Preparation and Planning: Which One can you trade for a Bin?

Preparation and planning are essential in life, no doubt. Yet most of the time, well, always, plans never go as scripted. It is akin to planning to have a brain transplant but ending up changing your mind about it.

We all plan, meticulously, for that matter, to do something. Then we forget the preparation part.

I can attest that preparation sometimes beats planning. There is a student who was obsessed with planning for exams that he forgot to prepare for them. Wondering how that’s even possible? You will find out in a moment.

First things first. What is preparation? What is planning?

Preparation sets us ready to carry out a certain task. Pre means before. So, the word preparation indicates readiness, a willingness to do something. For example, an upcoming date needs preparation: dressing up and smelling good is not an option.

Planning is the strategic part. It is developing a roadmap of how to achieve a specific goal. It lays down what needs to be done and how to do it. Great. But it can be just that: a plan with what to do and how to do it, devoid of implementation or actual execution.

Some of the best plans are neatly arranged and kept somewhere in cabinets and dusted every morning. It takes effort and preparation to take that first step of doing it. From experience, I found out that 80% of the time, things never turn out as planned.

No wonder life is what happens to us while we are busy planning for other things. Life is us surviving the turbulence of life long enough to know what to do when the next one knocks on our doors.

There is a quote from Sahil Bloom that takes a prestigious position in my office. It is set strategically to ensure I read it first thing in the morning when I step in. And throughout the day, I keep stealing a sneak peek at it. It states:

“Planning is based on the expectation of order.
Preparation is based on the expectation of chaos.
Plan for order and you’ll be destroyed by chaos.
Plan for chaos and you’ll thrive in any condition.” Sahil Bloom

That is it. Simple. Clear. Concise. Plan, but more importantly, prepare.

 A team of soldiers spent a lot of time planning for a war. They did an aerial surveillance of their enemy territory and picked what looked like a beachhead for a landing. They mopped up their supplies and packed in readiness for the task ahead. Their communication equipment was perfect. The ammunition was enough. Food and medical supplies were set. That was planning.

They also practised their combat and shooting skills. Most crucially, the teams brainstormed on what could go wrong and what to do. They did this by trying to recreate the war zone as they had captured it and carrying out small-scale drill attacks. This was preparation.

Come the D-day, it was chaos. What they anticipated to be a beachhead was a dense and treacherous swampy area. Adaptation was the only solution.

Had they not taken the time to prepare and be ready for any eventuality, that could have been the easiest war victory for the enemy.

The point here: there is no substitute for preparation.

In the context of the student who plans and fails to prepare, they know pretty well the dates of the exams, that they need to write in the exams (have pens, pencils, ruler, maths set and all those), and they’re confident because they attended all the classes and covered the syllabus. Period.

They anticipate the exams will be direct and that the questions will be the same as those they covered in the lessons. They don’t think that there will be a twerk in any way to test their understanding. They don’t revise to see how examiners present the questions. Such is the difference between planning and preparation.

Preparation or Planning? It is neither nor either.

In the end, planning seems the easy part. Greater effort goes into the preparation. Planning is having the right connections and the right networks, but without the hard work, all that amounts to nothing.

Arguably, there is a grey area that assumes planning and preparation are the same thing, which, when looked at critically, blurs, considering the objectives of each. Planning is proactive, yes, but largely anticipatory.

Preparation is action-oriented and more adaptable. It seeks to provide possibilities beyond how to do a task and offers insights on the course of action should the path lead to a dead end. It says the end is not destruction. It could be the beginning of something brand new. Something magical.

As I wrap up this piece, it is already been three hours since I started crafting this article word by word and piece by piece. Did I plan to write this? Honestly, no. Did I prepare? Just a little.

Rule breaker: Sometimes you can plan the best and prepare the greatest, yet everything shuns the northings and eastings, and you end up in a mess. But here is a wisdom nugget: the skills you gain while preparing become your stepping stones out of the mess. It is never in vain.

Greatest of all? Don’t spend all your time in preparation and planning alone, and forget to act. As a rule, you will never be ready. You’ve got to start somewhere. Put in the effort, and in the end, something beautiful emerges.

Postscript:

Next week, possibly, we will take a deep dive into effort. We will find out what it is and why it matters. Don’t miss it.