17,99 €
Mehr erfahren.
- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Fachliteratur
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013
Plan for success
No one would embark on a business venture without a thorough and coherent plan. So why are so many of us happy to stagger through life with no real plan – just going with the flow, seeing what happens? It’s time we gave our lives the same importance we give to our business exploits. The Personal Business Plan offers a practical, field-tested method for effectively planning out what you want from life and exactly how to achieve it. It will change the way you look at yourself, your job and your career. This is an essential toolkit for all ambitious career professionals who want to know how to thrive in their job and simultaneously become a happier and more effective person. Creating your own personal business plan will help you to define your purpose, plan your actions, break through limiting beliefs and reinvent yourself.
- Written by a top executive coach and head-hunter with the world’s leading Talent Management and Executive Search firm who has changed the lives of thousands of people
- A field-tested methodology for identifying your mission, setting your critical success criteria, defining your agenda, keeping to the point and become more fulfilled and happier
- A complete life view – how to excel in your chosen career and simultaneously enjoy a happy personal life
Sie lesen das E-Book in den Legimi-Apps auf:
Seitenzahl: 347
Ähnliche
Table of Contents
Title page
Copyright page
Dedication
List of Figures and Tables in The Personal Business Plan
Introduction: What Can I Use The Personal Business Plan For?
What Was Your Question?
How is This Book Structured?
What Do You Do?
1: What is My Situation?
Family Versus Work
What Baggage from the Past Must I Let Go Of?
What is Meaningful to Me Right Now?
How Can I Move Forward?
2: How Can I Thrive?
What Do I Like Doing?
What Don't I Like Doing?
How Can I Learn to Trust My Intuition?
3: When Do I Perform at My Best?
What Does Success Look Like to Me?
What is My Deep Down Motivation?
What is My Worst-Case Scenario?
4: What Energizes Me?
What are My Strengths?
What are My Weaknesses?
What is My Passion?
5: Where am I on My Personal Journey?
Where am I in My Life?
What are My Personal Priorities?
What is My Potential for Personal Growth?
6: How Do I Become Happy?
What is My Challenge?
Why Must I Do Something Now?
How Can I Obtain 20/20 Vision?
7: How Do I Reinvent Myself?
What am I Willing to Sacrifice?
Who Can I Turn to for Help?
What is My Life Ambition?
8: How Do I Differentiate Myself from Others?
What am I Better at than Anybody Else?
What Else Differentiates Me from the Rest?
How Good Do I Want to Be?
9: What is My Personal Business Plan?
How Can I Reinvent Myself in Order to Remain Relevant?
What is My BATNA?
Am I Happy Now?
10: What Have I Learned?
What is My Time Horizon?
How Far Can I Go?
What Would I Attempt to Do if I Knew I Could Not Fail?
Epilogue: What Now?
Your Personal Business Plan Toolkit
1 What is My Situation?
2 How Can I Thrive?
3 When Do I Perform at My Best?
4 What Energizes Me?
5 Where am I on My Personal Journey?
6 How Do I Become Happy?
7 How Do I Reinvent Myself?
8 How Do I Differentiate Myself from Others?
9 What is My Personal Business Plan?
10 What Have I Learned?
To infinity … and beyond!
Top 10 Recommended Reading
Bibliography
About the Author
Index
Cover design by Salad Creative Ltd
© 2013 Stephen Bruyant-Langer and Bruyant-Langer ApS
The Personal Business Plan is a registered trademark of Bruyant-Langer ApS
Registered office
John Wiley and Sons Ltd, The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, United Kingdom
For details of our global editorial offices, for customer services and for information about how to apply for permission to reuse the copyright material in this book please see our website at www.wiley.com.
The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.
Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book and on its cover are trade names, service marks, trademark or registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publisher and the book are not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. None of the companies referenced within the book have endorsed the book.
Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with the respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. It is sold on the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services and neither the publisher nor the author shall be liable for damages arising herefrom. If professional advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional should be sought.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-1-118-74413-0 (hardback) ISBN 978-1-118-74424-6 (ebk)
ISBN 978-1-118-74425-3 (ebk)
To Mette, Caroline, Claudia, Amanda and Adam.
