When was the last time you conducted a pre-mortem on any area of your life?

If you’re not sure what a pre-mortem is, then let me help you.

Here’s the best definition I’ve found for a pre-mortem. “A pre-mortem, or premortem, is a managerial strategy in which a project team imagines that a project or organization has failed, and then works backward to determine what potentially could lead to the failure of the project or organization.” (Wikipedia)

Now you might be wondering why I’m asking you about applying a business strategy to your life. And that’s a good question. But, if you think about it for a moment, you’ll soon realize that your life is very similar to an organization made up of many projects.

Let’s walk through a few examples together.

I’m going to start with health because I believe it’s the foundation to a good life. If I were to ask you, how does a person’s health deteriorate or fail, barring any unforeseen events such as diseases beyond a person’s control, what answers would you give me?

I think we would both agree that lack of exercise, poor diet, and maybe even lack of sleep as contributing factors that would lead to poor health if continued over time.

What if I asked you about poor financial health? Perhaps overspending, lack of financial knowledge would be a couple of factors we would agree upon.

What about relationships? Ignoring friends and family, taking people for granted, or even egocentric self-centeredness might all be contributing factors to poor relationships.

All three of these areas we’ve looked at can be viewed as projects, and while applying a pre-mortem strategy to them might not guarantee success, it will help mitigate the risk of failure.

So, take some time today to think about the areas of your life that you feel are important to you and conduct a pre-mortem. Identify the potential weak or failure points and begin to take actions that will increase the probability of success in the most important project you’ll ever work on – your life.

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