What is it to be Ready?

Over an hour of deliberations led to some reflections on my decisions, and what does it mean when I say I am ready, or if I want to understand if someone is ready.

Perhaps being ready is an outcome of having the willingness and ability to do something.

Willing + Able -> Ready is a hypothesis that we derived.

Willingness perhaps is an inside job, the manifestation of an intent from a stimulus. Translation of intent into action, may happen from my having the ability to do so.

While willingness could be a behavioural trait, ability maybe the skill I need to act on the intent.

The coming together of behaviour and skill may be the measure of my competence, and therefore I maybe ready.

Perhaps one could reflect on this hypothesis with a few examples, I would look at my own examples of having the confidence to say I am ready.

Example 1

I have been constantly stimulated by the lack of economic activity in regions such as Purvanchal, Nagaland, Manipur, Madhya Pradesh, Zambia, Kenya...I have been willing to participate in the development, however, I realised I lacked the required experience or skill to make it happen. I would say I am ready, but then was I really ?

I went through experiments, failed several times, kept building my experience through these failures, understood the challenges by investing time and financial resources in development activities.

It took me about 5 years of experience to keep building my ability, to get nearer to be competent enough to make any impact in economic activity.

I may not yet be fully ready, but I am much more prepared and able than I was in 2018.

Example 2

I have been examining the Silica Plastic Block project from the lens of TRL - Technology readiness level. I have been willing to participate and develop the solution for recycling or repurposing foundry dust with plastic waste.

This willingness to invest time and financial resources, take the risks associated, as I did have the ability to innovate and find solutions.

I could feel confident and ready to develop a solution with the experience and training received from the accelerator program of UNIDO.

Crossing stage 1, developing technology was something which I achieved with my team as a result of my being ready to act on the intent of finding a solution.

Then came the 2nd stage, could the technology be commercially deployable and sustainable as an independent business?

Yet again, I had the willingness, take that risk of time and resources invested to research, as I had the available resources and team, therefore was able to take the research forward

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Commercial deployment was again and area i was willing, as the impact the SPB solution could have in environment was connected to my purpose. The intent to incubate the innovation through different models in order to find how the project could be scaled was manifested from this willingness to act.

With the skills of behavioural approach from the Empretec program in 2018, I conducted several business model experiments to build my experience in scaling and deploying the project.

I realised I did not have the experience in starting a new business from scratch, be a commodity product seller, which was needed for the commercialisation of SPB. I also didn't have the experience of a joint venture or partnership, as my experience was of a family owned business, taking the mantle from my father as a second generation, building on an existing foundation.

This lack of ability made me realise that though I would say I am ready, I was truly not ready.

Over past one year, September 2023 onwards I started my journey to experience and gain deeper understanding of what it will take to make me able enough for being able to actualise the intent of taking SPB technology into commercial deployment.

Today I have a clearer picture of the 4 elements of business that I need to examine - technology, market, finance and culture ( entrepreneurial capacity).

While I am able to action technology and culture given my experience and knowledge, I keep looking for complementing abilities in collaborators for market and finance which is not my core strength or where I may be willing but not able.

Building a business that is ready, may not come from an individual alone, but finding complementing partners to build the ability may perhaps make one ready

.... these are a few recent realisations, I keep reflecting and sharing perspectives on the hypothesis of what it means to be ready.