Live your life

Henry David Thoreau is famous for saying to live the life you have imagined, but many of us are not sure what actually means. How does one decide what kind of life they want to live? What steps need to be taken in order to live that life? What if the life you want runs counter to norm? I believe that living your dream life starts with your values and principles. When you determine what is important to you, it becomes easier to craft your life.

When determining your values, you need to think about what you personally want. While this seems like an easy, logical step, it can be anything but. It can become very complicated to sift through your thoughts and feelings about money, relationships, location to live in, type of career you want and spiritual decisions. To help improve the process, start by making a list of the things that are important to you. 

Once you have a list you can look it over for consistent themes and narrow it down further. This list can then serve as a foundation for writing a personal mission statement or manifesto.

Review your list and write your principles into a series of action steps that reflect those values. At the end of this exercise you should have a page or two that you can use to evaluate the opportunities in your life. Those that are in line with your values can be acted upon, those that don't can either be passed over or changed to meet those values. When you take the time to really think about what is important to you and what life you want, you can create a framework that guides your decisions to  improve and amplify your life. 

This paper reflects who you are and who you want to be. Like anything, it can change over time and there may be some corrections, but when you know what you stand for and the mark you want to leave, your life takes on more meaning. 

ACL prevention

New research came out today touting the effects of the FIFA 11 exercises. These exercises were developed to address ACL injury prevention in young female athletes and have been validated a few different times. This latest research confirms the efficacy of incorporating this type of training into your routine.

The key to injury prevention is neuromuscular training, which is the fancy way to say performing exercises properly. Learning how to move correctly improves your efficiency, decreases energy leaks, improves performance decreases risk of injury.

Typical ACL exercises involve strengthening the hamstrings through Nordic or Russian Hamstrings, Straight leg deadlifts and ball curls, learning how to squat properly with your hips back and knees over toes, not coming together, single leg squatting and lunging, core strengthening through planks and side planks and cutting drills that focus on keeping your foot under your base of support and not outside of it.

To learn more about ACL prevention talk to an athletic trainer or strength coach with experience in developing ACL exercises.

Further information:
http://f-marc.com/11plus/home/
http://www.sportsmedres.org/2014/12/fifa11-improves-performance-and-reduces-injuries.html#more

Posterolateral corner injuries

When an athlete ruptures the ACL or PCL in the knee, there is a risk for a posterolateral corner injury. This is more common in contact injuries, or with a force applied to the anteromedial aspect of the tibia. When the posterolateral corner is injured, it can affect the stability of the knee and have poorer long term outcomes if not addressed.

The posterolateral corner is composed of the LCL, popliteus tendon, capsule, biceps femoris tendon and lateral gastrocnemius tendon. An injury to this area results in tearing or those structures that cause the tibia to sublux posterior to the femur.

When assessing the knee, and the posterolateral corner, look for an increase in external rotation at 30 degrees of flexion. You can also assess for rotary instability of the knee or for posterior displacement by abducting the hip and externally rotating the tibia. A depression over the lateral aspect would lend credence to the involvement of the posterolateral corner.

Injuries to this area can result in greater instability of the knee. Even if the cruciates are reconstructed, leaving the posterolateral corner can result in graph failures and early onset of OA and degeneration of the menisci. There are different surgical approaches to fixing the posterolateral corner that would involve discussion with a surgeon.

When assessing your athletes with a suspicious mechanism, remember to check out whether the posterolateral corner is involved to aid in treatment and rehabilitation decisions.

Online etiquette

The digital age that we are currently in has definitely made the world smaller and communication easier, but also somewhat impersonal. It is easy to get caught in a habit of having your online persona clash with your personal one. 

When someone writes an article/blog or posts a video, picture or other form of communication it is important to respect it. You do not have to agree with them, and part of the digital age is open dialogue, but do so in a professional manner. No one likes to see threads of people attacking and antagonizing others. Keep your responses short, constructive and polite. If you wouldn't say what you write to someone's face, then don't write it. 

When someone posts an article, they are sharing their thoughts and ideas with others. If they have done their reaearch, this should be in a persuasive manner. It takes courage to write and put yourself out there, so be respectful. Engaging with them can help clarify points and reach new perspectives. 

If your posting something use the mom rule. Do not post anything that you would be embarrassed about if your mother saw. This will help you make smart decisions in your posts. 

I have seen quite a few posts that do not follow simple etiquette. If you want to be seen as smart and articulate, then proof all your posts and comments first. Make sure that it is what you want to say and that it elevates the conversation. Adhering to those guidelines will improve your online persona. 

Marketing

Between my graduate coursework and my taking on more marketing responsibilities at work, I have come to realize how vitally important marketing is to an organization. Before learning more about it I did not fully grasp this importance and was ineffective in my ability to market the programs that I was in charge of. While I thought the programs themselves were good, they were not advertised properly where the potential customers would see and become excited about them, which led to lower sales.

This leads me the first thing I learned; marketing is customer focused. Advertising is sales focused with the result being to buy the product. But, marketing is placing the product in front of the desired customer and having them see at it and realize this is what they were looking for. It is geared toward the wants, needs and desires of the customer.

