DARE hope for the best, but plan for the worst
With another year coming to an end, and the New Year looming, hopes, dreams and resolutions start playing around in our mind, I invite you to start thinking now, a little ahead of the crazies of the holiday season, about what you want to achieve next year.
MindTools is a great source for templates to help you create your plan.
You need a PLAN!
In one of my recent blogs I mentioned the reports which indicate there are more over-50 unemployed than at any time in history.Yes, job fairs are swollen to the max with people: 60-year-olds in line with the 20-somethings. It’s hard out there
Over the past few years, I have met hundreds of women over 40 who lost their jobs, saw their retirement plans vaporize and, like thousands of other Americans, are struggling with demanding priorities. They swarm workshops, flood chatrooms, and burn hours networking. They craft and recraft resumes, different ones for different employers. They respond to anonymous job postings, and they write long blogs and thoughtful position statements on Linked In, hoping a prospective employer will notice. They post on social networking sites that have become refuges for job-seekers and career-changers over 40.
Like myself, almost none of these women have the option of saying “I give up.” And almost none of them want to give up.
HOW TO DESIGN A PLAN: Some thoughts and tips:
–º Wants and Needs. I encourage you to draw up a plan (with a significant other, if appropriate) that takes into account what you really want and what you absolutely need.
–º This plan can be as simple or detailed as you need. But it should first emphasize outcomes you want to achieve, and then the outputs to get you there. A plan that will enable you to anticipate, manage and gain a measure of control – over your lives, time, and money. Your way.
–º Get a template to help you. Templates for planning are all over the Web, including Google, Microsoft Office, and sites such as www.mindtools.com and www.12manage.com – both of which have so many charts and templates, your eyes will sizzle.
Actually, some of the best plans I’ve ever seen are on one page, can cover up to three years, and list in 3-to-6 month increments (in agenda format), the outcomes or milestones to be reached. From those can be developed 90-day detailed timetables for outputs (the “to-do” list). So-called equant tools like PERT (Program Evaluation and Review Technique) and GANTT charts (also called Critical Path Analysis) can help you take into account sequential requirements and time frames for activities. They are extremely helpful for complex planning, especially when you feel so overwhelmed that you literally don’t know what to do first.
–º Think of yourself as your life’s manager. All of us, regardless of our chosen lifestyle, education, careers, or geographies, are managers: of ourselves, our households, our families, our work. In the current economy, we’ve had to become even more diligent, more frugal, and more time-sensitive , about everything. The language of business – strategy, operations, finance and management – has become the language of our very lives.
It might be true that “man plans, God laughs” but without a plan it’s your demons that will get the upper hand.
So DARE plan! Yes hope for the best, but get a PLAN.
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