Interesting read from FastCompany.com, a study found that back up plans can hold you back from achieving effort-based goals by reducing your motivation. According to Jihae Shin, assistant professor at Wisconsin School of Business:
A backup plan can make you want to achieve the goal less. It makes you prematurely think that whatever happens is okay. Failure is okay.
A sentiment echoed by Tony Sarsam, CEO of Ready Pac Foods:
"Providing a backup plan would be similar to a sports team saying they can’t bear the thought of losing so they’ll plan for a tie," he says. "I believe that a company that opens itself up and takes risks will, in the long term, have better growth, be more successful, and will win,".
From personal experience, I do agree having a plan B can sometimes make me complacent, breathe a little TOO easy. Without it, I have no option but to push beyond my comfort zone and get it done.
Thoughts monkeys? Fancy a trophy just for trying or feel like DO-OR-DIE is the way to go?
At times, a back-up plan is part of being prepared. I often plan for the worst-case scenario, and also believe in the adage that two is one and one is none. Though, I also agree that having a plan-b often limits one's potential. Similar to anything in life, it's about finding a balance.
i think most rational / prepared people are going to have a back up plan (or 3, or 4), no matter what, it's more about how hard work towards the primary goal, how much you want it, opportunity costs, and how tempting the backup plans are.
hypothetical: let's say for example i want to go into comedy, professionally. my backup plan would be to work remotely in xyz field and move to medellin, colombia. being successful working in comedy would more than likely SUCK the first x years with failure after failure, while my backup plan sounds pretty tempting....Either a) I would need to achieve small successes in comedy quickly enough and keep going, b) attempt to do both at the same time, or c) after x months/years of failing at plan a, plan b would just become more and more tempting and eventually a reality.
Did not have one and lost it all
Having a plan B isn't always the a plan B in the traditional sense. Having a plan if everything blows up is called being smart. However, I believe what the article is trying to say is that having a plan to deal with things if things aren't exactly the way you would want them to is what holds people back.
Heister I think you nailed it!!! I do agree with pragmatic balanced approaches like those proposed by AndyLouis and shortstack. However, the study only looked at a particular situation ("Shin stresses that their findings only examined goals where performance and success is highly dependent on effort.").
The author did go on to mention other circumstances or types of "back up plans" like crisis planning, strategies to compensate for acute critical losses (company looses key data due to a natural disaster) or alternative scenario plans (similar to Andy's or even realjackryan's example), which have their place. Moreover, they prove beneficial according to another study conducted in the University of Zurich.
Lots of nuances, like shortstack mentioned, definitely about finding a balance!
Plan B is for the ugly Tinder chick you met last night
iBankedUp it may tickle you to know that my original title for this post was going to be a humorous take on the Plan B pill..a bit more tongue in cheek.
My plans B and C are usually circuitous routes to plan A, if my direct path to A falls through. So, I don't think i suffer from that issue.
Hahaha I have had some of those plans myself. Gotta watch out for that left turn at Albuquerque though...next thing you know you are in Canada!!!
There's probably some truth in the fact that having a backup plan can get in the way of success. If you look at a bunch of great entrepreneurs none of them think of things in terms of what happens when they fail.
A great recent example is Elon Musk, if you've read his book you'll see how the guy is literally crazy with how much risk he took on to build both Tesla and SpaceX. He literally spent all of the hundreds of millions of dollars he earned at Paypal to build these companies and both of them were on the brink of failure many times.
Any rational being would have either 1. Just lived off of the $300 million forever 2. At least saved some of the money as a Plan B, but Elon was so passionate about what he was doing that it never mattered to him.
For the most part, to be a great entrepreneur I think you have to be willing to takes risks that would seem crazy to the ordinary person.
Et quo ad laudantium iusto. Deserunt corporis a et. Aut neque ut veniam aspernatur repudiandae. Ratione aut corrupti quos est.
Et atque magni perspiciatis illum debitis. Aut natus et perspiciatis voluptatibus. Nam aperiam dolores totam quaerat dolorum assumenda aut. Et et sint neque fugit rerum laborum debitis voluptatem.
Ut temporibus perferendis et. Libero iure quia sed molestias eos ut. Quisquam rerum quos inventore sunt voluptatem neque ducimus. Et aut quaerat sapiente praesentium autem nam quia expedita.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...