One of the greatest hockey players of all time is “the Great One” Wayne Gretsky. He was once asked how he got to be such a great player and he replied, “A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck in going to be.”

That really hit home for me, and probably would for many people. It can be very easy to get caught up in the day-to-day grind of what has to be done now - today - to keep the cash register ringing, that we lose a little focus on ringing the register tomorrow! But is focusing on doing what we need to do today, playing where the puck is, keeping us from being great tomorrow? Hmmmm…

One that can be done with a “right now” mentality is to get out your planner and schedule “tomorrow time” knowing that it is critical to do something right now that will add some cha-ching later. It doesn’t have to be a large amount of time, maybe 15-30 minutes to just focus on the future. Schedule it on a regular basis - at least once a week to get started and more often as you get into the swing of it. Set aside time somewhere without distractions and commit to it as if you were in a meeting or with a client.

When you schedule the time, there are two ways you can invest it. You can have some “hard time” and “soft time” and both are essential to your future focus.

The first is “hard time” - and no, it isn’t a prison sentence. Instead, this is where you will spend time doing something that will directly put something into action that will either bring in new business or keep yourself in front of your existing customers as well as your prospects. There are several things you can do with this kind of time. Let’s take a look at a few:

1. Send out a hand-written note to ten customers that you haven’t heard from in a while - especially if your product or service isn’t one that is regularly used. It doesn’t have to contain sales speak, just something to let them know that you were thinking of them and hope that they and their business are doing well.

2. Pick up the phone and place a call to a couple of those customers instead.

3. Pick a customer or a prospect and take a few minutes to drum up a referral for them. Talk about doing something that keeps you in their mind! You’ll be surprised at how quick and eager they will be to return the favor.

4. Create a newsletter or some other piece of periodic correspondence that you can use that will provide value to them first - and provide value to them second! - and keep you in front of them third so you are the first, and maybe only person they call when they need your product or service.

5. Take a few minutes and surf on-line for a unique website or story that may pertain to a particular client or prospect and forward it to them with a personal note.

6. Get creative with it and have fun with it. When others see the effort today with some creativity and fun behind it, they will be more apt to ring the till tomorrow.

Now let’s take a look at the “soft time.” This is very powerful time spent and I cannot stress enough the importance of doing this. It is time that you will use to provide some focus and direction for the future. This will be time where you will dream. Not by the way of a nap, but through creating and re-creating a vision for your business/sales future. As you are painting this mental picture, keep a journal of your thoughts and ideas that you can develop and reference back to from week to week.

This will be different from setting goals and forecasting. This is more allowing yourself to dream a little and craft some mental inspiration for where you are heading. Dream wild. Dream fun. Dream successful. Dream big.

I want to be clear that I’m not suggesting the dreams of your future need to fit a social definition of big in terms of growth or successful in terms of financial standing. Rather, dream big in terms of where you’d want to be if not getting there wasn’t an option. “Big” is going to be very different for every person. Likewise, successful is going to be very different for everyone as well. It’s your big and your successful - go dream it, go focus on it and go get it!!

In your game of life, be good and live great! Spend a little time in the future and you’ll be able to “play where the puck is going to be!”