Thank You for Everything.
List of Figures and Tables in The Personal Business Plan
Introduction What Can I Use The Personal Business Plan For?
“Take a chance
while you still got the choice”
AC/DC
Life has taught me that you need an overarching life ambition in order to succeed. You need to remain learning agile in order to be able to reinvent yourself. And you need to have the courage to commit yourself in order to be happy.
Throughout my career as a headhunter I have had the privilege of interviewing and coaching thousands of outstanding leaders. These trustful dialogues with resourceful leaders have taught me a great deal about success in business and success in life. I would like to share some of the key findings to help you identify the personal and career paths which will make you successful.
My approach to both personal and professional life is that if you can dream it, you can do it. But in the necessary soul-searching process you must be ready to look the monster in the eye: The monster in this case being the sum of your self-limitations. Throughout your life you have constructed a truth about who you are; this truth limits you in the exploration and utilization of new experiences that could disrupt this idea. In turn, this self-imposed limitation means that you stop learning. There is no Truth with a capital T.
In your professional life it is important to know your adversary and to recognize that sometimes you can be your own “worst enemy”. You need to liberate and enable yourself, and become Pinocchio with no strings to tie you down. You need not lie – least of all to yourself. The feeling is great – to feel free and be able to focus on the future.
In my experience, most executives have great difficulties in applying their professional toolbox and techniques to their personal lives. Many – in fact most – mention one of the following existential dilemmas and challenges:
I have come to realize that our most secret thoughts are also the most common. These questions and thoughts are the reasons why I have chosen to write this book.
The Personal Business Plan will help you answer these fundamental questions and help you survive, live, and thrive. I have known leaders who have lost themselves in success – who have derailed and have fallen into the abyss of stress, substance abuse, addiction, divorce, depression, or suicide. The need to make the most of your strengths without overdoing them – without derailing – seems to be more relevant in the twenty-first century than ever before. You must reduce the risks in your personal life in order to perform in business life – and vice versa. I'll help you find your own way through the labyrinth – becoming maze bright and organizationally savvy. My mission in life is to make you happier.
The Four-Leaf Clover has become my signature. By using this core concept you will experience the different parts of your life falling into place. You will obtain a clear picture of your existential platform and you will improve your life. You will be able to act it out by turning thoughts into action – and action into value.
Figure 1 The Four-Leaf Clover
I will enable you to establish your own Four-Leaf Clover model which will document how each of the actions in your life fits into the greater picture and makes you develop your strengths and grow. You will have a strong sense of cross-fertilization between the different areas in your life and, as a direct consequence, you will become more self-aware and robust. Self-awareness and experience build resilience.
A business plan is a well-known concept in business. An ambitious business plan has many qualities. It is precise, it is complete and it is specific. It relates both to the short run and to the long run. First and foremost it can be executed. At thepersonalbusinessplan.com you will find a goldmine of resources in the form of tools, techniques, templates, cases, examples and exercises – together with articles, interviews and videos detailing the research behind The Personal Business Plan. I have also included my 10 best pieces of good advice:
The Personal Business Plan is the central tool in the executive coaching system I have been perfecting since 1996. Since then I have had the privilege of contributing significantly to breakthroughs for thousands of executives undergoing periods of personal transition. They have carried through the same steps and answered the same questions that I will ask you to reflect on over the following pages. For everybody, it has led to fundamental improvements in their lives. The Personal Business Plan allows you to perform judicious pivotal shifts around a fixed starting point: your values. It gives you renewed flexibility and certainty in your personal choices. As a dynamic document it offers you the opportunity for ongoing documentation of and building on your life experiences.
Most of the time, we have difficulties making important personal decisions. It is much easier for us to make decisions about something which doesn't directly affect our own emotions or our own future. I remember a very successful CEO who told me that he had never himself taken any fundamentally existential decision. He had simply followed the flow. And now he felt a void. When you make personal choices you also discard personal opportunities and that is very difficult for most people. It seems risky not to keep open all potential scenarios. Have the courage to commit yourself. Please remember that history never shows the alternative. You will be rewarded for making decisions – the right decisions.
