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Zachary Aldwin Milkshake in the Boardroom
Groundhog day! The term refers to going over a series of tedious events again and again and again, well I think you get it by now.
Bill wakes up in the morning, gets dressed in the same style clothes he has worn for the last 20 years, eats the same cereal that he has eaten since childhood, jumps into the 10 year old sedan, drives to work along the same route he has taken since he started there 15 years ago, and does the same tasks of filling in and filing forms that he has been doing since he arrived at the company.

He can predict that at 10:13 Mary will walk past his desk on her way to the coffee pot, that at noon exactly and not a second later Evans will sharpen his pencil, and can recite in order the way Emily packs her bag at the end of the day.

Life is boring. Perhaps your life resembles Bill’s a little, perhaps not. I would hope that at least your business doesn’t.
Bill does the same thing daily never bothering to question why. Ask him why he eats the cereal he eats and he is probably stumped for an answer (why did you eat what you had for breakfast this morning by the way?). It is time for us to revisit the ‘why’.

There is a phrase in design that “form follows function”. How something ends up looking has a lot to do with what you intend to do with it.
A chair needs to hold your weight in a comfortable position that is the function. While chair designs differ widely the form usually included a repository for you to rest upon. Going a little deeper, a chair designed for office use will look differently to a chair designed for relaxation and comfort at home. Your business should look like it fulfils what it was designed to do. Every step in it should have an underlying ‘this is why we do this’ behind it.

Why is your décor green and blue? Why does every receipt need to be in triplicate? Why is your reception lay out the way it is?
There needs to be intentionality behind every aspect of what you put out, every project that you execute.

To make matters worse it needs to be a little pedantic. It is time we revisited the ‘why’ and question everything.
Here are a few reasons to go back and examine the underlying causes for everything. Chances are when you started out your process and planning your may not have bothered with the “why”, you did something because it worked not because it was the best option. Once you had a working solution to the problems that came your way you switched off your solution generator and went with the flow.

Some stuff probably just ended up happening without you being aware of it. Your receptionist arranged the furniture in the reception because you were too busy to worry about first impression layout.

What you have may not be the best option. Not only that it may not be the best option any more.
Things change over time. New technology makes certain processes redundant. You obtain extra equipment that changes the flow in the office. The plan that you had at the beginning has shifted. Re-looking critically at why the reception layout looks the way it does may be necessary. Do you need as much printing and filing if you have everything backed up onto a cloud based server? Why do you file everything anyway?

There may have been professional attenuation in your company. Over time people leave or shift position in an organisation.
Often they take the “why” with them when they go. They leave behind a checklist of instructions that should be obeyed dutifully. Then that person leaves. The next employee has even less of a clue about why things are done; he or she just knows that the stamp goes in the bottom right hand corner of the document. Requisitioning the “why” may help you realise the real reasons why things are done again, or eliminate redundant processes.

Finally, questioning the “why” helps correct irrational or incorrect reasoning. Often when people question why something is done, without having the correct person supply the answer, they create an answer of best fit. That answer may actually be wrong. Take a trip through your business and ask staff why they do some of the tasks they go through, you too may be shocked at some of the reasoning people have for processes that you created.

It is time to question everything we do in order to make it better. Deliberately re-examine your business and your life and see where things need to change.
By the way, I would hope that reason you eat what you eat for breakfast is because it is healthy and nutritious and gives you the energy and nutrient you need for the day.

There is a very plausible argument for eating a protein loaded, whole wheat bun or burger for breakfast but that is another story.

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