“12th floor please!”
I had just finished my keynote. I was grinning from ear to ear as I stepped onto the elevator, rode up to 12 and walked to room 1243.
I tried my key.
It didn’t work
I tried again.
It didn’t work.
“DARN THESE KEYCARDS! They always deactivate.”
(I despise having to go all the way back to the front desk to get my key reprogrammed and then go all the way back to my room…especially after a keynote with sore feet from my 2-hour shoes. iykyk!)
I got in the elevator and pushed the lobby button. I pulled out the keycard sleeve and as I was slipping the card into it, I saw the number on the sleeve.
1940
Oops….1243 was my room from last night in Reno. I’m in Austin now.
This is a unique and strange scene from my weird life, but in reality, how often do we do this in regular life too. We get set in a routine, habit, way of responding, and just repeat it without thinking. Unfortunately, this can put us in the wrong place!
In Uncertain by Maggie Jackson, she nailed what we need to do. “Superior experts are ‘forever testing what they think they know’.” Our brains like certainty and it can make us miss key details or changes that have happened around us.
In order to roll with all that’s happening in the world, the workplace and our lives these days, we have to be on alert to changes. Expect them. Anticipate them. Have the humility to double check ourselves before we run to the front desk and slam down the keycard in true “I-need-to-see-the-manager” fashion!
Because let’s be honest…sometimes we’re not locked out, we’re just confidently and unconsciously working with yesterday’s data.
Pay attention. Question what you “know.” And don’t let yesterday’s habits keep you locked out of today’s hotel room!
Go get ‘em Tiger. (but check the room number first!)