When we have finally made a tough decision, then we are often good at executing it. Once you have decided what you want with your life, then you can plan the work as linearly as you plan any other project. It is the “what” which is difficult, not the “how”. You are used to solving problems: It is much more challenging for you to make an existential decision about “where” to go than executing the plan, once you have made it. The steps then are often self-evident. The perplexity and the doubt – everything that lures you into delaying instead of acting – exist because you still lack answering some fundamental questions about your life situation, your life ambition and your dreams.
I have come to believe more and more that, in order to perform as a trusted advisor and participate in the changing careers and lives of highly qualified professionals, I need to be able to create an inner space from where I can draw energy when needed. The success of an intervention depends on the interior condition of the intervener. The quality and character of this interior condition is at the heart of leadership success.
Let's assume that this book contains the answers that you are looking for.
What Was Your Question?
This question says more about yourself than nearly anything else you may formulate to yourself. You need a framework – a guiding principle – to help you in your endeavors. In essence The Personal Business Plan is an answer to all central questions around you. When you have finished the book you will have formulated “the business plan of your life”.
Goals are dreams with deadlines. The Personal Business Plan turns your dreams and aspirations into specific and measurable targets. It's a compass which will help you choose when you find yourself bewildered and don't know which way to go. It teaches you your life patterns and helps you break them when necessary. It will be a valuable tool for you whenever you need to reflect upon or make decisions about your career and your life. If you take this process seriously it will in itself create exceptional value for you.
In the old days – that is, yesterday – there was the Peter Principle, which asserted that employees would continue to be promoted until they reached their level of incompetence. Today's workplace has ushered in a new principle; it's called the Paul Principle. The Paul Principle states that employees don't need to get promoted to become incompetent. They will become incompetent in their current jobs if they don't grow, adapt, and evolve.1
The important message is: “I need to change”. And you are not alone. We all need to change in order to succeed in life. I call it serial mastery: When you've become excellent at something, then it's time to reinvent yourself. There are no traffic jams along the extra mile.
And the simple fact that I live, work, and thrive in Denmark – consistently the happiest country (or one of the happiest countries) in the world2 – should make you feel at ease. I know what good looks like!
The former Chinese president Hu Jintau, when visiting Denmark, said: “This is luxury”. He explained his spontaneous exclamation the following way:
“Look at the people and how they take the time to sit and have a beer or a cup of coffee with their friends and family. And breathe the air and feel how crisp and fresh it is. If we can bring this from Denmark to the Chinese people, they would be much happier than they are today.3”
One of the main reasons for the quality of life in Denmark is not visible to the eye. It is trust: Trust in the institutions, trust in others, and trust in yourself. There is also a certain paradox associated with trust. You may have a specific trust in your bank but a generalized mistrust regarding the financial sector. In Denmark equality is high (measured by the Gini coefficient), delegation is high, average income is high, taxation is high, digitalization is high, educational level is high. Furthermore pollution is low, crime is low, corruption is low, unemployment is low, distances are small, traffic is smooth, and public transport is effective. Finally, relationships are predominantly collaborative, cooperative, and interactive. All of this fosters a climate of general wellbeing and balance. Add to this inspiring talent within gastronomy, art, music, architecture, and design, and you get a higher quality of life overall.
Just for the record: I am not complacent. I am acutely aware of global competition and that the European welfare model may not be sustainable. I often half-jokingly say that, in Asia you tend to work as long as in Europe, you simply start eight hours earlier. There is no doubt that the geopolitical balance is shifting towards Asia and that the rising social costs in Europe represent a time bomb under the system.
It is important for me that the well-documented and time-tested framework of The Personal Business Plan leads to action for you and makes you succeed in your endeavors, just as it has for so many other life ambitious individuals.
At thepersonalbusinessplan.com you will find your clean Personal Business Plan Toolkit. Download it – but don't read ahead. You will get enough to think about over the course of the book and answering one question at a time. You will also find your clean Personal Business Plan Toolkit at the end of this book.