The typical marketing plan consists of understanding the P's, product, price, placement and promotion. While these are very important in helping to understand what the product is and what the value is to the organization, it is not necessarily meeting objective number one. The P's are indeed important, but need to revolve around the needs of the customer and therefor meet the needs of the organization.

Understanding your customer involves a lot of work. There are a lot of people available to see your product on any given day, but how many of them are potential customers? You need to know where they live, what the competition is and how you are different. It is important to engage with your customers to learn what they want, need or desire and then deliver it to them. Trying to dictate to them what they need is advertising, and not successful in the long term. Communicating with them about they actually want creates a deeper bond and establishes brand loyalty.

Be wary with how you utilize social media. Social media has made it easier than ever to engage in dialogue with your customers and learn more about them. It can also be very tempting to place a lot of advertising and promotions on social media for your customers to see. If your posts are routinely advertisements, your customers will start to tune you out. Instead, use social media to develop a greater overall picture of your organization. Incorporate educational material into your posts so that your customer can learn more information that is valuable to them. This leads them to see you as the expert. Incorporate some personal information and fun into your posts. Social media is personal and it allows your to showcase your personality. This helps your customers see the real people behind the organization. If some of the posts are fun, the customers feel that they are missing something if they are not engaging with you. Once they start to see that your posts are fun, education and personal they will respond better when you do place that product advertisement  or promotion in front of them. First, develop a relationship to learn about their problem, then place your product (or solution to their problem) in front of them.

Good to great

I just finished reading 'Good to Great' by Jim Collins and I learned quite a bit. It was pretty interesting to discover the results of their research on what made some companies thrive and others stagger. The following is what I learned when I completed the book:

Great companies have Level 5 leaders. I know that this has been studied by numerous people since the book was published, so I won't belabor the point. Concisely, level 5 leaders come from within the organization and use that understanding to drive forward growth. They focus on establishing a great team and a culture of discipline that allows the people in the organization the ability to thrive. They focus success outward and channel failure inward.

 Great companies focus on their people. They hire the best people they can find and give them the flexibility within their culture to be great. Good people are self motivated and driven for success and the challenge for the leader is not to motivate them, but not to de-motivate them.

Great companies face the truth. When companies look to determine the potential for growth it has to be done in a truthful manner that really takes into consideration the total environment. Great companies understand themselves, their product and the business landscape and they do not enter the field if they cannot be successful.

Great companies focus on developing a hedgehog concept. This concept is the simple truth about what their business is: what do they do better than everyone, that they are passionate about and that fits their economic ratio? The energy is focused into this concept with extreme discipline to achieve success.

The economic denominator is the ratio by which great companies determine their success. It varies depending on the company, but can be profit per customer, profit per customer visit, profit per purchase, etc. Each decision is graded on how well it fits this ratio.

Great companies are not made overnight, rather it is the accumulation of their drive and discipline over time that leads to continued success. Great companies focus on the process: get great leadership, get great people, face the truth, and create a culture that leads to consistency over time to produce outstanding results.

From a management standpoint, we can learn that in order to have a great product we need a great team with a common vision for shared success and the discipline to do what needs to happen to make it a reality. If the vision is line with the abilities of the people, the available resources and the discipline to maintain the course then greatness is indeed possible. This is true of large national and international organizations, small local businesses and athletic teams. If the pieces have been thoroughly understood and placed together then they will achieve greatness within their realm.

From an investment standpoint, if you are able to identify those unique companies that have been able to curate their hedgehog concept and be consistent over time you will find an opportunity to beat the market by far. These companies produce returns that are far superior to the general market and their competitors, so including them in your portfolio will increase your holdings.

Business planning

You have probably heard of the adage ‘failure to plan is planning to fail’ or the proverb of the 6 P’s Prior Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance. The moral of both of them is that by taking the time to plan ahead of time can help with a crisis later on. A crisis may not always be averted, but having a framework in place makes it easier to manage when they do occur.  Taking the time to write a business plan is a very important step and failing to do so will lead to a crisis later on.

A business plan does not necessarily have to be a long complicated document, but it does need to put your business idea down on paper and identify the purpose of the business. It should cover the following:

• The customer
• The environment and market conditions the customers reside in
• The strategy of the business including its structure and function
• The financial feasibility of the business including all costs to build it

This document then serves as a reference for the decision making process. When deciding what avenue to grow the business or how to adequately spend your time, this plan helps to align your end goal with the steps needed to get there. If something does not fit with the strategy of the business then choose something that does.

It appears that one of the reasons businesses struggle is they either lack a coherent plan, or they veer away from that plan. There was  a reason the business was started and getting away from that vision may not prove profitable. If the proper effort is put into identifying the current and potential future market position and determining the avenues for generating revenue, and hopefully profit, then the business should be in a position to achieve its initial objective (assuming that the vision is realistic and attainable). By changing direction without a plan in place, there is less of a certainty of future success.

It is very important to take the time to really think about the business, why the business exists and who it exists for and then trying to identify the markers for future success. This process of thinking through what the business is helps to clarify the mission and objectives. Putting the time in up front will save a lot of time, and money, later.