I’m sure we’ve all had that experience in our lives before when we prepare for what seems like an eternity to either, execute a project, win a game, or accomplish some type of objective, whatever that objective may be, and when it came time to execute the plan, things didn’t go the way you wanted at all.

It seems the longer and more detailed you planned, the harder the results hit you and there’s an inherent danger in that aspect, when you delay putting the plan into action with even more planning as you start to build images of grandeur in your mind when no foundation was built in reality as you haven’t put your plans into action yet.

So what do you do after you execute and things didn’t go the way you planned?

First off, look for the positive by asking yourself this simple question:

What worked?

Look for it because you want to salvage something good from the fruit of your efforts so at least you know that your efforts were not in vain. It may seem like nothing is there but keep looking until you find it. It’s there, however small it may be.

Second, ask others around you for insights. Ask them what they think went well, what worked, what didn’t, what could be fixed, etc. Your mind is too “clouded” at this point and shocked at the same time as you’re too close to really get a good objective look at the situation. A fresh perspective helps in that department and the people giving it can shed some light on some insights you’ve never seen before.

Third, do something simple. When in doubt, go back to the basics. Go back to what worked and you’ll know that from the first step and the second step you took of asking others. Keep on applying what worked and that will eventually lead to new ideas based on what worked. It will also result in progress which will help patch up any confidence you lost along the way.

What you’re ultimately looking for is something to find that you can build a foundation on. Find the simple reason behind what worked and build off of that. You have a target to hone in on and that’s valuable because before, you weren’t really sure of what worked in real life. In your planning stages, you might’ve thought that x and y worked, but when tested in reality, you realized it was really z that worked. Building a foundation on that z, whatever it may be, will reap exponential results as you now have something specific to learn more about and leverage through learning from other various sources.

Realize that there’s never going to be a perfect plan. It’s really a constant journey where you plan, build, tear things down, build again, plan some more, tear things down again, build, etc. Expect that things will probably not go the way you planned, especially in the beginning, but understand that it only happens in order to help you narrow in on what the “hot spot” is and how you can leverage it to get the results you want once you identify what that is.

Don’t get into the habit of over planning. Just form a simple plan and execute it swiftly in order to sift through the results of it because what you’re really looking for is to see what type of things that have worked for you, so you can continue to concentrate on those specific areas to become more effective in your future planning and the results that come from it.

When things don’t go the way you plan, it’s just part of the process of searching for what WILL work so things do finally go the way you plan in the future.