Happy Leap Day!
Today, February 29, 2016, many of us are blessed with an extra day in the calendar year (assuming you are on the Gregorian Calendar) – an event that only occurs once every four years. So, what are you going to do with this extra day?
The concept behind leap day is to adjust for the imperfection in our calendar year, as it takes approximately 365.25 days for the earth to complete it’s orbit of the sun; thus, adding an extra day every four years helps reset our calendar to better match the orbit cycle. There are other calendars that also make adjustments, such as the Chinese and Hebrew calendars.
As I thought about our Leap Day of 2016, I first was thankful for an extra day in which to accomplish some goals.
The act of leaping: moving from one point towards another place. In honor of Leap Day here are the TOP 5 things that come to mind for leaping into your future.
5. Step forward, not backward. In recent conversations with two separate, accomplished installation firms, the reoccurring theme was: “the containment industry is in a race to the bottom as far as quality is concerned”. With all the advances in technology for materials and installation equipment, combined with technologies capable of finding pinhole size holes, there simply is no reason to settle for substandard quality. In fact, I would challenge you to raise the bar! Set your expectations above the industry standards. “A rising tide raises all boats”. Let’s move the tide together.
4. Stagnation. When is the last time you actually had a clear sane moment to evaluate your core business practices? It is so easy for businesses to keep doing business as usual, such as using the same vendors, keeping the same procedures and even believing that certain roadblocks are immovable. Stagnation usually comes with a fairly hefty price tag! Here is a quote from our office wall:
“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, in either case you are right.”
-Henry Ford
What do you want to believe this year?
3. Safety. Sometimes we just want to scream at all the safety blah, blah, blah. The reality is safety is such a poignant subject. We all want to keep our loved ones healthy and safe. However sometimes we stay in places of safety when we need to take some risk in order to get to our future. Leap Day is a great day to evaluate ways we keep our co-workers, friends and family safer and it is also a great time to analyze our corporate life. Where do you need to take some calculated risks to Leap into your future?
2. Crazy Fireman Syndrome. This year, take some time away from the all too heavy “fire fighting” and take some “corporate me time”. Write a list of your personal career goals. Then proactively make concrete plans with measurable steps and timelines on how you are going to achieve at least one of these goals this year. Move forward into your future because while you are busy saving one tree, you might be loosing the forest!
1. Recycled Specifications. Every year, well honestly it seems like almost every week, we see the ramshackle of projects from recycled specifications many with significant failures. These out-of-date specs often merged from multiple projects almost always fail to meet the needs of the fieldwork they should govern. All too often, we see recycled specs do more harm than good. This year, leave recycled specs behind and move forward into specifications that are designed to properly manage your field projects.
