trade offs - the game of life

Have you noticed I have been making lots of trade offs recently? as in I haven't posted here for awhile - so I must be spending my time elsewhere? That would be me trading the time it takes to brainstorm, write, and edit a post with laundry, watching TV, studying, working, catching up with family over the phone, and designing an RV among other things.

I have been learning a bit about business strategy and trade offs in my Supply Chain management class this semester.  We learned that a lot of companies ignore strategy and just work on being operationally efficient instead.  

Operationally efficient: when you work harder to get better at what you already do; like answer more phone calls, or take more payments, or submit paperwork with fewer errors.  You can measure all of those things, they are tangible - you either hit your goal or you didn't.

For companies, it is easier to focus on the tangible measures than making a decision on where you want to take your business in the future (aka strategy.)  The problem with becoming operationally efficient is that at some point you will make all the improvements possible and need to decide WHAT'S NEXT??? This is called hitting the productivity frontier.  I snapped a photo of my notes from class below.  Once you hit the curve, this is where you have to make a trade off.  Your business can expand, create another product, offer another service, decide to sell, or move to another region just to name a few options.

 

Reading through this - it is starting to sound quite dry.  This is how I try to stay interested: while I am daydreaming in class, I like to apply this very "businessy" language to my real life.  Here is my comparison.  I try hard to be operationally efficient day to day by sticking to a schedule for the kids drop off, squeezing in a gym run during lunch at least once a week, and getting gas at the same time I am out for groceries.

Just like in business though - there are only so many things I can do to become more operationally efficient.  At some point we need to start making decisions about what is the most important way to spend time.  Here are some of the real life trade offs I have made in the last 30 days:

• helping with the kids bed time routine vs. going to my evening MBA class
• writing blog posts vs. studying for class
• watching any TV vs. getting my butt to the gym

Hopefully the little trade offs every day support my long term goals.  In my case I am giving up quite a bit of family time during the week, but will walk away with an MBA once it is all done.  I consider that a pretty good trade off, others might not agree.

I am sure this is all pretty geeky (I am a self aware dork at heart.)  I do find it valuable to reflect on my goals and whether I am truly making any progress on them or not.  To be honest, I have it pretty easy right now with the MBA.  My classes are chosen for me every semester and I just need to attend class and do my homework - no need for a lot of thought here.  Once that is finished though, life will get tougher because I will have to make some REAL decisions about what comes next.

I hoping that these posts will help me figure it all out :)  Feel free to send over any advice - I could certainly use it!

need for speed

Next week is the start of another semester of MBA night classes.  I learned a hard lesson last year during my first semester.  I loved my Accounting class and enjoyed the challenge of the homework and as a true nerd even loved taking the tests.  My huge mistake in Accounting landed me my first B in the MBA program (and hopefully my last!!)  I got cocky.  I was speeding through the tests and the homework with great success and I took this to an extreme with the final.  The night of the final I had an obligation to get home at a certain time (so my husband could go to work) and I let that take priority over my final exam.  I made foolish mistakes – answers that I could have fixed if I had spent more time reading through the test again.

Lesson Learned: What I should have done: hire a babysitter to watch the kids.  That would have let me stay in class as LONG as I needed and let my husband get to work on time.  Less stress across the board – doesn’t that sound nice!

This MBA program has been really interesting to take on.  I have to balance the class with work, kids, gym, friends and anything extra that gets thrown into the mix.  I know that I don’t have the time to study for 20+ hours a week.  I am ok with that – I am also ok with getting a B if I need to.  At the end of the day the grades for each individual class won’t make a difference.  The real goal for me is completion of the full program.  What drives me nuts about the scenario above is that it was under my control and I could have resolved it with a little planning ahead.  I won’t make that same mistake again. 

With the semester starting next week – I am making myself a couple promises:

·        Don’t get cocky

·        Take my time during class – to ask questions and absorb anything I can.  (The more I can get done in the class, the less I need to tackle at home.)

·        Go to weekend study groups at Panera – and don’t eat too many pastries!

 

How do you balance your time?  What lessons have you learned this year? 

 

*** in case you were wondering - my text books make a great lamp base ***