How is This Book Structured?
When reading through the chapters you will experience consistency. I have focused on making the questions and the exercises as simple and precise as possible. Each of the 10 chapters consists of a set of three existential questions.
1. What Is My Situation?
This is where you define the baggage that you carry around and that you have to let go of. This is what we are setting out to do. Together we define your Four-Leaf Clover, your life's stepping stones, which together form the basis of your life-long learning. In the definition of your potential, you will begin to find clarity and comfort. Actually, you knew it already, but nobody has ever challenged you to express it as transparently. Don't try to satisfy an imaginary public – do what makes you happy! Change the conversation.
2. How Can I Thrive?
We establish your internal wellbeing benchmark. What does it mean when you say that you feel good? Compared to what? We go through a Heaven and Hell Exercise which forces you chronologically to compare for example the happiness of succeeding in high school or being promoted at work to the sorrow of a divorce or a child being ill. Together we define your life anchors and look for situations where there is an alignment between your interests, competencies, and possibilities. We establish your talents, knowledge, and capabilities.
3. When Do I Perform at My Best?
Now we focus on your professional life. Together we establish the conditions that make you thrive in your work life – your Functional Condition Map. This means that you get to calibrate what is important to you from a career perspective. Some drivers are universal, but you have something which specifically motivates you more than anything else and define what sustained success means to you. You need to transcend your self-perception and work hard to become the best version of yourself.
4. What Energizes Me?
In order to make the best of your future, we must now work with your key competencies. We will distill your passion and leverage your strengths while damage controlling your weaknesses. You will produce a Personal SWOT Analysis defining your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, and identify the challenges that will enable you to make an epic win. Live a life that truly looks like you. It is your responsibility to remain relevant.
5. Where am I on My Personal Journey?
This is where we determine which phase of your life you are at. What are your priorities in life? What is your potential for personal growth? In principle we are all living the same life. We go through the same seasons and we have the same preoccupations. Research has defined a generic life phase and the book will introduce you to the most important Life Phase Analysis. Why not learn the guiding principles that can help you get the best out of your life? Why not piggyback on other people's experiences?
6. How Do I Become Happy?
We all share some basic needs and aspire to some inherently human characteristics of happiness. The central question is: What are you looking for? The concept of Happiness 360 will be used to identify the stakeholders of your life and identify their expectations. How does this concept of Happiness 360 influence your feeling of wellbeing and how will the insight benefit you and make you an even better leader? You need to surprise both others and yourself.
7. How Do I Reinvent Myself?
Of course there is no such thing as a free lunch. You will need to decide what you are willing to sacrifice. Actually you don't need to sacrifice anything; you simply need to make choices. At this point you will have a firm grip on your life ambition, and this concept will serve you as a helpful guideline. Your reinvention is not easy, you will need help from good people, and luckily for you they are out there – it's simply a question of asking for help.
8. How Do I Differentiate Myself from Others?
The fundamental idea here is to find out how you stand out from others and what you are better at than anybody else. If you want to stand out you need to be outstanding. You don't need to compete with others. Make them irrelevant – compete only with yourself. How good do you want to be? If you stick your nose out then of course there is a risk of failure. Learn to dominate that fear and live with a fundamental trust in your future.
9. What Is My Personal Business Plan?
Finally you have reached a higher level by documenting how to reinvent yourself and remain relevant. Through hard work you have made and written your own Personal Business Plan. Your attitude and mindset have changed. You know your BATNA (Best Alternative To Negotiated Agreement).4 Your personal choices are more grounded than ever and you are seen as a person in balance with yourself and your surroundings. You feel more authentic. You are able to create personal meaning and dare to be yourself – it is fundamental to the quality of your life. You are ready and set to go for your life ambition.
10. What Have I Learned?
As you reach the end of the book, you'll be asked: What is your key learning? What energizes you and gives you a feeling of flow? Through Scenario Writing you will be able to decide exactly along which course you want to progress. By documenting a process you commit yourself to the project. So reflection leads to documentation. And from here action is a natural next step. Disregard some of the advice given to you earlier on in your life and career – you have probably already evolved so significantly and improved so much that the advice is no longer relevant. Now, if you were sure not to fail, what would you do?
