These are practices to follow wherever you fall on the employment spectrum – from ecstatically happy, to profoundly unemployed.

• Have a career roadmap
• Prepare your elevator speech
• Keep your resume current… and update it annually
• Foster a network outside your current workplace
• Have an internet presence

Have a career roadmap

“If you don’t know where you are going any path will do…” – Cheshire Cat to Alice in Alice in Wonderland

Many of my colleagues remember that in the earliest days of The Wunderlin Company we used Lewis Carroll’s writings in our work—his writings are so relevant to organizational and personal change, and enabled a nice play on my last name!  This particular quote is one that has always been a personal guiding principle.

Every person needs a lifetime career plan.  It doesn’t have to be detailed; you can simply plan by decade.  We know that careers roughly follow the decades of life—in our twenties, we experiment, build foundations, and find the work we are meant to do.  In our thirties we achieve, progress and continue to learn.  In our forties we consolidate our successes, solidify our skills.  In our fifties, we leverage our significant skills and life experiences, in our sixties we consider and transition to our next careers.

Wherever you are now, pay attention to the high-level matters: What have you learned?  What do you still need to learn? To what extent do you have an entrepreneurial itch you need to scratch? What are your feelings about the public and private sector?  What are the significant experiences you want—international work?  A stint in marketing?  A sabbatical to write a book?  To teach at some point?  Take time to discern what is important to you: Predictability? rewards tied directly to your work? Financial security?  Making a difference? Control of your work? Prestige?

From here, you can set out your overall roadmap for your career.  It is not about getting it right – we can’t predict the future.  It is about identifying what you desire.  Then as life unfolds, you will be better prepared to differentiate true opportunities from distractions.

Here are a couple of my favorite tools to assist clients in defining a career plan:
Personal Compass
If You Don’t Know Where You are Going, You’ll Probably End Up Somewhere Else

Prepare your elevator speech

Every week we meet new people, open new doors, and make new connections. When someone asks what you do, you have very little (less than 10 seconds) time to answer. You must introduce yourself and your capabilities in a succinct and compelling fashion.  Having an elevator speech is not a new concept; and it’s like getting enough exercise.  We all know we should do it, and can find many reasons we don’t!

An effective elevator speech is simple, memorable, concise, and it describes you very, very well.  Even if you are not in sales, and not looking for a job, as we walk through life we are making impressions.  It helps to leave a clear and positive one.

In drafting your elevator speech, think about: What are your unique combinations of skills and attributes?  What is the best reason for someone to remember you in a work setting?

You can find numerous elevator speech tools on the internet by googling the term.  I found one article that seems particularly helpful: The Elevator Speech is the Swiss Army Knife of Job Search Tools.

Keep a current resume…and update it annually

We never know when an unexpected opportunity is going to come our way…or when we are unexpectedly going to be in the job market.  In the past 12 months, I have had coffee with numerous folks who were looking for their next position.  Those who had a resume handy were several months ahead of those who had to start their job search by reflecting on their careers, remembering key accomplishments, then drafting and redrafting a resume.  The ones who had a current resume were ready to get started with networking.  Largely, they were also reemployed more quickly.

I recommend that once  a year you think back over the last year.  Write down your major accomplishments, note the professional development you did, update your objective, and shorten earlier sections to keep the resume to one page. I undertake this exercise every year between Christmas and New Year’s. It has been an enormously helpful exercise.

Foster a network outside of your workplace

If you should unfortunately find yourself looking for a job, that is not the best time to create a network.  What you need in a time like that is a robust network of people who already know you and with whom you have a relationship.  So even if you believe you will sail into a gentle retirement at age 80 and never need to look for work anywhere else, just in case, pay attention to who you know outside your current workplace. Find ways to stay connected with people you will be glad to know if/when you are seeking your next opportunity.  The parents from Little League, the guy you coached basketball with or who go to your church are certainly connections; but in a career context, may not be the highest value.

To what organizations do you belong?  Are you on a non-profit board?  Do you maintain contact with college and/or graduate school friends?  Remember, if Sheree hasn’t heard from you in 18 years and that first contact is an ask for an introduction, you may not get the full benefit of what she can do to help you.

Try to set an informal goal (say once a month) of being in a professional setting that enlarges your network. You will also find that many of these contacts can enrich your current worklife.

