Value Day 9 of 365

You may have thought that we covered No yesterday and were done. You are half right. We did cover no yesterday but No we are not done. Why not? I could say because I said so but I would lose half my readership, and I do not want to be the only one reading what I write. ??

What more is there to cover? Yesterday we discussed saying no. Reasons why and its impact on Value delivery. No however can take on other forms. Disguises' if you will. When it does this the harm to value is the same. It may come out as "I am not sure we have time". "We had to do a change order for this extra work and the budget impact may mean". These are subtle and insidious NOs in the making. What we are really working up to is saying NO to the value creation we promised.

Stop here for a moment. Imagine for a second we decided we would say NO to anything that threatened to erode the value we promised. We have mechanisms to ensure that we do not fall victim to "scope creep" yet nothing to ensure that we do not fall victim to value loss. In fact, we accept it as an almost expected part of things.

How do we do this.... Anticipation

• Anticipate the enemy's metamorphosis: Recognize how the enemy's causes and effects change as they transition to their desired actions.? - Sun Tzu.