Opening Day
Mark Inboden
For baseball fans, we are only three weeks from Opening Day! Every year, this is a day that is celebrated with a lot of fanfare and anticipation of the season to come.
Fans want to see their teams' new players, coaches and line-ups; and look forward to starting out the season with a win!
But what if the win doesn’t come that day, or more importantly, our team is not winning much at all? Most baseball fans “stick” with their team through thick and thin, and usually do not give up hope for the playoffs until after the “All-star break." By then, you usually have a good idea if your team will be in the “hunt” or be looking forward to next year.
In business, we do not “start over” each season, and we really don’t have an Opening Day. It is true that we have a fiscal year that is determined by some date so we can report how we did, and determine our taxes. It is also true that we have to plan for the year, set budgets, etc.
What businesses don’t have are “All-star” breaks to reset their year and the opportunity to “just get experience, get paid and wait until next year” if the year is going badly. Businesses need to perform day-in and day-out, and always need to be in the “hunt." Pretend today is Opening Day for your business or job and make sure you win today, tomorrow and the next day.
Mark is President and CEO of UCEC.