Onwards and upwards!
“It is the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting.” This quote from the Brazilian author Paulo Coelho is my favorite quote. It is worthwhile pursuing your dream. Much too often we lack the imagination necessary to comprehend how much we can fulfill in the one life we have at our disposal. When you have reached a situation where you spend your time on tasks which you consider meaningful, which are fun and which give you energy instead of draining you then you will never look back, then you've reached a tipping point, and you will instinctively direct your thoughts towards the future.
Some years ago I was contacted by a man named Niels Moller Nielsen who wanted to discuss his life situation and his development as a top executive in the telco industry. He worked as Nokia's CEO in Ukraine and had organized his work life according to his priorities, not least to keep the close contact to his son. In Kiev his base was a hotel room. Every second Wednesday he flew to Denmark in order to spend time together with his son and on Monday morning he drove his son to school on the way to the airport. Back in Ukraine he then focused on work and was present and visible vis-à-vis his 80 employees.
However, there was also a dissonance. Niels described himself as a fiery person and the more questions I asked him to reflect on the clearer my picture became. “You remind me of a Formula 1 driver who barely keeps the car in the curves without skidding”, I told him the first time we met and he perfectly understood what I meant. Maybe time had come to view himself more as a gray eminence and strive for more boardroom appearance – to radiate overview and exude a natural authority. We continued to meet, talking about his way from elementary school to the job as CEO of Nokia Russia, which he got after Ukraine with P&L responsibility for several billion dollars. It very soon became clear to me that Niels Moller Nielsen as a leader was exceptionally focused.
Focus has two functions – a laser function and a filter function – and both provide energy. The laser function seeks out the central issues and the filter function sorts out the rest. The choices he had made in his private life had given him a sense of balance and now he wanted the same sense of balance in his professional life. He had created a greater distance to his surroundings and employees than he wanted – and he could clearly see it himself. We spoke about many things that he could do differently when returning to Kiev.
Already the third time we met I was happy to be able to tell him: “You seem much more at ease and much more relaxed”. He then told me that he could clearly sense how others had begun to see him as a more whole person – more spacious and judicious. By gradually opening up and showing some vulnerability Niels Moller Nielsen felt stronger than ever.
Throughout the book, you will find the story of Flemming Borreskov, the former CEO of Realdania, the most influential philanthropic foundation in Denmark. He is on version 7.0 of himself and will be one of our heroes in this tale. Flemming Borreskov has carried out all the exercises and answered all the questions in his Personal Business Plan. Thanks to applying this mental discipline he has succeeded in taking control of his life and his future. He is a perfect example of the power of The Personal Business Plan and a role model in planning his life.
I SALUTE HIM!
I have also included the story of Jan Asmussen who is at an earlier stage in his life than Flemming Borreskov. He works as a Nordic Controller at the Nordic Headquarter of CSC, one of the largest IT solution providers in the world. He is a wise man who has successfully dealt with his main challenge, namely that he is profoundly introvert. In that respect, his Personal Business Plan complements that of Flemming, who is resolutely extrovert. An extremely interesting fact is that many successful senior executives are indeed introverts, who use their time and energy on solving issues rather than rising and shining. If you are, yourself, an introvert, Jan's story will give you deep insights into dealing with the potential downsides and optimize your behavior in order to get as much credit as possible. If you are, yourself, an extrovert, you will learn what a valuable personality trait introversion can be. Western society in general promotes and rewards extroversion. However, introversion might provide the key to what is worth being extrovert about!
I SALUTE HIM!
In any case the dichotomy between the two tales will allow you to compare and contrast. It will also allow you to comprehend how flexible the Personal Business Plan framework is. It has been used successfully by students, housewives, and the self-employed, as well as middle managers, directors, and senior executives. The mindset behind is existential – therefore it also applies to you.
