What Should You Quit This Year?

There are two essential business strategies that go hand in hand. The first is 'opportunity cost' and the second is 'planned obsolescence'. They are not often linked together in business texts, and I think they should be.

Opportunity cost refers to being 'too busy' to take on a new project or lacking the time, energy, capital or creativity to see an opportunity when it arrives.

Often, we are so caught up in busy-ness, that we fail to see the 'next big thing'. We have no time or interest, no energy or capital to engage in research, learn new skills or to seize opportunity when it presents itself.

A key solution is to maintain a healthy 'margin' of time and energy that are available for innovation, and one way to get that time is to intentionally phase out old programs, old products or old ways of doing things.

I'm told that General Electric earns half its income from products and services that are less than five years old, and they achieved this with a two-pronged approach:

1. Intense commitment to R&D so they always had new revenue sources coming on-line.

2. A plan to phase-out obsolescent business components.

What should you phase out this year? How much time, how much money, time and energy will you need to seize the opportunities that will come your way this year? The cost of working too hard, of spending all your time making money is extremely high. Leave plenty of time around the 'margins' for creativity, and never hesitate to stop doing whatever isn't working anymore.

Copyright (c) 2002, all rights reserved. U.S. Library of Congress ISSN: 1529-059X From The Innovative Professional's (TIP's) Letter Sunday, January 5, 2003 Written & Published by Philip E. Humbert, PhD Contact him at: www.philiphumbert.com or email Coach@philiphumbert.com