Tag Archives: balanced approach

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

The political answer

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I attended a question and answer session today with the Minister of Advanced Education for Alberta.  It was an interesting reminder for me about the political answer. 

Often politicians say a lot of words in response to a query but the question itself remains unanswered, although the intent is for the response to appear complete. 

Positive Perspective

Many of the inquiries were about funding ( no surprise).  The answers to these questions were a carefully crafted non-response.

That is the answer follows a pattern like; “funding that program has merit, however, all funding must be balanced, a budget review is imminent or underway and I really can’t say much more about that until the review is complete.

Being direct

This measured approach to responses is better for me than outrageous statements simply focused on making the speaker look good.

A good example of this, by a politician who is currently front and centre in the public eye, is the diatribe of Donald Trump.

President Trump does not hesitate to say what he is thinking, even if it contradicts what he said previously on the same topic, which it often does. 

Although his comments have led to labels like pathological, sexist, racist liar he somehow continues to retain some level of support and popularity.

It make me wonder is the measured, reasoned, logical approach to acting in the public interest is going by the wayside?

Is the population tiring of middle of the road politicians, are fierce conservative bullies with dictorial aspirations making a comeback?  Sadly, could be.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Why wait?

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Waiting occurs when you have an expectation toward something but do not act immediately or perhaps at all (i.e., stay in place).  This is not necessarily a bad thing. 

However, on the other side of the coin, Nike’s icon add campaign of 30 years ago suggested, “Just do it”.  This campaign put the company on the map and took them from a small start-up to a huge large cap corporation. 

Enticing Thought

“Just do it” resonated with the athletic shoe makers target audience.  In essence, activity and waiting are opposite concepts and for an activity-oriented product, encouragement to get going makes a lot of sense. 

How does this work as a general concept?  Is there a time when waiting is a good idea or as a general rule should we just forge ahead?  There is no simple answer to this question – it depends. 

Waiting can result in lost opportunity, on the flip side a precipitous decision could bring negative results.  In any case, the concept of proceeding actively is usually more motivating, hence why the slogan “just do it” resonated so strongly. 

In the balance

Most importantly, aggressively getting around waiting, for example butting into a line or forcing your car ahead in a traffic jam can provide an emotional high, but also could lead to trouble. 

On the whole taking action is more likely to bring results (you need to do something to achieve something) so waiting should be a balanced response where the risk considerations are too high.  

If the risk of action is likely to be detrimental and the negative impact is high, it probably is worth “not just doing it” rather wait and see.  

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Taking Flight

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Get airborne, drive fast when you come to a bump in the road if your speed is great enough your car will leap into the air.    Metaphorically speaking, your life travels can be eased by not getting hung up on the barriers.

Common sense must prevail, the reality of speeding over a road bump, or crashing into a barrier to blast it out of the way, could be painful and destructive.

Drive with Caution

Conceptually, resolving your issues and challenges can be achieved by addressing them directly (i.e., crashing through the barrier) and this approach should not be discarded lightly.

However, some caution is warranted lest the problem, rather than overcome, becomes worse.  The key takeaway is not to let obstacles stop you from soaring.

A Balanced Approach

Aggressively addressing the bump in the road so you fly over it might not be the best method but not trying and letting the barrier impede your forward progress is not optimal either.

The balanced approach begins with recognizing the issue or challenge and consciously acknowledging the need to succeed with your goal, overcoming the problems.

This might not mean charging forward blindly, but recognize the potential roadblock and don’t let it stop you.  This is not about trying but rather knowing you can try.

Stopping before you are airborne leaves you grounded.  While you might not achieve great height, at least attempt to leave the ground.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Revenue, Expense and Service

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Most organizations, whether run for profit or otherwise, live or die on the balance between funds for operations, cost of operations and the quality of the resulting  product or service.

This applies regardless of the organizational function, e.g., government, corporate, charatible, educational, other non profit and so on.

Of course, governments are a bit of a special case in that they seem to be able to overspend without dire consequence, to a point anyway.  That is governments have a much larger tolerance for deficit spending than most other types of organization.

Getting the Balance Right

Given there are only three parameters, it might seem easy to set the organizational goals.  Simply put, maximize revenue, minimize cost and give the stakeholders what they want, i.e., the product or service provided by the organization should exceed the users expectations.

Not surprisingly, in practice, it is far more complex.  Before maximizing revenues or minimizing expenses both the sources and the integration income, cost and quality come into play.

Reducing cost could reduce quality, resulting in a lower price for the product or service and thus lower revenue.  Or higher quality could result in lower demand due to a higher cost of goods leading to lower sales due to affordabilty issues.

There are in fact a wide myriad of combinations and scenarios to consider.

Also revenues can come from a variety of sources, many which are somewhat out of the organizations control.  Things like donations, government handouts, revenue from sales of goods or services, investment income and the list goes on.

The point, developing clear and simply strategies and execution plans for managing the intricat dance between income, expense and outputs is not easy.

Ultimately though, no matter how difficult, of all the things an organization does, strategizing, planning, executing and monitoring expenses, revenues and quality is the most critical activity to ensure organizational success.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

The never ending quest for balance

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Basically our daily lives are filled with a series of behaviors ( and the associated actions).  That is, what  we do results in outcomes, that is why we do it.

The outcomes are either satisfying or not.  Very simplistically stated, we do stuff to cause stuff and then we die.  (We may die because thats the natural outcome of the stuff we do, but that is a different deep  conversation).

Sounds boring

We do stuff that causes stuff to happen over and over.  On the surface it seems repetitive and unmotivating, why bother?  The key to managing the outcomes in a fun and motivating way is  through the practice of balance.

This requires analysis and planning.  Balancing the things you do to achieve better results more efficiently can be invigorating.  It puts a lot of spice into your activities.

How does it work?

Practicing balance is the process of determining how much time, effort and what kind of time and effort is best used to achieve the result you seek.

For example you need groceries because you are hungry.   You are low on funds so you will need to balance what kind of food you buy against what you can afford, yet still satisfy your hunger.

You are hungry now but you need to balance speed ( by car -low on gas) with walking ( slower but definately better on gas).

These simple examples highlight the competing choices we encounter all day as we figure out if we should do this or do that or some combination.

Frequently we need to balance the options carefully to attain the best result.  The simple emotional approach to resolve the need directly is often not the best.  Take your time, plan it out, incorporate balance.

For example, building on the above scenario,   you are hungry so  drive to the store intending to buy what you want.  Unfortunately you may run out of gas or money so can’t afford what you want and end up still hungry.

Remember, things are not always as straightforward as they initially appear and a considered balanced approach might not only be more satisfying, but could also achieve a better result.