Preliminary preparation
Preliminary preparation (Full Kitting in TameFlow) allows getting ready for performing activities, for example, modeling or changing the world around you. When you take the course "Modeling and Cohesion," you prepare for industrial (serial) creation of quality models for work and life. When you conduct orientation for employees, you prepare them for changes in the company's work.
Preparation is necessary for performing quality activities. Meetings with clients go much better if you prepare for them, that is, outline the meeting agenda, possible participant roles, possible scenarios, and your actions. Leisure time will be of higher quality if you plan and organize it periodically, not just relax randomly. Elite athletes require much longer preparation than amateurs. Elite athletes need to lay a high-quality "foundation" so that in the future they can progress and not face any problems.
Preparation allows maximizing the opportunity that arises with minimal effort - and doing so under stress. Sometimes it's said, "In an extreme situation, we don't rise to the level of our expectations but fall to the level of our training." This literally means that people will behave automatically in stress, as they are accustomed to - and it's better if these habits are of high quality. Also, Robert Cialdini, the author of "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion" and "Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade," considers preliminary preparation one of the most important factors in convincing agents. Agents must be prepared to hear arguments and agree.
Preliminary preparation includes all operations necessary to successfully complete playing a role. For instance, to successfully complete a work product, you need to ensure conditions for performing the work beforehand: allocate time in your schedule to solve the task, eliminate distractions, make sure you are in a state to do it (not sleepy or hungry), check if you understand the method to solve the task, ensure you have the required "raw data" or "semi-finished products," and the solution model[1].
To successfully delegate some functions to an employee, you need to first ensure that:
- the employee's qualifications allow them to carry out the function;
- the employee's workload with new tasks will be manageable;
- performing the functions corresponds to their job description and/or implies offering a new position;
- how the employee's qualifications will improve after regularly performing the function - and at what point a salary increase will be required;
- how to train the employee;
- how control will be implemented/feedback provided.
Without preliminary preparation of the employee and delegation tasks, failure is likely. Preparation reduces the complexity of delegation and enhances the feasibility of the task.
Preliminary preparation undoubtedly takes time. However, this doesn't mean it should be avoided altogether - it simply indicates the need to carefully choose when and where to engage in it to achieve the desired results faster. In the end, structuring a series of activities for delegating work may quickly result in obtaining a high-quality outcome, compared to delegating "directly" and hoping it works out.
Organizational changes also don't happen instantly. For example, to implement sales practices used by top salespeople for everyone else, it may not be enough to merely describe these practices and propose their implementation. A complete cycle of "internal sales of organizational change" may be needed. This includes firstly orienting the employees (preparing them for the "sale"), then "selling" the change, reducing resistance to change, involving them in developing new methods, and implementation. Implementing changes in sales practices may not be just one project within the company but a whole series of projects, eventually leading to the desired company outcome.
To find a new niche and secure a position in it before competitors arrive, companies also need to prepare. It's often recommended to allocate 5-10% of the time for future investments - that is, for searching and preparing to use future opportunities that may arise unexpectedly.
Preliminary preparation is also feasible in modeling. When an agent plans to model, selecting information also prepares them to create the model.
Designing attention paths, mentioned in previous sections, is also part of preliminary preparation - tuning for action execution. Additionally, training is considered part of preliminary preparation: it essentially prepares agents for roles. For instance, performing the role of an ontologist well after the "Modeling and Cohesion" course.
Rest/leisure can also be a component of preliminary preparation. Elite athletes' training programs always include recovery after intense physical workouts. Similarly, recovery is required after intense mental work: if you regularly acquire knowledge with your brain, it needs breaks for "recharge," on different time scales. On a focus scale - breaks between Pomodoros/rests, on a daily cycle scale - quality sleep, on a sprint scale - physical exercises, on a habit scale - regular leisure and vacation, on a lifestyle scale - it's about the style of relaxation. Without recovery, it's impossible to maintain high performance throughout a person's entire life.
Preliminary preparation can be described using the reverse engineering method. That is, first describe the end result (for example, a specific work product) that should be obtained. Then move from the end result back to the beginning through intermediate results (work products), describing each time the operations needed to achieve the end result, the result just before the end (the last intermediate one), and so on. For example, the end work product - "published post in the SHSM club," the last intermediate - "edited post in the club's editor," and so on back to the start - "idea for the post."