When you do meet a new person, be intentional about capturing their information in your Outlook address file or your address book.  Make a note about where you met them, and some impressions of that person.  If you contact them in two years and remember how much that person likes to fly fish or that they have an electrical engineering background, the connection will be stronger.

Have an Internet presence

Finally, if there is a chance you will be moving to another position in the next 24 months, you need to be on LinkedIn—with a strong informative profile, and with careful attention paid to the key words you use.  If you have a technical background and are a skilled salesperson, be sure your resume includes the words and phrases that will bring your profile forward.

Then make any connections you can to your old workplaces, colleges, and groups. There are a growing number of ways you can use a LinkedIn profile.  For example, my daughter is just starting a career in the theatre, so for her birthday this summer, I went to moo.com to get her some business cards.  It offers an option to include a link to her Linkedin profile!

The younger you are the more likely Facebook is an important part of your social network.  Twenty years from now, when today’s twenties are running organizations, Facebook’s true place will be clearly understood.  For now, most of the folks who are hiring don’t consider Facebook essential… many are slightly distrustful.  In addition, they sure aren’t fond of finding a favored candidate tagged in numerous drunken poses!  If you are looking for a position, and you must be on Facebook, make your Facebook page appropriate.  You will be checked out online; be cognizant!  Remove tags you wouldn’t want an employer to see, pay attention to the comments you make on yours and others walls.

Let me know what else you do to maintain your career bearings.

Have you ever wondered…

• Should you “friend” your boss on facebook? What about your boss’s boss?
• Who calls back when a cell call is “dropped”?
• Which ringtone should you select? And what does it say about you?
• Can you post a photo on your facebook page that was taken 10 years and 20 pounds ago?

On my bookshelf is a 1975 edition of “The New Emily Post’s Etiquette” and I actually pull it down and refer to it once or twice a year. In her introduction, Ms. Post tells us that manners are just as important to us now as they were to previous generations. She rightly claims, “manners evolve of their own accord, influenced by current lifestyle.” While Ms. Post died in 1960, she would be bemused by the manners dilemmas people encounter in 2009.

So, because Ms. Post is not around to arbitrate these questions, Wired Magazine has stepped up to the plate with extensive and highly entertaining answers to your most pressing new-age etiquette questions. Entitled: How to Behave: New Rules for Highly Evolved Humans, I read this article while on vacation last month and believe you will be entertained and pick up a couple useful pointers!

One of our core values at The Wunderlin Company is building capacity within our client organizations. We want our clients to possess the knowledge and the tools they need to implement and sustain change both on individual and organizational levels. We want them to be expert facilitators, supportive coaches, and effective meeting leaders.

Over the years we have developed a series of workshops to enhance management skills. Three of The Wunderlin Company’s most popular workshops are being offered this fall. See if one of them is just what you need to pump up your leadership skills or someone’s who works for you.

FACILITATING FOR RESULTS

January 26-28, 2010
An introductory workshop that provides critical skills needed to plan and facilitate great meetings.

Facilitating for Results is a three-day experiential training class with a participant to faculty ratio of 9 to 1. Persons completing this class will be ready to:

• Shadow facilitate an in-depth problem-solving meeting
• Assist in the organization and planning of problem-solving meetings
• Facilitate most day-to-day meetings
• Become an internal leader of the cultural change initiative
• Take a facilitative approach to his/her own work

Click here to learn more and to register.

ADVANCED MODELS FOR FACILITATION

September 22-24, 2009
A master-level workshop for those interested in taking their facilitation skills to the next level.

For experienced facilitators, Advanced Models of Facilitation exposes you to the latest in facilitation practice. It also gives you hands-on experience with new and more advanced facilitation skills. You’ll come away rejuvenated with ideas, skills, and tools that you can immediately put to use with groups.

This workshop is designed to increase your skills and effectiveness with groups. You’ll learn how to:

• Design sessions so that you dramatically improve their effectiveness
• Increase your own self-awareness so that you operate more intentionally with your group
• Apply change acceleration processes
• Manage difficult conversations, difficult topics and difficult personalities
• Effectively utilize “standards” that will help you and your group be more authentic
• Help your groups grow developmentally and begin to manage their own processes
• Be comfortable introducing new models for how groups can work together, selecting the one that is most appropriate for the work that needs to be done

Click here to learn more and to register!

