The Fog

It was foggy all day yesterday and that resonated with me.

(Photo credit: rchughtai)

Maybe because it was the start of another week and like an old car I’m getting harder to start and was a little foggy, or maybe because all I keep hearing about is the uncertainty of financial markets, the economy, and lots of other things that are near and dear but not very clear.  Either way, a December day that was warm and foggy was unusual enough to give me cause to reflect.  Of course, it prompted some business thinking I’d like to share.  Let me digress, however, for a minute.

I like playing golf in the fog (no I did not play yesterday).  I know – “you like playing golf period.”  True enough.  But playing in the fog has a unique set of challenges, the most obvious being that tracking the ball once it leaves your club face is impossible.  Because of that, I find I have an increased awareness of all the things that tell me what shape the shot took – where on the face did I strike the ball, was it solid contact, was the face open or shut, my swing path – and where I might go find it.  I can see it go off in a general direction but without an awareness of if I hit it to bend right or left or how far it might have gone, finding the ball is almost impossible.  I pay more attention to what I’m doing in the here and now.

Back to business.  Like golf on a foggy day, the business landscape can be obscured.  Ask anyone in digital for a five-year outlook and you’ll get a lot of shrugged shoulders.  Maybe five months is clear, like the first 50 yards of the golf shot.  After that?  Who knows.  Then again, as with golf, the uncertainty makes us focus very clearly on every little aspect of what’s going on now, since there are a hundred things that can affect where the ball – and the business – ends up.  Rather than complaining about an obscured future, our job is to examine what we’re doing now that will bring about the possibilities that future holds.

While I liked the foggy day, I much prefer the sun.  We can’t, however, control the weather.  Business is another matter.