You probably see this situation at least every day. I was walking behind a woman when she suddenly slowed down so much, she almost stopped. She had just pulled out her phone and was starting to text someone. She was so focused on the new activity, she didn’t realize she had slowed down. She was oblivious to everything around her, except for the phone.

Things pop up in business every day that create distractions and slow us down. Many times, they take us off our primary goals. Do you know what they are in your business? How do you ensure you don’t slow down?

It is that time of year. New year’s resolutions are made and a wave of people show up at the gym. The influx lasts only a few weeks. Some push too hard, are too sore and don’t come back. Others come back a few times, but don’t make it past the end of the month. It isn’t a priority and eventually it falls off the schedule.

As you think about your business goals, have you made them a priority? Have you thought through what it will take to accomplish them? Have you put the necessary resources in place to accomplish your goals? If not, take time this week to set your business up for success.

I was walking down the street in Southeast Portland as a mail carrier walked by with his bag of mail. He walked down the block, going up and down the stairs to drop mail through the mail slot in each house. Years ago, I lived in Houston and the mail was delivered the same way. In both of these cases, the homes are 80 or so years old and don’t have mailboxes. My current home was part of a development. The mail is delivered in one location for the entire neighborhood, a much more efficient method of delivery for the postal service. At a time where costs are rising, volume of mail is declining, delivery points are increasing and the postal service struggles its budget, the inefficiencies in mail delivery are strikingly obvious when you see them. And, the inefficiencies are not addressed. Do you have any inefficiencies in your business? What is holding you back from addressing them?

It is that time of year again. The steady rain has arrived in the pacific northwest. The sky stays gray for months. When the rain falls, trucks create a mist so encompassing that it is nearly impossible to see anything but a gray wall. The mist seems to reach the sky and becomes one.  But once you get around the trucks, you can see the road, cars and trees that were completely obscured moments before.

At times, there can be items obscuring your view. It may be a project, a customer, personal challenges or other pervasive items that don’t allow you to see what is in front of you. How are you getting around the items that are obscuring your view?

It has been a local draw for 54 years for those driving up and down the interstate. A place to stop and get a bite, and stretch your legs before continuing the journey. But with major development in the works, the location was about to experience a number of changes. So, the owners decided to sell the location and move on to a new adventure.  It is the end of an era, but also the start of a new one.

Change comes in a number of ways. Sometimes it is welcome, other times it is forced on us. How are you keeping an eye out to adjust directions when it is the right time for you?

There has been a string of great news about the economy. Unemployment has been going down, labor participation rate is up, and businesses continue to have cash to invest and are investing it. In fact, there are a number of banks and high profile periodicals that believe we may be in the longest period of economic expansion ever. At some point, the expansion will end. Are you prepared for it? Do you have a set of economic metrics that indicate when your market is turning? Do you have a plan for how you handle market expansions and market contractions? If you don’t have an eye on these, it is time to start planning so you know what levers to pull and when.

Hurricanes, earthquakes, shootings, fires, missile launches. There have been major events all over the world over the last two months. They are important and attract major news attention. For a day, or a week at most. And then the news cycle ends and the topic of the day moves to the top of the news cycle. The major issues that attracted so much attention become all but forgotten. It is not because the situation has been resolved. It is simply a matter of a new topic catching the attention of the news cycle, even if the subject is of lesser importance.

It is important not to manage your business like a news cycle. Meetings, email, phone calls, etc. are frequent consumers of time and attention. They can be a constant stream of new stuff, just like the news cycle. But are they really the right place to spend the bulk of your time? How are you making sure you are spending your time on the things that will move your business forward?

It was an intensive project. People were working on it for months. Extensive conversations involved people from each department. Every detail was looked at and planned for. Everyone knew the timing, what had to happen, how long the downtime would be and who all was involved. There was a ton of communication. Only that communication was amongst the groups involved in making the project happen. There wasn’t any direct communication with the customer, creating surprise and confusion when the downtime happened. It was a blip that people got over, but the frustration didn’t need to happen.

It is a common business situation. Whether you are in leadership or working on a project, it seems like all you have done is communicate. The real question is, whom are you communicating with? If it is only the people who are working on the project, initiative, or your senior leadership team and not those who are impacted, you are not communicating enough. When was the last time you stepped back to think about how you are getting your message out? If you aren’t talking about it all the time, its time to take a step back and rethink your communication strategy.