In Five Years, Where Do You Want to Be?

Yesterday I was hired to lead a conversation with the communications team of a large global company. It was their annual retreat and they brought me in to push and pull them to think about the answer to the question of where they wanted to be in five years.

We talked a lot about technology, but also about the culture shift that had to happen in their company to embrace and utilize the ever growing social nature of the world around them and the constant fire hose of information that everyone is trying to deal with.

It was a great discussion and I hope they got as much out of it as I did. In fact I hope I get to work with them some more in the future as they've got some amazing opportunities in front of them that I hope they take full advantage of.

But, after my time was done I took some time to chill down beside the ocean.

The meeting was out on a point in Newport, RI and I found a quiet little spot where all I could hear was the crash of the waves rattling thousands of sea rocks and the occasional screech of a seagull.

After leading a room of people through the exercise of future planning, I started doing some of my own.

I'm currently riding the wave of a best selling book and working on writing my next one. I get hired to speak and consult on a fairly regular basis, but no where to the level that I'd like and see others doing. My home life couldn't be better and I have a loving wife that supports me in all I do.

So, where do I want to go? What mountains do I want to climb or markets do I want to break into.

The crashing waves didn't bring me all the answers, but the quiet time to think about them helped a lot. I don't think we take the time for quiet moments nearly as often as we should.