The most successful people are adaptive — yet disciplined.
I call their approach ABZ planning.
Here's how this framework applies to your career:
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First, the terminology:
• Plan A: What you’re doing now
• Plan B: Your pivot
• Plan Z: Your fallback plan
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Plan A is what you’re doing right now.
It’s your current job, or competitive advantage.
And you make minor adjustments as you learn.
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Plan B is your pivot.
Sometimes you pivot because Plan A isn’t working.
Or because you’ve discovered a new opportunity.
Or because you change.
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Once you pivot to a Plan B and stick with it, that becomes your new Plan A.
Then some new Plan B eventually emerges.
Leave one job for another one? That new job becomes your new Plan A.
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Plan Z is the fallback plan.
This is your lifeboat.
It's your stable plan if all your career plans fall through.
The certainty of Plan Z is what allows you to take risk in your Plans A and B.
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The ABZ Planning framework fosters trial and error.
It doesn’t pressure you to find your purpose before you’re ready.
It allows you to aggressively pursue upside and mitigate downside.
ABZ Planning isn’t something you do once early in your career.
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It’s a process equally important for someone in their 40s as it is for a new college grad.
There is no beginning, middle, or end to a career journey.
No matter how old you are, or at what stage, you will always be planning and adapting.
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