COACHING AS A LEADERSHIP SKILL
November 3-4, 2009
An action-learning workshop focusing on the art and practice of coaching others so that they perform at higher and higher levels.

This workshop is designed to increase your skills and effectiveness with groups. You’ll learn how to:

• Build trust in the coaching relationship
• Deliver “tough” news effectively
• Ask the right question at the right time
• Support an individual in getting clear about goals
• Actively listen in collaborative conversations
• Offer feedback that is constructive and productive
• Match your coaching style to an employee’s needs
• Improve your own “emotional intelligence” and help the individual you are coaching to do the same

Click here to learn more and to register.

The Wunderlin Company also offers these workshops in-house for up to 16 of your employees. Two other workshops are also available:

• Effective Meetings
• Discover Your Strengths and Put Them to Work

Call Karen Wunderlin at 502.895.3689 or email kw@wunderlin.com to schedule an in-house workshop.

Figure out who can benefit from these opportunities. Register today.

Try as we might, we’ve not yet figured out how to be in two places at one time. If a TWC professional is coaching an executive, that professional can’t be leading a team through a Work-Out session at the same time. I can’t be facilitating a strategic planning retreat while helping senior management implement a company-wide organizational change effort. We can’t be in two places at once and we can’t clone ourselves.

But here is what we can do. We can be available to our clients and prospective clients via The Wunderlin Company’s website 24/7. We’ve recently revamped www.wunderlin.com to be more welcoming, more accessible, and more helpful.

The new site is chock full of content from 11 years worth of newsletters. Since 1998, our newsletter has morphed from a paper publication sent via snail mail to an enewsletter to its current blog format.  Newsletter topics have ranged from “Choosing and Using an Executive Coach” to “Driving Change in Your Organization” to “Conducting More Effective Meetings.” All that content – information, insights and practical tips – is now available, searchable, downloadable and shareable.

The new website also lists our favorite books and websites as well as hundreds of other books, articles, and web links, all organized by subject area. (43 entries just in the Executive Coaching section.)

The site has a robust search engine. So, for example, if you key in “facilitation” you’ll get 23 links to all our newsletter articles on the subject, facilitation resources, as well as links to any of our team members who are skilled in this area.

And speaking of team members, The Wunderlin Company is more than just Karen Wunderlin. It is an international network of professionals each uniquely qualified to address your specific projects needs. Besides Karen, 13 other professionals allow us to maximize flexibility, nimbleness and responsiveness in addressing your needs. Let us reintroduce The Wunderlin Company team to you.

One of the features of the new site that we are most excited about is its ability to foster conversation – not just two-way conversation, but million-way conversation. At the end of every one of our newsletters entries is a place for you to add your two-cents about the topic at hand. You can add content, opinion, related links, questions. Others can respond, creating on-going dialogues on a multitude of topics.

We hope you will spend a few minutes perusing the new site and let us know what you think of it. The site is designed to be dynamic, offering you the latest and greatest from The Wunderlin Company. But remember, it is just one channel for exchanging information and fostering relationships.  You can always call us (502.895.3689), email Karen (kw@wunderlin.com ) or come by the office (2123 Frankfort Avenue, Louisville).

– Warren Buffet, 2008 Letter to Shareholders

Sounds awfully gloomy, doesn’t it? Reminds me of the ballad which begs hard times to “come no more” and made fresh by Bob Dylan as he strums and laments: “Tis the song, the sigh of the weary.” (Click here for video of Dylan’s rendition). As I talk with business owners and organization leaders I almost expect them to break out into the chorus: “Hard times, hard times come again no more.” What is one to do?

Last week I took two actions to help me survive these tough economic times. Both felt like positive steps forward. First, I made a conscious decision to limit the amount of news I listen to. Avoiding reality, you say? Shying away from the truth, you wonder? I prefer to think I am preserving the sense of balance that shrill pronouncements of defeat and ruin drown out. Yes, I still listen selectively to NPR, watch the national news and read the New York Times (albeit, I pick up the Style section before tackling the World in Review). But I’ve quit listening to the “talking heads” predicting gloom and doom at every turn. I don’t need that. Thank you.

