I used to work with someone who had an email signature that read – “Your failure to plan does not constitute an emergency on my part”.
When I would be up late fixing bugs, I would come back to this line and think about this line – “whose emergency is this?”.
You can’t plan for everything, but you can plan for your need.
I recently finished a month-long planning and strategy session with a client. At the end of it, they wanted all the answers, all the plans, everything laid out from them from A to B. I sensed this, I knew it was coming and in the final delivery, when I showed them the plan but also the recommendations that would have to be put in place to make it work, the caveats that would have to exist for it to become a success.
We spent more time discussing the recommendations and caveats than the plan as a whole.
Because it’s those recommendations and caveats, those elements are not part of a plan that will make the plan possible and lead it to success.
