to doing the wrong things is not to do more, faster, better.

“A system can only produce predictable outcomes when the output of the system is chosen before the system is designed.  (At least here in Townsville..)”

And most likely the same applies wherever you are. “Tactics” are in the design of the system.   And you don’t need to know them until you have a strategy.  Knowing thousands of them and trying to apply them (without strategy) will result in overload and misery.     I know because I spent a decade spinning faster and faster, collected better and better tactics.

Now it is simple.  Choose the categories that make up your life.  Choose exactly what you want for each area – and know what evidence will show you have  it.   And only then choose the steps and way you are going to manage them.    There are other steps – but this one is your primary responsibility.

Choosing to design your life is also the key to motivation.  You are in control of your destiny.  You have a sense of power, and your life can become a work of art.  Instead of the pressure-filled grind chasing opportunities and never completing – you get to be in control.

So – for today – choose your categories.  And be wherever you are!

Ciao from “Strategic Townsville”!

James Hooper

Townsville Business Coach and Strategist