The second thing I did was read two publications that helped me frame my thoughts about the economy: Warren Buffet’s 2008 Letter to Shareholders (22 single spaced pages) and renown business writer Ram Charan’s Leadership in the Era of Economic Uncertainty (138 pages). I highly recommend both publications, but since I realize that many of my colleagues and clients are too busy to read even these useful publications, this post highlights two quotes from Buffet’s letter and a summary of Charan’s points with some added examples.  For leaders in the not-for-profit and public sector, I have also attempted to “translate” Charan’s guidance into your frame of reference.

Charan begins his book by noting, “Whether you lead a small group of people or a whole business unit or company, these next few weeks, months, and years will test you.”

In responding to that test, he advises that you transfer your attention to cash.  “Your focus must shift from the income statement to the balance sheet.  Protecting cash flow is the more important challenge.”  You know the three sources of cash in your organization—earned funds (or donated funds in the not-for-profit world); working capital invested in inventories and accounts receivable, and proceeds from the sale of assets.  Make maximizing the cash flow from these three streams your relentless focus.

Another important change is shifting your focus from growth to gaining cash efficient market share. What Charan is referring to is that growth your organization can attain without excessive outlays of your precious store of cash. And, shrinking to providing only those products and services that provide cash will be a mandate. “Eliminate the rest,” he implores – that means shrinking will present opportunities to simplify your processes and reduce the layers of management.  In the end you will have fewer customers, fewer products, fewer facilities, fewer people, fewer suppliers –and a stronger [organization].”

In this new environment leaders need to dive into the details of operating their organizations in unprecedented ways.  Charan calls this “hands on, heads in”.  In adopting this leadership stance, we will all adopt a more intense approach to managing our companies.  We will communicate more with sales or development people, field people, our customers, and our employees who will need an ongoing balance of information from you about both the challenges of the current reality, and your optimism that your organization will come out in 2010 or 2011 healthy and strong.  The cycle for measurement and rewards will compress. Charan advises, “You have to increase your frequency of control, setting targets on a quarterly, monthly or even weekly basis.  Aggressive actions and decisions build optimism and confidence—your own and others’.”

The Six Essential Leadership Traits for Hard Times
Charan argues that the new economic reality changes the attributes leaders must have for success.  Think about your work, your decisions and your leadership since September.  Which of the following are your strengths?  Which do you need to intentionally add to your repertoire?

Honesty and credibility. Do the folks in your organization absolutely trust you to tell them the truth, even when it is a difficult truth?

The ability to inspire. How skilled are you in finding the compelling strands in your organization’s or department’s future and knitting them into a story behind which your folks can align?

Real-time connection with reality. To what extent are you getting real-time information from your customers, clients or donors?  Basing decisions from even January’s information could be very misleading

Realism tempered with optimism. How balanced are you in your communication and decision-making?  Have you unwittingly become the prophet of an apocalyptic future?  Or are you clinging too hard to the belief that this will all go away in 90 days?  How skilled are you at finding that balance?

Managing with intensity. What is your personal energy level these days?  To what extent are you modeling “Hands on, Heads In?”

Boldness in building for the future. What investments are you making with limited resources to ensure your organization’s or department’s strength when the recovery does kick in? Again from Buffet’s most recent Letter to Shareholders:

“Amid this bad news, however, never forget that our country has faced far worse travails in the past. In the 20th Century alone, we dealt with two great wars (one of which we initially appeared to be losing); a dozen or so panics and recessions; virulent inflation that led to a 211⁄2% prime rate in 1980; and the Great Depression of the 1930s, when unemployment ranged between 15% and 25% for many years. America has had no shortage of challenges. Without fail, however, we’ve overcome them. In the face of those obstacles – and many others – the real standard of living for Americans improved nearly seven-fold during the 1900s, while the Dow Jones Industrials rose from 66 to 11,497. Compare the record of this period with the dozens of centuries during which humans secured only tiny gains, if any, in how they lived. Though the path has not been smooth, our economic system has worked extraordinarily well over time. It has unleashed human potential as no other system has, and it will continue to do so. America’s best days lie ahead.”

The balance of Charan’s Leadership in the Era of Economic Uncertainty is organized around the actions, skills and decisions required for the major functions in most organizations, many of which build on the concepts already outlined.

