If you’ve spent any time at all with Dr. Greg Bethard, you know he is not only an outstanding nutritionist but an excellent teacher in and out of the classroom. He’s the kind of person I like to hang out with because a conversation with him is always going to be thought-provoking.

I had the opportunity to work with him a couple of years ago conducting a workshop for one of his dairy clients and recently got to pick his brain while we walked pens together at High Plains Dairy near Plains, Kansas.

I asked him for his insights about the future of the dairy industry and what a dairy operation would have to do to succeed in that future. What he shared with me would make for very interesting reading, but I decided that it would be better not to share what he told me in this article.

Instead, I want to challenge you to think about the future of the dairy industry and what your operation will have to do to be successful in that future.

You could engage in a strategic planning process. But before you invest time and money in traditional strategic planning, consider this – only 5 to 10 percent of strategic plans are ever implemented.

The reason most organizations engage in strategic planning is to reduce anxiety. It’s like taking a couple of aspirin for a headache. In this case, the headache is the future.

The aspirin is a couple of days locked in a room putting checkmarks in the appropriate boxes. Mission statement (yada, yada, yada): check; SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis: check; long-range goals (three to five years): check.

Ah, that feels better. And like the aspirin bottle, the plan is put on the shelf. But the future, like the headache, keeps coming back. As Dr. Phil likes to ask, “How’s that working for you?”

Even if you do try to implement a plan using this process, it will be flawed. Think back five years ago. It seems like a millisecond, doesn’t it?

If you look no further ahead than five years, you’ll simply see the future as an extension of the present and the present as an extension of the past. You’ll be trying to solve tomorrow’s problems with yesterday’s solutions.

That’s precisely why so many major corporations went over the financial cliff during the economic meltdown of 2008. They were banking on the belief that what had worked for them the last five years would work for them the next five years. That belief broke the bank.

I abandoned the traditional strategic planning process years ago because I didn’t like the results – or more accurately, the lack of results. You should abandon it, too. You should stop planning and start pioneering.

Instead of looking three to five years into the future, you should be looking a generation into the future. If you want your business to be successful for the next generation, you have to view it from a generational perspective.

After I abandoned traditional strategic planning, I developed a pioneering process that I have used with clients for many years with great results.

I’m going to share with you how I’d use my pioneering process with a client in the dairy business. Keep in mind this is the basic template. I always customize the process for the client because there are no one-size-fits-all solutions.

To get started, we’ll assemble key people in your organization to be part of your pioneering team. How many and who you choose will depend on the size and structure of your organization. I’ll divide them into small groups.

I’ll ask the following questions, one at a time, giving each group time to discuss and record their answers. After each question, the groups will share their answers with the group at large. In this case, the questions will be:

1. What did the world and the dairy industry look like 30 years ago? The list of monumental changes that have taken place in the last 30 years of the dairy industry will prime your pump for the monumental changes that will take place in the next 30 years.

2. What will the world and the dairy industry look like 30 years from now? Jules Verne was writing about a trip to the moon 100 years before it happened. You want to be as futuristic as your collective minds will let you.

3. What will your organization have to be, do and look like to succeed in the future you just described? You are not bound to the form or functions of your current organization. Borrow a page from Star Trek and dare to boldly go where no man has gone before.

4. What will you have to do to get there? Armed with a picture of what your organization will have to do and be to succeed in the future, what are you going to have to do to get there?

The collective answers to these questions provide all the information you will need for the next assignment. A major news magazine has selected your company as The Model Organization of the year in 2043.

Each team member will write a 1,000-word article from the perspective of 30 years into the future describing what happened between then and now that enabled you to become that model organization.

This is a process of writing tomorrow’s history today. Everything you need to do to succeed in the future is contained in that history.

You’ll identify your organization’s purpose, operating philosophy, business models, structure, goals and objectives. Implementation then becomes a matter of living the history.

What makes this process effective is that instead of starting at the present and trying to work your way forward, you are starting at the future and working your way back.

This helps create a picture of the future where people find meaning and purpose, not just as a group but as individuals.

If you think this process sounds a little far-out, keep in mind something IBM founder Thomas Watson said: “If you want to be a big company tomorrow, you have to start acting like a big company today.” And after my conversation with Greg Bethard I will tell you this – you’d better be thinking big.

What I’ve shared with you is a much-condensed overview of my pioneering process. It takes a genuine commitment of time and energy.

If you simply want to reduce your anxiety about the future, take the road most traveled and use the traditional check-the-boxes method. But if you want to succeed in the future, you have to go beyond traditional planning and do some serious pioneering.

Pioneering has never been for the faint of heart. It’s for those who want to lead rather than follow and thrive instead of just survive. Pioneers take the road less traveled.

Which road will you choose? PD

Jim Whitt
Founder
Purpose Unlimited