Flemming Borreskov made a personal commitment to himself early on. He wanted to leave at the top of his game. He had seen too many CEOs of prominent companies going into retirement and vanishing into oblivion. And in order to be able to carry through his promise he needed a compelling life ambition. What did he discover? He found out that there was one thing he had never done. He had been a marketing director, he had been a sales director and he had been a CEO. He had worked in the public sector, he had worked in the private sector, and he had worked in a philanthropic foundation; but he had never had his own company! I will never forget the glimpse of boyish charm and joy that passed over the face of this noble man in his sixties when he, in his core, realized that this was what he was going to do for the rest of his working life. Found a company together with his wife and build up a totally new existence based on his fundamental values – a company centered round catalytic society.
Jan Asmussen had made significant choices in his life. When he had found himself at a dead end he had always created his way out – often by taking a path which might at first seem risky. He had always landed solidly on his feet – quietly and robustly he had managed personal and professional transitions. Before joining CSC he was a Partner in two global auditing companies, Grant Thornton and BDO. He deeply felt a need to leave the hamster wheel and actively contribute by personally implementing business solutions instead of being limited to auditing. His journey is the journey of a specialist developing into a generalist – a business oriented leader. This reliable and trustworthy man in his early forties also deeply felt that he lacked some inspiration in his daily life. Therefore he had come to me for guidance. As he succinctly pointed out in one of our early sessions: “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams”. My interpretation was that Jan was looking for life quality.
What Do YouDo?
Many people find it tiring to meet the same question over and over at receptions and family parties and other places where people meet:
“So, what about you, what do you do?”
I don't feel like that. I love that question. Many years ago I decided to perceive this question as a challenge. As a chance to present my professional life in a way that creates interest and might be the spark to a giving dialogue. Which forces me to put words on what I think is important.
My answer is often:
“I change lives.”
To create change in other people's lives sounds somewhat more exciting than “I recruit executives”. And when I suggest that I change lives, it's for real. As a senior partner in Korn/Ferry International, the world's largest executive recruiting firm and a leading global provider of talent management solutions, I help top management of the world's largest companies reach their objectives. Korn/Ferry International places nine professionals into new roles every hour. I am used to treating personal and corporate information confidentially – as one of my candidates once told me: “I could tell you more, but then I'd have to kill you!”
The core in my work is the insightful dialogue. Both as a headhunter and as an executive coach I find myself working in the boundary between psychology and business. I have worked for more than 17 years in executive search and spent a number of these years together with some of the best business psychologists. Before that I worked 15 years as Marketing Director for L'Oréal and The Coca-Cola Company. Over the past 17 years I have also taught at Copenhagen Business School as an External Lecturer in Strategic Market Management and Corporate Communication.
Everything I write is based on research and more than 17 years of experience helping career people find their own way. At Korn/Ferry International we always work on a scientific foundation and much of our new knowledge is published at kornferryinstitute.com. Korn/Ferry International has assessed more than 1 million candidates. I have personally carried out more than 6000 candidate interviews and placed more than 700 executives.
So when I say that I change lives, then it's true. Not sometimes, but every time. The reason why I can be so convinced is that I've seen it thousands of times and continue to receive many testimonials from people who are grateful that they have followed The Personal Business Plan. In short my mission is to make you happier.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is the largest transparently operated private foundation in the world. The primary aims of the foundation are, globally, to enhance healthcare and reduce extreme poverty, and in America, to expand educational opportunities and access to information technology. There is a direct line between the individual (Bill Gates), the group (the foundation), the organization (the projects) and society (healthcare, poverty, education, and IT). Therefore it intuitively makes sense. And the intriguing dimension behind this tale is that it allows Bill Gates to reinvent himself from being the person who made the most money in the world to becoming the person who gave the most money in the world.
Al Gore served as the 45th Vice President of the United States (1993–2001), under President Bill Clinton. He was the Democratic Party's nominee for President and lost the US presidential election in 2000 despite winning the popular vote. Gore is currently an author and environmental activist. He has founded a number of non-profit organizations, including the Alliance for Climate Protection, and has received the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in climate change activism. Again there is a direct line between the individual (Al Gore), the group (environmentalists), the organization (the non-profit organizations) and society (climate change). And this process has allowed Al Gore to reinvent himself from being a former US presidential candidate to becoming a global frontrunner within environmental causes.