Despite my swearing off (or maybe weaning off) of gloomy news programs, I did catch a recent NPR report (click here to listen) on the Arizona Diamondbacks which illustrated the success organizations can achieve in implementing Charan’s approaches (although as far as I know, Charan and the Diamondbacks are not in contact!) The Diamondbacks have lowered their cash breakeven by implementing a player acquisition strategy that keeps them significantly under the salary cap.  They forgo marquis players with back-loaded ten-year contracts in the hundreds of millions in favor of talented but lesser known players. They are adjusting their products and services to suit the times—you can now bring your own food to the baseball park, or for $25 you can sit on the suite level and enjoy their All You Can Eat Buffet.   Their General Manager, Derrick Hall notes their philosophy is “One Fan at a Time”.  By maintaining this highly personalized approach to customer satisfaction, their season ticket sales remain strong.  Hall noted that they are working with their season ticket holders to define packages for next season that fit their reduced circumstances—such as partial or split season tickets—and keep them coming to the ball park.

I hope this post has inspired at least one or two new approaches or tweaks to your leadership that will make you more effective, and more confident, and your organization more successful during these most difficult days. I’d love to hear from you about what is working for you and what you are doing to survive. Please post your comments as a REPLY in the box below.

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A New Look Is Coming Your Way

We are currently revamping The Wunderlin Company website and blog to make the format and content more engaging for our readers. We will let you know when it is up and running and available for your perusal. In the meantime, you can still visit us at www.wunderlin.com. or contact Karen at kw@wunderlin.com.

http://www.nea.gov/news/news09/ReadingonRise.html

And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count.
It’s the life in your years.
~Abraham Lincoln

Response to our series of suggestions for how to seize the day in 2009 has been overwhelmingly positive. Thank you for your comments about how YOU are making the most of current opportunities. If you wish to revisit any of the post in this series, go to the end of this post and click on the topic you wish to read.

As you head into the new year, we wish you a 2009 filled with hope, happiness, success, and less stress.

While you may not be able to control the world, you can control how you respond to it. So wake up! Get going! Life is short and time is fleeting…Here’s our sixth suggestion for how to seize the day:

Get your heart rate up
Our last tip for “Seizing the Day” is to get your heart pumped up. Yep, we are recommending that you consider interval training to supercharge your fitness, boost your metabolism, burn off extra fat, and reach those goals that you have set for yourself.

Interval training is basically exercise which consists of activity at high intensity for a period of time, followed by low intensity exercise. These “sets” are repeated.  The four variables that you can manipulate when designing your exercise routine are:

• intensity (speed) of work interval
• duration (distance or time) of work interval
• duration of rest or recovery interval
• number of repetitions of each interval.

The idea is to work harder than usual in your work sets and to fully recover during the low intensity intervals. Interval training is a great way to change your routine, increase results and burn more calories. And there is nothing like a good hard workout to clear your mind of cluttered thoughts, leaving only deep physical and mental refreshment.

Let us hear from you.
We have enjoyed sharing our suggestions about how to seize the day. If you missed one of the installments in the series, you can click on any of the links below to revisit them.

• Push yourself to breakthrough thinking
• Reach out to someone in need
• Figure out your current crossroads
• Read broadly, read deeply, and read copiously
• Bring your business to the world of social networks
• Get your heart rate up

We’d love to hear how you are “seizing this very day” as well as your comments on our suggestions. Just hit the “comments” button below and let us hear from you.

And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count.
It’s the life in your years.
~Abraham Lincoln

While you may not be able to control the world, you can control how you respond to it. So wake up! Get going! Life is short and time is fleeting…Here’s our fifth suggestion for how to seize the day:

As many of you know, I have been experimenting with virtual social networks and trying to understand how they can be relevant work tools.  If you have teenagers you have undoubtedly experienced (second-hand) the magnetism of Facebook or MySpace. If you are under 30, you probably can’t imagine managing your life without these virtual applications.  But just because you might fall into the over 30 category, doesn’t mean that you can’t begin to reap the benefits of social networks. If you just don’t think it is up your alley, think again. These social networks are finding new converts for businesses, non-profit organizations, and even specific products.

