It’s a beautiful Sunday afternoon in Arizona. The sky is blue and cloudless , the breezes are still balmy – not like the hairdryer blast they will turn to come July. Parked by the pool with my laptop, it’s a perfect time and a perfect place to review what I saw last week and plan for the week ahead.
The Week in Review
Monday was an exciting day as Joe Carangelo and I presented the RiboMed opportunity to potential investors from Germany, Florida, and New York. Not only did we get to spend time with investors but we made contacts with some really cool companies. Tuesday – Catch up time – sending follow up emails to the investors and innovators I had met the day before and then a real treat – a tour of SARRC guided by the one and only Denise Resnik. Wednesday – a day of brainstorming ideas with old friends and new. Thursday – time to buckle down to work – drafting plans, running numbers, and making phone calls. Friday – two separate introductions brought great new connections and a great exchange of ideas and resources.
The Week to Come
The week ahead is equally exciting – more conversations in New York and Florida, helping some friends in California arrange financing for an exciting project, speaking to the Tempe Kiwanis Club on Tuesday, putting together this years sponsors for the 4th Annual Arizona Entrepreneurship Conference (mark your calendars for November 12, 2009 for the state’s best entrepreneurial gathering yet) and the list goes on…
Getting Ready
Keeping things exciting means being ready to react to and capitalize on new opportunities as they appear. Here are a few strategies that work for me:
1. You are what you read. Things are happening and changing faster than ever before, I found a great tool that puts all the latest happenings at my fingertips. This link takes you to my AllTop page. http://my.alltop.com/joankw My list may not be your favorite reading, but the cool thing is that when you sign in you can configure your page for the stuff you want to read and stay up to date on. And best of all its free!
2. Clean up your email. Look through your In Box and your Sent Items. Flag as follow ups things you need to touch back on or reply to, File important messages in folders for future reference, and delete the rest. Nothing is more depressing than trying to figure out what to do with thousands of emails that have been accumulating for weeks.
3. Do your homework – You know what you have planned for the week ahead. Take some time to do a little research – check out the newest developments on line. If it’s a company or an organization you are visiting – check out their News or Media page. If you are meeting a new contact, look them up on Google or Linked In. Your meetings will be more productive for it.
4. Plan your trips – Whether you are heading across town or across the country – think about who you know who is close to where you will be. Call them and set up a quick coffee or time to drop in and see them. That way you leverage your travel time and can get much more accomplished with every trip.
5. Set aside time for new developments – There’s nothing worse than discovering a new opportunity but being too busy or booked up to seize it. Keep some time available to pursue something new when it pops up. Because if you are open to discovering new opportunities – they are out there – and they will find you!
– Joan Koerber-Walker