By Sunny Simon
The other day my friend Cassandra who lives in Germany posted this on Facebook: “I absolutely hate autocorrect!!! I’m typing in 3 different languages daily and it’s always picking the wrong language and trying to ‘correct’ all my words.” I sighed, understanding her frustration. Most people experience enough autocorrect interference working in one language.
On the bright side, this application has created a host of humorous tales when it guesses wrong. To alleviate my friend’s annoyance, the word on the street is Apple has filed a patent to solve the perils of autocorrect. Well, sort of. Any words or phrases changed by autocorrect will be highlighted alerting the reader your words have been changed.
Typing, texting and spelling bloopers aside, the correction theme should be applied to our daily lives. Self correcting is done in all walks of life. Think about flying, pilots are constantly course-correcting. During my tenure at Xerox it was a common practice at the end of the meeting to create a “Did Good, Do Better” chart. Participants chimed in on the session highs and lows in an effort to both acknowledge the positives and reflect on correction for the next time.
Steve Jobs, a leader who relentlessly pushed his team to continually improve in an effort to build “WOW” products expressed it well when he said, “Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.”
Whether we are talking about work life or life in general, incorporating a routine self correction process enhances our success meters. Often at the end of the day I review my interactions at home, and in the workplace. I reflect on what was accomplished, my completed actions and things left undone, owning the mistakes, learning from my missteps and vowing to take corrective action.
If you are not taking the time to track and review your day-to-day interactions, you may be more off course than you realize. Get back on track by observing your behavior, thought patterns and progress toward goals. End each day with either journaling your course and corrections, or, as it was technology that presented us with the loved/hated auto-correct, use it to your advantage. Download aps like 42 Goals, a tool for tracking goals and activities, or HabitForge, a site designed around accountability to motivate you in self correcting and creating positive habits with daily check-ins and progress reports. This week gain control of your life and move auto-correction to the forefront.
Sunny Simon is the owner of Raise the Bar High Life and Career Coaching and the author of the blog, www.lifeonthesunnyside.net