Take Facebook for instance—it can be a powerful growth tool. Facebook is no longer solely the domain of college kids. It now reportedly has over 67 million members and is adding 1.2 million a week, most of whom are in the 25-49 age group. Not only are individuals signing up, but companies are too. The NBA, for example, has an NBA Facebook page as well as a page for each of its teams. CBS recently announced a Facebook page for each of its shows.  According to a recent Fortune article, Proctor and Gamble’s network has 10,200 members and IBM’s has 33,000!  Uses include recruiting, connecting to alumni, and setting up internal groups.  According to “Facebook for Dummies,” the reason why many businesses promote themselves in this fractured way is because people might identify with particular parts of their business but not the business in its entirety.  Creating different pages for the different entities with which people might connect is important for maximizing engagement.

Think of a Facebook page for your company, your department, or a specific product as a way to engage your customers with videos, reviews, flash content, photos and more. Your customers can express their support by adding themselves as a fan, writing on your “Wall,” uploading photos and joining other fans in discussion groups. You can send updates to your fans regularly — or just with special news or offers.

Here’s a look at the top 10 Facebook business uses.

Spend some time getting to know the application and what it can do for your organization in 2009. Then consider creating a Facebook page for your business, brand or non-profit organization. It’s free and can be done in a couple of hours.

And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count.
It’s the life in your years.
~Abraham Lincoln

While you may not be able to control the world, you can control how you respond to it. So wake up! Get going! Life is short and time is fleeting…Here’s our fourth suggestion for how to seize the day:

Read broadly, read deeply, and read copiously

I’m a reader – an enthusiastic one. Always have been; always hope to be. It is one of the main ways I learn, keep up with developments, and derive pleasure. Much to my dismay, I read the following statistics recently:

• 58% of the U.S. adult population never reads another book after high school.
• 42% of college graduates never read another book.
• 80% of U.S. families did not buy or read a book last year.
• 70% of U.S. adults have not been in a bookstore in the last five years.

I trust that if you are reading this blog, you do not fall into any of the above categories. But perhaps you are a reader of just one or two genres…you love fiction, or business books, or TIME Magazine. Perhaps you only like to read the sports page, mysteries or biographies.

Here is my challenge to you: read more broadly, more deeply, and more copiously. Here are some ways to get started:

• Read what your children are reading in school or pick up a significant work that you didn’t read in high school or college and read it to see what all the fuss is about.

Catch 22, by Joseph Heller
Moby Dick; or, The Whale, by Herman Melville
Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe

• Find a blog that matches an interest and subscribe to it or put it in your bookmark menu.

Fast Company
Boing Boing
Lifehacker

• Instead of getting your news from the local paper and the Wall Street Journal, check out:

The DrudgeReport
Salon.com
SportsBlogs Nation

• Spend a few minutes reading a poem or two.

The Art of Drowning, by Billy Collins
The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry

• Be brave. Sit down with a graphic novel and experience this updated comic book genre.

Archewood: The Great Outdoor Fight, created by Chris Onstad
The Watchmen, by Alan Moore (writer), Dave Gibbons (illustrator)

I hope this will encourage you to expand your reading repertoire – and thereby your knowledge and pleasure. Let me know how it goes…and happy reading.

And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count.
It’s the life in your years.
~Abraham Lincoln

While you may not be able to control the world, you can control how you respond to it. So wake up! Get going! Life is short and time is fleeting…Here’s our third suggestion for how to seize the day:

Figure out your current crossroads
Although not always apparent, we are always in a place of making choices and setting direction in our lives.  One effective response to the uncertainties of 2008 is to make your current crossroads explicit, to think clearly about your choices, and then make decisions consciously about where to direct your life.

Here’s an exercise that I often use with my coaching clients:
Take a blank sheet of paper and draw two intersecting roads on it.  Click here for an example.

Draw yourself in the crossroads.  Put a big thought bubble above you. In it, pose the focus question that describes your current crossroads in life.  For example, What do I really want to do with my career?, How can I conclude this chapter in my life? or How can I balance my work and outside work interests?

In one quadrant write about what is calling you; what draws your attention or energizes you. Your answers could range from very specific things, such as learning a new skill, to big dreams. In another quadrant, write about what is pressing; what is immediate, top of mind. Your answer should focus on the practical realities of your situation.  In the third quadrant write about who and what is involved. It should take into account your network of people and the relationships that affect your plans and decisions.  In the final quadrant, write about the possibilities. Imagine your best and brightest future.

Then return to your focus question.  Look for patterns and themes in your writing that will help you focus on the direction in which you need to move your life.

Note: Inspiration for this activity comes from The Personal Compass by The Grove Consultants.