High Performing Business – Discernment – Change
Michelle LaBrosse, CCPM, PMP, PMI-ACP, RYT
Mastering the ability to discern the best ways to respond to changes is a skill required to have continual success in life under any circumstances.
It isn’t what happens in life that defines me, it is how I respond to it. Developing abilities to best respond to changing circumstances is crucial for any entrepreneur who wants to maintain a thriving business.
I’ve written about change before – the last time it was about adapting to technology upgrades required for running the business and moving through the world. This time it’s about the changes that ensue when I’m the one who has set the wheels of change in motion.
For the past eight years, inspired by the chaos (i.e changes) in the financial markets, I set out on a path to become energy and food self sufficient – and to teach others how to do the same. At the very minimum, I’ve become more aware of the myriad complexities involved in our status quo to sustain myself. But I have also developed extensively more capabilities to in fact be more energy and food self sufficient. I am much closer to achieving this – even with the current demands as the CEO of a mature, thriving business.
I’ve learned how to discern the viability of various opportunities for increased self sufficiency – to wade through the hype and gauge the level of changes I would be required to make when evaluating one approach over another.
Let’s take electric cars – I have yet to get an electric car. While I do produce sufficient electrical power with solar panels for the majority of my household needs, and put the excess back into the grid, I do not live in an area with sufficient capability to repair an electric vehicle. Nor do I currently possess the skills to do so or the time to acquire those skills. So no electric car yet for me.
But let’s also look at living on food I can grow myself and that is caught or raised within 50 miles of where I live. I have made major strides with that – for probably precisely the same reasons owning an electric car does not make sense for me, right now. In rural Alaska, those with a certain survivalist bend are attracted to places like this. Food is life and I live in a community where developing increasing capabilities for food self sufficiency is the norm. The changes required to improve my food security are a lot less sexy than getting an electric car, but also much more attainable.
Discenment is critical when evaluating response choices to changing external conditions. To improve my response – abilities I contemplate perceived changing conditions through these three questions:
- How immediate is this change? What is the probability this change will come to pass and what is the impact?
- What are my options with responding to this change?
- How well does each option enable me to enjoy life the way I would prefer (increasing autonomy away from elements of our infrastructure that wield too much power over me, strengthening family and community relationships, expanding capability for self sufficiency, to deeper engagement and fulfillment)
Taking time to deliberate on the best course of action for me when I encounter changes improves my abilities to discern which ways will bring out my best and help others do the same.
At Cheetah Learning, we also help others achieve improvement in their own abilities to discern the right responses for them to changes. In Cheetah’s 40 hour online course, Project Breakthrough, students quickly master the discernment required to respond in the best ways for them to changing situations.
“The first thing my boss said when I told him I was interested in getting my PMP certification was that if I was going to do it, he’d heard Cheetah Learning was the best.”