Karl Edwards presents Working Matters

Tag: opportunity

  • Listen In -> Posture of Strategic Readiness with Van Wray #4: The Built-In Slack

    For those of you who believe in cracking the whip in order to make sure everyone is working as hard as they can every minute that they can, stop reading here. You won’t appreciate this week’s podcast episode.

    In fact, those who keep all their other resources tied up and busy should probably read elsewhere also.

    The reason is simple. In this week’s podcast discussion Van Wray of Amperant Advisors and I take a look at the importance of building some slack into our plans.

    You read it correctly. Slack. Intentionally.

    Not all opportunities or problems can be anticipated.

    What if an unexpected opportunity came along, and we couldn’t respond because all our resources were already committed?

    What about the work stoppage at one of your key suppliers? Now you’re off plan before you’ve even begun.

    Unless, that is, you’ve built slack into your strategic plans.

    How does one plan for the unexpected? How can we plan around what we cannot control?

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Listen In -> Bold Resolutions for the New Year #4: Create Your Own Opportunities

    Have we become overly risk-averse?

    One has to wonder.

    That was a devastating and frightening near-miss with total disaster that our economy experienced a few years ago. And we don’t seem to have recovered yet.

    We are sitting on our wallets, postponing investments, and not hiring.

    We need to find ways, though, to take the initiative and create opportunities where none may yet exist.

    Easier said than done.

    Hence Claudia and my discussion this week suggesting that we need to make the creating of our own opportunities a New Year’s resolution.

    We cannot afford to wait around for someone else to jump start the economy.

    Can you?

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Loving Monday: Loving Freedom

    loving_mondayMany of us Americans are off of work today.

    The 4th of July falling on Sunday results in most workplaces granting a holiday on Monday.

    It seems fitting to acknowledge that our conversations about work, careers, and the choices that meaningful and rewarding experiences of each entail, are only possible in a free society.

    Freedom and security create the opportunity we have of hard-working, fun-loving teams of energetic, engaged and dedicated individuals designing workplace cultures that bring them alive during the day, provide for their families during the week and transform the world over time.

    Even when the worst of work life in America is experienced, there are means for getting help dealing with a bad boss, a stale career,  exploitative practices, and/or criminal excesses.

    And so we celebrate Independence Day with the conscious intention of both treasuring and seizing the opportunities our freedom has bought for us.

    Loving Monday is loving freedom. It’s great to have a day off of work, and it will be great to get back to work.

    Happy Birthday, America!

  • Listen In -> Tangible Accountability #4: Motivators That Build In Lifelong Learning

    Tangible accountability transforms failures into learning opportunities.

    Now that you have structures that build in results and relationships that build in support, you are aware of missed deadlines, errors in judgment, miscalculated budgets, etc. right when they happen.

    For accountability to serve a positive purpose (ensure that your stated intentions are accomplished), these problems need to become possibilities. Instead of failures being the end of the story, they need to be the beginning of a new story from which your team emerges smarter, quicker, and more skilled than they were before.

    In this week’s show, Claudia and I discuss the third component of tangible accountability: Intentionally using problems to create learning opportunities.

    Imagine entire teams and processes improving in real time simply because your accountability structure provided a mechanism for learning.

    Listen in.

  • When Crisis Presents Opportunity #2: ReConnecting With The People In Your Life

    people-connectIn our last newsletter I posed the question, what if the current financial crisis were to present an opportunity?

    We first looked at the opportunity that may lie in some creative re-visioning of ourselves and our professional contribution. (Read the previous article here.)

    We turn our attention secondly to what opportunity might lie in doing some relational research. We do not need to find our way through this financial morass alone. While not every acquaintance, friend or family member can be the source of your next job, these connections can be more valuable than you think.

    When we place too much pressure on relationships at time of need, networking can feel contrived and manipulative. Where have we been all this time?

    But if in the course of life we stay in touch with people on a casual, personal, yet (more…)

  • When Crisis Presents Opportunity

    No doubt the news of 700,000 lost jobs can be nerve-wracking. Of course stress levels increase and worries of job security can fill our horizon.

    Maybe you have already lost your job. Maybe your nightmare has become your reality.

    But what if the current crisis were to present an opportunity? What if that opportunity outweighs the trouble and trauma experienced on the way to it? What if something far better lies on the other side of the muck and mire in which we currently find ourselves?

    Do we risk proceeding through the muck, knowing neither its extent nor its resolution? Or do we scramble back to where we were before, reverting to what we knew as safe and secure, (however much we hated our job at the time.)

    What if making our way forward involved three components: some creative re-visioning, some relational research and some intensive effort on our part? Would you choose to go forward? Or back?

    This month we look at the opportunity that may lie in some creative re-visioning of ourselves and our professional contribution.

    The creative re-visioning might be in any of three areas: your role at work, the professional field within which you exercise your role, or you may have an idea that changes how we view or use a product or service altogether.

    Maybe your role needs to change. Expand, focus, involve new skills or new responsibilities. Are you learning continually? Always challenging yourself? Do you try to add value to your role each year?

    Look around the office and ask yourself which roles and/or tasks are attractive to you. Do you admire Mark’s ability to work with others? Do you come up with ideas that you wish you could implement? Is Sarah overwhelmed by a project with which you could help?

    Maybe your skills would be better suited in another professional field. Which of your skills are task-specific and related to your particular job description, and which skills are transferable and applicable anywhere? Knowing how to use a particular contact management/calendar computer program would be an example of the first. Knowing how to make plans, organize events and stay in touch with people is an example of the second.

    Make a list of your transferable skills. Get people who know you to help. Transferable skills are the keys to expanding your opportunities to fields outside your own.

    Finally, maybe you don’t see the world the way others do. Maybe the source of your frustration is at a deeper, more fundamental, even structural level. A more radical change may be in store for you.

    Who would have imagined listening to music in random play lists? Who would have foreseen using a phone for multiple communication and organizational purposes? Maybe you’re like us at Bold Enterprises and foresee a working world where people design for themselves working environments that are worth getting up for and pouring oneself into.

    Maybe this economic crisis is your opportunity to take a step forward.


  • Toughing Out a Tough Job #2: When It Couldn’t Get More Boring

    Boredom is the kiss of death.

    Once boredom sets in, it’s like a slow, inevitable march toward madness. Nothing seems to matter. Energy levels plummet. The mind makes periodic escape attempts toward spectacular fantasies of life and adventure.

    The flip side of boredom, though, is challenge. Instead of blaming the boring job, you may be dealing with a changing you. It may be time for new challenges. Increased responsibilities. More complicated skills.

    But you can’t wait when bored. Time is your enemy. You need to take the initiative to seek out new opportunities or create them if they aren’t there.

    Boredom sucking the life out of you? Listen in to this week’s podcast conversation. (And don’t forget to leave a comment and say hi!)

  • Question of the Week

    How can you create three opportunities to redeem a recent failure?