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My Wife's New 'Do': Pt. 7 – Expect Pain

January 13, 2010 by Christopher Wilson

My wife’s new hairdo caused, for the first time in our marriage, and probably the first time in her life, a hair-related emotional breakdown. While getting ready to go out one day, this woman who had never given her hair more than a passing thought, had to rewash her hair 3 times and still didn’t get the ‘do’ correctly. She was running late. Our event was starting. My kid and I had had to leave without her, hoping she would eventually catch up. She didn’t. There were tears. And muttering under the breath. And possibly actual cursing, though she’s far too much of a lady to let me hear. And disbelief on her part that her hair could EVER cause such a strong emotion. We’ve also had a number of other, less extreme events, and stress over getting ready to leave the house on schedule has peaked a number of times.

The culmination of everything we’ve learned from my wife’s hairdo is this: Expect pain. No matter how well we prepare or train, prepare for things to go wrong from time to time, especially at the outset. Mistakes will be made by people who are still learning. Misunderstandings about how the new solution itself works or what it will do will occasionally cause issues and confusion. These will cost time and money. We must prepare ourselves for these small breakdowns, padding schedules a bit until things come under control. We must tell ourselves and our partners and employees that the occasional mistake is OK. Pick ourselves up, work through the pain and move on.

My Wife's New 'Do': Pt. 4 – The Cost of Reeducation

January 8, 2010 by Christopher Wilson

Often, growth and change requires training. Whether implementing new equipment, software, techniques or workflows, re-training is inevitable. When my wife got her new hairdo, she had to learn a new way of styling her hair. Mistakes cost her, and even at this personal level, these weren’t small costs. Especially at the outset, mistakes have led to hours of lost time from her life and wasted hair product, especially when she has to resort to re-washings and restarts. She has learned that, at least for now, she needs to give herself more time to prepare to go out.

Most of us who have implemented new solutions or upgraded to ‘new and improved’ have had to deal with this learning curve. Whether we choose to purchase training from an expert or do it on our own thru books, videos or other means, we realize that we WILL lose both time and money after implementing new solutions or upgrades to existing solutions. Also we realize that mistakes, sometimes many mistakes, will be made. Upgrading is almost assuredly a speed bump in our otherwise smooth workflow. Until we work out these kinks, we may need to pad our timelines a bit to keep from overworking ourselves or delivering sub-par work to our clients, and expect to lose a bit in revenue when time is lost to education and mistakes.

When we upgrade, we need to prepare ourselves and our businesses to deal with the costs of reeducation in both time and money.

Its OK to Fail. Maybe…

December 30, 2009 by Christopher Wilson

Is it OK to fail?

Wise men will tell you that it is OK to fail. That you will learn a lot from failure. That you can grow from failure.

Realists will tell you that failure will cost you, sometimes dearly.

Everyone will tell you that failure is inevitable.

Who’s right?

[Read more…]

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