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Even if neither of these occur rethinking things every three or four years can be revitalizing in either confirming the contours of your life company and career or adjusting without being under much external duressThe ReImagining ExerciseThe exercise consists of four steps Asset Listing The Real Constraints DefineSelect the Challenge and Reinvent and Reimagine The exercise should be done with a diverse backgrounds skill sets and more group of people if you are doing this for a company or team but also if you are doing this for yourselfIf you are doing it as an individual rethinking your future include at least two or three people besides yourself who know you well a partner a colleague a mentorold boss a friend Diverse views ensure planning with a sense of upbeat reality versus delusional fantasyAsset ListingEvery individual team and company have assets These assets may be depth of talent financial wealth heritage expertise skills reputation good will clients brands family connections partners distribution networks etcSometimes an asset may be that you your team and company have little to lose No one has nothing and often much more than we originally believed when we take stockList the assetsThe Real ConstraintsNow list the constraints that you must live under and cannot get rid of under any circumstancesMany constraints are works of imagination and not real constraints Usually there are only three real constraints for companies and teams and four for individualsThe Law You cannot break the law or do something illegalScience You cannot pretend there is no gravity for instance or imagine technology that does not exist todayFinancial Reality Limited funds or the need to break even in quotxquot number of yearsFamily For individuals doing this exercise an additional constraint is their family reality which often is their biggest asset but limits optionalityIn most cases the constraints tend to be of the financial type These need to be interrogated and not accepted at face valueGillette placed a constraint of protecting margins versus launching a lower cost blade and believed they could not cannibalize their existing retailer network by selling directly via subscriptions and therefore eventually suffered an eightbilliondollar writedown due to losing share to Dollar Shave Club and othersAnother big constraint companies or individuals place on themselves is allowing themselves to be narrowly defined We compete in this category which we define like this amp8230 Hotels did not pay attention to Airbnb auto companies did not pay attention to Tesla or Uber because they selflimited and selfcurtailed themselvesIf you do not have a skill you can acquire it If you company39s scale does not allow it to move fast you can start fund and staff a smaller unit or buy a smaller unitIndividuals often practice all sorts of selflimitation or selfcurtailment such as pricing themselves out of their dreams by living a lifestyle that impresses others but robs them of their options or believing it is too late to reimagine or restartIt is never too late to become who we want to be or areList the absolute constraintsDefine the ChallengeWhat is bothering you or creating a problem for your team or your companyA new competitor creating a loss of market share Category dynamics reducing your relevance or competitiveness in winning or keeping clients High employee turnover or inability to attract or retain clients Stalling out at work and not growingOr it may be more of an opportunity How to scale and build expertise in a new category How to deal with demand that you cannot meet or deliver with a certain quality slippage How to take the plunge into a new careerOne of the most important steps in solving for a problem and coming up with a new solution is to ask the right questions For more on this please read Navigating the Perils of Wrong QuestionsHere are ways you and your firm may minimize the risk of asking the wrong question1 Look at the question you are trying to ask and turn it around and see if it makes more senseHere is an example Should you focus on how to get the cheapest arrows or should you be asking how you can get the best archers Paying more for quality is always cheaper in the long run since itthey tend to work faster think better last longer and signal to your organization that you understand that buying cheap pigs maybe buying diseased pigs and could lead to poisoned hot dogs2 No question is off limits Nothing is written No sacred cowsTime and time again we find that the idea for the next big thing was born in the last big thing but the management of the last big thing squashed the idea since it did not fit in the business model Or we find that the problem was clear for all to see but was looked away from since it would mean the person who called it out might lose their job The brown moist thing in the middle of the table is not always a brownie It could be a turd To ensure people call out the turd on the table please read The Turd on the TableReInvent and ReImagineYou can access any or all the assets you have listedYour only constraints are those of the law the rules of science and some real quotimpossible to get rid ofquot constraintsYou have a clearly defined the challenge Now imagine if you were starting with a blank sheet of paper How would you address the challenge of being able to leverage all your assets but none of the stuff you do not want while working with the limited constraintsImagine you are a new competitor trying to disrupt or replace you With all your assets none of your legacy thinking and limited constraints what would you doEverything is flexible You and the people who are working with you will come up with brilliant and compelling ideas because you will have changed your mindset in three waysYou have gone from defense to offenseYou have stopped being constrained and anchored by legacy mindset or fearYou have unleashed the creativity and positivity accompanying building and solvingOnce you have done this exercise and have generated one or two great ideas it is time to make them real and tangible in a hurryWhy If you have thought of something that could solve or address a challenge better than you are doing now it won39t be long till one of your current competitors or a new competitor puts it into motionTo be a startup one does not need to just think like a startup but to take the plunge act with urgency and move forwardJust startClick the social buttons to share this content with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated writers

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Rishad Tobaccowala

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