The Power – and Pain – of a Reset

Last Wednesday, Mother Nature roared through Central Indiana in a brief but mighty storm. Tree limbs went down, transformers went up in smoke – and our house went dark. The neighborhood text chain blew up with “when do you think we’ll have power back?” missives.  The answer: About 60 hours later on Saturday night.

My family was blessed to have friends a few blocks away with power who let us, and the dog, enjoy their A/C (and Wi-Fi!) for several days.  While we were able to evacuate the meat and freezer jam from the deep freeze and a few items from the refrigerator, the rest of the food had to be tossed by the time power returned. The salad dressings we opened two years ago? Gone. Leftovers on their last leg? Out. Condiments we never used? Not worth taking a risk.

While I hate food waste, this event was an object lesson in the beauty of cleaning out and rebooting. Sometimes it’s important just to step back and start fresh, even if it is a little painful.  This approach can apply to communications programs, too.  “Keeping around” PR programs that don’t really work but aren’t too time consuming can be the ones hardest to toss.  Pushing off a decision to leave a social channel can be akin to that “salad dressing school of thought” that keeping it isn’t hurting anything. Or is it? Spending any time on a communication effort that isn’t lined up with your goals needs a firm look.

I appreciate clients tapping me for perspective on what is working and how we can creatively approach their public relations and marketing needs.  Don’t wait for the power to go out, so to speak, to evaluate your PR programs. Starting fresh can feel good and inspire discipline to keep programs fresh and relevant.  We’ll see how long we can keep the fridge looking this good!