A Secretary of Defense for the US was once asked a very revealing question: 

“What keeps you up at night?”

That’s important to know, right? What are our weaknesses, what are the threats? 

His answer completely rocked me.

He said, “Nothing. I keep others up at night.” 

What a revolutionary mindset! 

In essence, the safest, most successful approach is to be the one to whom others react, rather than vice versa. 

For my business clients it made me think of the many different approaches and mindsets they each have toward change. Most tell me they are managing change, embracing change, or adapting to change, with entire trainings and programs centered around those. 

These are noble aspirations… if the best you hope to do is survive. 

If, instead you want to thrive, to grow, to profit, to lead, I am inviting you to elevate to a new mindset.

It’s time for you to stop managing change, and start to create change… to lead change. 

I want you to be the ones who define the curve, rather than follow it.

Imagine the transformation you could create if all the time, money and effort you spend teaching your teams how to react to change, you instead spend teaching them to proactively create change - to discover, create and act on new opportunities pre-emptively?

You’d be unstoppable. 

This is the essence of the “What IF Mindset.” 

Yes, sometimes the unexpected happens and we must respond by managing, embracing or adapting. Please recognize, though, these are all reactive postures and we want to move back to proactive change quickly. 

To do this I want you to leverage an interesting phenomenon: When you boldly create and lead change, your response to outside change naturally strengthens, evolves, and in many cases becomes unnecessary. 

In essence, the best defense is a good offense. 

How do we create change? By constantly asking “What if we could that? What if we didn’t do that?” By adopting the “What IF Mindset” for innovation, creativity, radical problem solving, you harness your team’s sense of purpose.

You are surrounded right now by opportunities that you’re missing. From billion-dollar innovations that change the world, to simple productivity changes which supercharge your bottom line.

Together, let’s discover and act on those opportunities by elevating your organizational mindset to one of creating and leading change.