Proactive Vs Reactive
“Proactive” creating or controlling a situation rather than just responding to it after it happened
Source: Oxford English dictionary
“Reactive” acting in response to a situation rather than creating or controlling it
Source: Oxford English dictionary
Every year we hear new buzz words. Sometimes it is useful to make your own buzz words to motivate or as a reminder when times are tough. It can be a cruel world sometimes. We psychologically tend to remember the negative more readily. There is nothing wrong with retaining the unhappy moments, they can help remind us to not “go down that path” again or learn a lesson to approach a task or activity differently.
There’s a difference between dwelling on our past experiences and using them simply as a reminder. The personality type who is often caught up not wanting to try again is in a way paralyzed by the bad memory of a prior effort that didn’t turn out well. We become reactive. We wait for a defining moment then act to either stop it from happening again or becoming more impactful. One might say, “that’s the way it is supposed to be, I’m not a mind reader”. If there are mind readers out there, then this article may not be for you.
Most animals are equipped with a reactionary mentality. It is part of our evolution to recede from things that are scary or dangerous, or in many cases perceived as such. We don’t want to get too close to the edge, or do we? A lot is learned from pushing boundaries. I would make a gentleman’s wager your favorite professional athlete experienced crushing failure over and over yet willed themselves to continue the path toward being a champion or a legend in their sport. We admire these people, just like the Romans and Greeks did so to the pantheon of gods.
Our society includes many professional careers rooted in a reactionary mindset. An example police or disaster response units. Yes, being reactionary in certain instances is for the greater good. However, disaster responders may have a less perilous job if more precautions are instituted. We can learn from past disasters and how to make future unpredictable scenarios less cruel. The 1989 earthquake in Northern California was an event I won’t forget. The double decker freeway traversing West Oakland collapsed upon itself, killing several people and severely injuring many more. It was a hellish sight. The rebuild is a wider, single deck span. One might say, how can we be proactive in a situation such as this? It’s an extreme example. There are so many factors involved, local, state and federal government. Who pays for what? Who is responsible for upkeep, on and on. The larger the project, the more complex it is orchestrating a proactive approach.
We have the freedom to develop processes in our business and personal lives to limit the impact of a negative occurrence or eliminate it altogether. Make time to think through a costly aspect of your business, there’s a starting point. Take a minute to write down one or two activities in your business you feel is a negative. The negative can be something that is a time waster or a financial burden on your business. An example, outsourcing a call center operator to a third party, whether right down the street or in a foreign country. Does this third party make your business leaner, or does it cause more issues for you or a high paid person on staff to manage? Keep the $15 an hour work for the lower skilled staff. Allowing a key member of the team to spend more than an hour a week on supervising or handling an issue a call center person is handling is a redundancy. Be open minded about it. Realize you allowed it to happen (forgive yourself) and know it is fixable.
Trial and error is being proactive. It’s easy to confuse whether we are being proactive or not. If you are making a concerted effort to improve your product or service, that’s the action of pro-activity. I have heard some say they think proactive action leads to perfection. Maybe it will if that’s what you are after. Yet, how long is something truly perfect?
Being proactive is something we do continually. It is a means to stay competitive in the market place. It is a source of ingenuity and helps make the mundane interesting again. When we spend our valuable time thinking and most importantly acting on improving a process or procedure, we are making our business more efficient, safer, more profitable or a combination of all three.
This year make “proactive” and “reactive” your buzz words. Be aware of distinguishing one from the other when thinking through your activities for the day. Is this activity one or the other, and whether to attack or plan before acting. It may go a long way in building a better more efficient business or project.
“I believe that everyone chooses how to approach life. If you’re proactive, you focus on preparing. If you’re reactive, you end up focusing on repairing”
Source: John C Maxwell
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