Last week, in my article ‘We All See the Opportunity, but Keep Walking Past It?’, I wrote about how opportunities often pass us by because we fail to notice them. This week, I had another interesting realisation.
Perhaps many of us stop noticing opportunities not because they no longer exist, but because our mind quietly learns to ignore them.
Think about it.
How many times have we noticed a problem, wanted to solve it, put in our best effort, and still failed? Failure hurts. Disappointment hurts even more. Slowly, without even realising it, our subconscious starts protecting us from that pain. It quietly tells us, “Don’t get involved. Don’t look too closely. If you don’t see the opportunity, you won’t experience the disappointment of failing again.”
Strange, isn’t it?
The opportunities are still around us. The problems are still waiting to be solved. But our mind has learnt to walk past them because it remembers the pain more than the possibility.
Over the years, I have realised that what gives us the confidence to pursue opportunities is not simply having a good Plan A. It is knowing that we have a well-thought-out Plan B.
A Plan B is not an expectation of failure. It is preparation for uncertainty. It gives us the courage to move forward because we know we are not trapped if things don’t go exactly as planned, for dampening our subconscious to block us from seeing the opportunities.
From my experience, these are some of the important prerequisites, or should I say practices, for creating an effective Plan B.
- Begin with the end in mind. Be absolutely clear about the outcome you want to achieve. When the destination is crystal clear, changing the route becomes much easier without losing direction.
- Aim higher and be more precise than the actual target. Build a margin into your goals. If your target is 100, plan for 110. If delivery is expected in 30 days, prepare for 27. Stretching the target creates a safety cushion when unexpected challenges arise.
- Create early warning triggers. Decide in advance what signals will tell you that Plan A is drifting off course. Don’t wait until the situation becomes a crisis before activating Plan B.
- Regularly estimate the expected outcome and expected completion date. Continuously ask yourself, “If we continue at the current pace, what result are we likely to achieve, and by when?” This simple habit gives you valuable time to activate Plan B before it is too late.
- Identify and monitor your critical assumptions. Every plan is built on assumptions. Customer demand may change. Suppliers may delay. Key people may leave. Review these assumptions regularly and be ready to respond if they no longer hold true.
- Perform scenario analysis and war gaming. Ask yourself questions like, “What if demand suddenly doubles? What if our biggest customer leaves? What if our supplier fails? What if costs increase sharply?” Thinking through these possibilities before they happen makes decision-making much faster.
- Simulate execution before reality does. Wherever possible, use pilot projects, prototypes, mock runs, or digital twins to test your ideas. It is always cheaper to discover mistakes in a simulation than in real life.
- Continuously think about possible risks and their solutions. Make this a habit rather than a one-time exercise. Every day brings new information that may require refining your Plan B.
- Build bench strength. Never allow critical knowledge or responsibilities to remain with only one person. Develop capable backups well before they are needed.
- Create buffers. Whether it is time, money, inventory, capacity, or skills, a small reserve often prevents a temporary setback from becoming a major failure.
- Learn systematically from every setback. Instead of asking, “Who made the mistake?” ask, “What did the system teach us?” Every failure should make your next Plan B stronger.
- Empower people to make timely decisions. If every small decision needs multiple approvals, valuable time is lost. Define in advance who can activate Plan B and under what conditions.
- Practise Plan B before you need it. Just as fire drills prepare people for emergencies, periodically rehearse important contingency plans so that everyone knows what to do without panic.
- Seek the guidance of a coach or mentor. Regularly discussing your plans with someone who has different experiences often reveals blind spots that you may never notice yourself.
- Build emotional resilience. Sometimes the biggest obstacle is not the situation but our reluctance to admit that Plan A is no longer working. The sooner we accept reality, the sooner we can recover.
I have come to believe that successful people are not those who never face uncertainty. They are the ones who prepare so well that uncertainty never stops them from moving forward.
A strong Plan A gives us direction.
A thoughtful Plan B gives us confidence.
Together, they give us the courage to keep seeing opportunities where others only see risks.
So, let me leave you with a thought.
What important goal in your life or organisation depends entirely on Plan A today? More importantly, if Plan A stopped working tomorrow, have you prepared yourself well enough to confidently activate Plan B?
Happy Reading!
