Design Your Plan!

Designing a plan. This is the fourth step in Ray Dalio’s Five Step Plan for Getting What You Want. This step is crucial to the process because once we’ve identified our goals and road blocks, the next logical step is to design a plan that eliminates the problems in our way.

The first thing to be aware of is being able to look at your circumstance and problem from a higher level and recognize that the outcomes you achieve are outcomes produced by a machine or system. Look at everything that is happening in your life (as it relates to your goal) and identify the aspects of the machine that are not working properly.

The second element is that making a plan is a lot like writing a movie script in the sense that you need to understand who is going to do what at what specific intervals in time. Not only that, but you need to recognize that just like there are multiple actors in a movie, there are multiple players in your life that will help you implement the plan. For example, at WPT there have been instances where the knowledge needed for a specific plan or task went beyond the walls of the clinic. In those instances, hiring outside consultants that have a high degree of proficiency in an area where I am weak has helped overcome obstacles that stand in the way of our progress.

The third piece of a well thought out plan is that it’s written down and can be measured against. This includes all of the specific details about who needs to do what tasks and when. If we cannot measure against it, we won’t know how effective our design is and what elements should stay and which should go.

We’re excited to bring you the fifth and final step to getting what you want in the next video. Stay tuned!