Change By Switching Business Rituals

Every morning you wake up, eat and -– most days of the week -- you go to work. By that time you have already finished a set of daily habits. But at work, there are even more waiting for you; starting with the computer: Switch on. And then, what do you do next: open your e-mail program, “You’ve got mail” or your internet browser? And in the last case, what is the start page of your browser? The (local) newspaper, presenting fresh headlines. The home page of your preferred search engine. Ready for the first search of the day; let s think... Your stock broker, with the latest investment news. The intranet of your company... There are software agents that could help you if you would like to have a random start page. Just for creativity-sake, to observe (others) and learn. Yet, this topic is about daily habits and the opening of the browser window to the world (wide web) is only one out of many daily activities that are standard. These daily habits are like rituals although they lack the ceremonial rite behind it. Where real rituals are very infrequent, the daily business rituals are not and that’s why they are important, not only for managing your daily business, but also when dealing with change. Focusing on business rituals is just another element in business management. But more relevant are they when you manage change. In that case you could make a list of all the rituals you encounter during the week and verify their current relevance. For each ritual you strike off the list, you should introduce a new one. For example; cancel the Monday morning meeting and invent the Tuesday Afternoon Team Gathering instead. © 2006 Hans Bool Hans Bool is the founder of Astor White a traditional management consulting company that offers online management advice. Astor Online solves issues in hours what normally would take days. You can apply for a free demo account .