Bill Clinton left office with the highest end-of-office approval rating of any US president since World War II. Since then, he has been involved in public speaking and humanitarian work. Based on his philanthropic worldview, Clinton created the William J. Clinton Foundation to promote and address international causes such as prevention of AIDS and global warming. In 2004, he published his autobiography My Life and in 2007, he published Giving: How Each of Us Can Change the World. This is another clear example of a spectacular reinvention from being president to becoming an advocate for global philanthropy. Again we see a clear connection between the individual (Bill Clinton), the group (the foundation), the organization (the projects), and society (AIDS and global warming). He once confided that he had made a specific plan after being re-elected for his second term – however, at that time he didn't know about The Personal Business Plan. There is no limit to what you can do if you prepare yourself properly and have the courage to commit yourself entirely.
What I Expect from You
Maybe you are a leader, maybe you are an ambitious employee climbing the corporate ladder or maybe you work in a public organization. It really doesn't matter. In any case, this book puts some demands on you:
The important thing is that you are motivated to make decisions about your life and ready to take the consequence of these decisions. Perhaps the most fundamental prerequisite for you is even more pragmatic:
“Don't declare, deliver”.
If you don't meet the success criteria in your present job you need to find out what is missing. This book will help you act and create a context in which you will succeed. And the road to success is at the same time inspirational, tough, energizing and rewarding.
I would like to point out a few ground rules:
The earlier in life you adhere to the life philosophy behind The Personal Business Plan the happier you will become.
Fundamentally, the form of the book is everything that you should aim to be. Ambitious. Energetic. Challenging. Clear. Positive.
On their death bed people don't talk about what they did – they talk about what they didn't do. My objective is that this book gives you a wake-up call. You decide much more than you think you do. The field is much bigger than you believe. In the best of worlds this book will motivate you to reach for your dreams, and when you have found the way you will say to yourself: “I cannot not do this!”
Probably, you will experience that the road is quite different from what you believed. Because even though there is plenty of specific advice in this book it is the questions which are most important. An AESC (Association of Executive Search Consultants) survey taken some years ago found that most people spend more time planning their annual vacation than they do planning their career!5
Your Life Platform
A way of illustrating your life platform is by using the Venn diagram.6 Typically used in mathematics, the Venn diagram shows all the possible relationships among various different sets of abstract objects. In the overlapping section of the following sets of three circles lies the key to truly understanding yourself.
Figure 2 My Life Anchors
My Golden Rule of Life Anchors is: Don't change more than two at the same time! During your life multiple changes will occur in the three different spheres. A possible scenario is that you will get married, you will have kids, you will move several times, you will have many jobs and you also may divorce. On top of that illness and existential crises will contribute to the turbulence.
When considering your options, think of them in pairs. For example:
Inevitably, these events often overlap, for example when you need to move in order to get a new job and there is also a tendency for multiple opportunities to turn up at the same time. However, try to minimize the simultaneous changes of which you are in control. I would like to put Relaxed Readiness, a state of awareness, as the central common element of these three spheres; that is, in the middle where they all overlap. Sometimes you may need to take a deep dive in order to use a window of opportunity. When confronted with major choices, you need not feel stifled by the perceived risks; you simply need to be aware of them.
Figure 3 The Importance of Time
There is an inherent conflict in these three time perspectives. In the overlap is “Equilibrium”, but very seldom you will find yourself in this hot spot. During a lifetime much time goes with the “production” associated with raising a family and working. So there is seldom much time left as “Own time”. This time, however, is primordial for regenerative purposes. Time where you reap what you have sown. So much time goes with production that we hardly remember why we are so productive. Well, the answer is: “To enjoy ourselves!”
I can promise you two things:
If you approach your career as professionally as you approach your tasks then you will be successful. If you approach your life as professionally then you will become happy. Self-observation will lead to self-awareness. By documenting your behavior and your dreams you will progressively align the two and prioritize the actions that lead you towards your ultimate goal.
Notes
1Kenneth P. De Meuse,
