09 September 2017

Resilience: Optimizing a Continuous Cycle in Your Particular Environment...

Walking across the River Thames over a bridge in London, you can see several signs of resilience, if you look carefully.  This city has listened to air raid sirens, bombs exploding and witnessed vehicles running over pedestrians in a pure act of terror over the past seven decades and beyond.

Big Ben was strangely silent, for maintenance and restoration work.  Yet the citizens of the area and tourists alike were anxious to make it past the new vehicle barriers, to reach the other side.  Resilience runs deep in London and you can see it on the faces of those who call it home.

To endure hardship, disappointment, disability, destruction and years of abandoned dreams is just part of life.  Some cities across the globe have endured and stayed vigilant.  They have learned the art and science of resilience, so that their citizens can carry on, no matter what the negative forces may be.

Across any major continent you will find examples of places and people who have endured and remained resilient.  To the wrath of Mother Nature or the evil deeds of other human beings.  Whether it is Houston, Texas or New York City, London or Berlin doesn't really matter.  The examples of resilience are personified in granite, museums and historical sites with the names and faces of resilient people.

Yet as the train pulled out of Euston Station towards Edinburgh, the city fades into rolling farms and wooded forests, thousands of sheep dot the hillsides.  People living outside the city still have their own challenges and battles with everyday life.  They too must adapt and encourage resilience.

A crop that never makes it to harvest due to a fungal disease or live stock threats from liver fluke, are just a few threats that farmers and ranchers must plan for and respond to, in order to lower the risk of loss.  So should you find yourself in the countryside or in the middle of the city looking up at the Edinburgh Castle, here is a standard six-step process to endure and remain vigilant:
  • IDENTIFY
  • ASSESS
  • DECIDE
  • IMPLEMENT
  • AUDIT
  • SUPERVISE
These steps in the process are not some new invention.  Others have invented variations such as the OODA Loop.  The point is that even Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) will provide a continuous cycle for the city dweller or the countryman, the banker or the fighter pilot.  The hedge fund manager or the venture capitalist.

So what?

The likelihood is that you to have witnessed operational failure.  You have felt the emotion of severe loss of life.  You have been part of a life or business scenario, that has brought you to a point when you have lashed out at those you love, or brought you to your knees looking to the sky.

Beyond your faith and wishful or positive mental attitude, you only have your proven process left to work with, to endure, to be resilient.  The continuous cycle will keep you heading in the only direction you have and that is, to the next step in that cycle.  When you skip a step or have missed one altogether, you are simply opening yourself up to increased exposure of loss or even complete failure.

You shall discover your favorite process or cycle in your life, your vocation and within your domain.

Once you do, you must decide to master it.  To never skip a step and to adapt, learn and improvise.

When you do this, you will have achieved resilience for yourself, your family and your country... 

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