The next phase calls for action, both cognitive and physical, to complete your personal strategic plan by Implementation or tactics. In the First Gulf War, General Colin Powell wasthe strategist, General Norman Schwarzkopf was the tactician.
In your world, you are both.
Implementation Process
Implementation is the final phase wherein you address specific Focused Tasks and complete them…by yourself, possibly with the help of supportive people—your team. You will need to muster the skills, passion, and perseverance to complete each task.
Progress on some Tasks may falter and they may have to be reevaluated. This may require some Tasks to be altered or even abandoned. Other tasks may take a new track when additional information, resources, or hurdles are revealed. You may wish to create contingency plans that can be put in place as soon as an insurmountable barrier is met. An alternate is to split a challenging task into two or more smaller tasks, and move on.
Being Your Own Change Agent
One definition of strategic planning, be it for an organization or an individual, is:
“The management of change”
For strategic planning to be of any benefit, it must lead to change. Your willingness to make changes in your life is a product of many factors, the most important being your past experiences. Your previous planning, efforts to change, and to take charge of your life are the key factors in any potential future change. If you succeeded, you might be ready for more changes. If you failed, your interest in change may be diminished.
Efforts for change may also be affected by your fear of the future, such as:
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fear of the known
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fear of the suspected
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fear of the unknown
As your own change agent, you may fear failure or even success and the demands that accompany success.
You may harbor fears of criticism that may arise, paradoxically, with either failure or success. There may be toxic forces or people in your life that want to keep you just as you are.
Beware the self-fulfilling prophet, who may reside within you and undermine your efforts. Replace its negative message with the positive mantra:
“Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Even though you know the “what and why,” some things should be done to improve your life. The energy to change must be mustered. Your source of personal power for change comes from many venues, both internal and external. The key factors are:
- motivation
- inspiration
- attitude
- positive thinking
There are times when the anticipated reward from the completion of a Goal or Project is enough to carry you through to the finish line. However, quite often, you need positive input from outside yourself, from a range of sources including religious and secular sermons, lectures, tapes, and books. Occasionally, the support of a mentor will suffice for success.
Celebrate Your Efforts and Success
Since you are the leader, President, and Chief Executive Officer of your life, you provide the action for Implementation and monitor the progress of efforts on each specific task on a scheduled basis. You must have vision, skills, and passion for each of your specific tasks. You must maintain the written scorecard on each One-page! When any task is completed, celebrate your success. When effort is expended, even if success is not attained, celebrate anyway. Celebrate what you have learned and adapt it to your future efforts. Start by setting aside a specific time of the week for celebration, be it Friday after work or school, be it before or after your weekly religious or spiritual time.
Celebrate your efforts, your successes, and your life.
Author’s Suggestions
Defining laudable Goals/Projects/Tasks for your personal strategic planning can be a relatively easy process, perhaps even fun. It takes time, effort, and introspection (sometimes a bit painfully) to read the text, to ponder the worksheets, to write down the answers to the questions, and then to define and select the Goals/Projects/Tasks. The hard part is beginning to act, to reach into the unknown to change your life and habits, and to take risks.
The One-page concept addresses these latter challenges by reducing your Implementation, your efforts as a tactician, to small Tasks—to small steps for change, and to small increments of risk
The awesome power of classic Goal-setting can be applied successfully by reducing each Goal down to manageable and attainable tasks, to small bites, to small steps. Lao-tzu noted:
“A journey of a thousand miles
must begin with a single step.”
In Old French, we find the original meaning of the word “journey” to be “the distance one can walk in just one day.” In the past when strategic planning failed, it was often because its adherents tried to do too much too fast... and became disillusioned and abandoned the process.
“Our greatest glory is not in never failing,
but in rising every time we fall.”
—Kung-fu Tzu (Confucius)
“Take time to deliberate,
but when the time for action has arrived,
stop thinking and go in.”
—Napoleon Bonaparte
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