When Preparation Meets Opportunity, You Can Influence Culture

One of my favorite quotes is "When preparation meets opportunity, purpose is discovered" - author unknown.  

This quote is often thought of on an individual, personal level.  What if you considered it for a team or department?  It may help you to consider what preparation should be underway to create the results you need for the organization to be successful. 

When considering results, people often think about the investments in sales, marketing, customer service, products, etc  but they forget about how their people and culture will make or break their success in all of these areas.

What are you doing to influence your culture and maximize your opportunity for success?  Culture dictates how the work gets done. 

In business, every team, department, and organization has a business cycle with key activities that occur.  There are key points in every business cycle where there is an opportunity to take actions that can significantly influence your culture.  This is where the "preparation" noted in the quote comes into play.    

Taking some time to understand and map the culture of your organization or team will allow you to begin to identify improvement opportunities.  Once you understand the opportunity that exists, you can then prepare a plan to influence significant change during the key points in the activities associated with your business cycle. 

The actions you define may just help your people find their purpose while significantly changing your culture.

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