668 Blog for Week of 5/10/2010

Identifying opportunities for change. How do you know when change is needed? How do people become passionate about change?

There are a couple of ways someone would know when change is needed. Personally, when they get to a point where something is detrimental to their personal lives. Perhaps when a smoker/gambler/overeater reaches a point where they would perhaps die, or strain their relationships with their loved ones is when they reach that melting point or what I call the 'defining moment' It could be a positive moment or a negative moment. Regardless, it's a moment where this person HAS to change or something detrimental will happen, OR that detrimental moment DID occur and that person now looks to change their lifestyle.

From a business perspective I view change as necessary when the same process and procedures yield no profit/effectiveness or efficiency. Perhaps that's the point of equilibrium. In order to improve upon the satisfactory results, the company/group/team must make a change in their way of doing things in order to spice things up or ruffle some feathers so to speak. (same with a workout, the more routine it is, the less results you'll see)

I can speak of my passion for change and hope that it's the same driver as others, but there are plenty of motivations out there for change. You can see a homeless person and would help that person to go home and make a better person of yourself, be a better father, husband etc. You can feel that you are overweight and it's affecting your lifestyle and you become passionate about losing weight in order to stay healthier so that you can see your kids grow up. You can view a defeat as a victory in some cases by further improving yourself now that you have free time. Being passionate about something is different to me than it is to others, but everyone is passionate about change because they may view that change as imperative to their lives. You MUST enjoy what the cause is, why you're changing and for what good that change serves you or people. If you don't enjoy it, you will not be passionate about administering that change, at work or at home personally.