What's Your Backup Plan?

I remember reading a great book that was cowritten by the late Miami Dolphins coach Don Shula and Ken Blanchard. It was called Everyone’s a Coach. Hockey has always been my sport, but many of the references in the book referred to football and were adaptable for business life. One of the strategies the co-authors encouraged was to be “audible-ready.” At first glance, I didn’t really understand what it meant. However, as I did my research, I realized why it was so important.

In football, when the offense of a team is huddling up to plan their next play, they decide on what it’s going to be and everyone on that line is prepared to execute it. However, if the quarterback looks around and feels that the other team has figured out their play, he can call an audible. An audible is a plan B. It’s a backup plan that all team members know and are ready to execute in the event it’s needed. The important thing I gleaned from this research was that they didn’t just make up something else on the fly. They already had plan B ready to go, if needed.

So, what about you? Are you audible ready? What is your backup plan in case your current business goes belly up, experiences a major slow down, is affected by supply chain delays, or is impacted by a completely different kind of competition? Any of those things could happen and do happen, just about every day in business.

I always encourage my entrepreneurial clients to have at least five backup plans. What that means is that as soon as you use one of your backup plans, you start identifying a replacement plan so that you never have less than five. You don’t wait until you are on your fifth backup plan to come up with number six.

The second thing to remember is make sure that anyone who was affected by the audible knows what the backup plan is before you need to use it. As Brian Tracy said, “A lack of planning is the cause of every failure.” Stop waiting for the next rainy day and start formulating your backup plans today.

“You were born to win, but to be a winner, you must plan to win, prepare to win, and expect to win.” – Zig Ziglar

Let me hear from you.

This excerpt is taken from the seminar entitled Stumbling Onto Success. I encourage you to click here to register for the exclusive live Zoom presentation of Stumbling Onto Success on Thursday, August 24, 2023 from 9 AM to 12 noon Eastern Standard Time.